If I'm honest, I became a gardener because I like getting dirty. Beatrix Potter's The Tale of Tom Kitten is the story of my childhood (and my adulthood too, only now I don't have to pretend I'm going to stay clean). Of course, high-quality soil leads to high-quality produce, and I deeply adore the flavors of strawberries growing in deep, dark soil. Biting into a juicy, homegrown tomato still warm from the summer sun is bliss.
First, let me explain where I'm coming from – my husband and I spent over a decade growing nearly all of our own vegetables and a considerable portion of our other sustenance on our homestead. So even though our current smaller plot only feeds us a side dish or three per day, I tend to think of gardening as something that should be good for our wallets as well as our bellies and the earth. Gardening When It Counts is all that and is 100% based on the author's personal experience growing most of his own food. Highly recommended.
The decline of cheap oil is inspiring increasing numbers of North Americans to achieve some measure of backyard food self-sufficiency. In hard times, the family can be greatly helped by growing a highly productive food garden, requiring little cash outlay or watering. Currently popular intensive vegetable gardening methods are largely inappropriate to this new circumstance. Crowded raised beds require high inputs of water, fertility and organic matter, and demand large amounts of human time and effort. But, except for labor, these inputs depend on the price of oil. Prior to the 1970s, North American home food growing used more land…
If you only grow from the last frost to the first frost, your gardening season is extremely short. But a few simple season-extension techniques can mean you harvest fresh food nearly every day of the year. I've used Eliot Coleman's crop suggestions and his quick hoops and can say from experience that they make all the difference during the cold season.
"Brimming with ingenuity, hope, and eminently practical advice, The Winter Harvest Handbook is an indispensable contribution."-Michael Pollan
"Useful, practical, sensible, and enlightening information for the home gardener."-Martha Stewart
With The Winter Harvest Handbook, everyone can have access to organic farming pioneer Elliot Coleman's hard-won experience. Gardeners and farmers can use the innovative, highly successful methods Coleman describes in this comprehensive handbook to raise crops throughout the coldest of winters.
Building on the techniques that hundreds of thousands of farmers and gardeners adopted from Coleman's The New Organic Grower and Four-Season Harvest, this book focuses on growing produce of unparalleled freshness…
I have a love/hate relationship with permaculture. I adore the concept...and when I put most authors' assertions into practice, I find that I get a much lower yield than doing things the old way. That's why I enjoy books like this one from gardeners who walk the walk, not just talk the talk. Warning: You will be sorely tempted to buy ducks. Resist, resist!
Scientist/gardener Carol Deppe combines her passion for organic gardening with newly emerging scientific information from many fields - resilience science, climatology, climate change, ecology, anthropology, paleontology, sustainable agriculture, nutrition, health, and medicine. In the last half of The Resilient Gardener, Deppe extends and illustrates these principles with detailed information about growing and using five key crops: potatoes, corn, beans, squash, and eggs.
In this book you'll learn how to:
*Garden in an era of unpredictable weather and climate change
*Grow, store, and use more of your own staple crops
*Garden efficiently and comfortably (even if you have a bad back)…
This book has all of the same selling points as Carol Deppe's but is geared a bit more toward those with larger homesteads rather than a simple backyard plot. Even if you're an urban homesteader, though, the title is well worth a read to drum up outside-the-box ideas.
A practical, comprehensive, and essential how-to manual with information on growing perennial crops, soil fertility, water security, nutrient dense food, and more!
"Essential reading for the serious prepper as well as for everyone interested in creating a more resilient lifestyle."-Carol Deppe, author of The Resilient Gardener
The Resilient Farm and Homestead is for readers ready to not just survive, but thrive in changing, unpredictable times. It offers the tools to develop durable, beautiful, and highly functional human habitat systems anchored by preparation, regeneration, and resiliency.
Ben Falk is a land designer and site developer whose research farm has drawn national…
This is a different type of book than the ones listed above but is nonetheless essential for the gardener who wants to enrich rather than deplete their soil. Once you learn about the beneficial fungi, bacteria, and other critters that make up the soil food web, you'll think twice about tearing up their landscape with a rototiller.
Smart gardeners know that soil is anything but an inert substance. Healthy soil is teeming with life not just earthworms and insects, but a staggering multitude of bacteria, fungi, and other microorganisms. When we use chemical fertilizers, we injure the microbial life that sustains healthy plants, and thus become increasingly dependent on an arsenal of artificial, often toxic, substances. But there is an alternative to this vicious cycle. We can garden in a way that strengthens the soil food web the complex world of soil-dwelling organisms whose interactions create a nurturing environment for plants. "Teaming with Microbes" extols the benefits…
Grow twice the fruits and vegetables in half the space on the farm, in the backyard, or in your window. Using simple techniques like soil testing, remineralization, no-till gardening, and soil amendments, The Ultimate Guide to Soil gives you the real dirt on good soil. Maybe next year your neighbor will be envious of you!
In Love It or Lose It, I share the wisdom and techniques I’ve gained over decades of helping people declutter their lives. Alongside my colleague, Maggie Bedrosian, we offer a roadmap for those feeling overwhelmed by the physical and emotional weight of clutter. This book isn’t just about tidying up—it’s about transforming your space so it can better serve your purpose and bring more peace and joy into your life.
Through stories of real-life clients and our own personal experiences, you’ll discover how to tackle clutter with humor and heart. Whether you’re a business leader, a busy parent, or…
Finally, here’s your chance to break free from the clutter that’s weighing you down. It’s your opportunity to move from being overwhelmed and disorganized to clutter-free and clear.
In Love It or Lose It, long-time organizational experts Barbara Hemphill and Maggie Bedrosian share the secrets and techniques their clients—everyday people, celebrities, business and political leaders alike—have used to dig out from under all their junk and distraction. In stories filled with humor, heart, and success, you’ll learn how to declutter your own home and work spaces, and keep them that way for good.
