BY MIKE PEARSONHOME & GARDEN
$70 investment in hobby can harvest $600 in food
BLADE FEATURES EDITOR
The National Gardening Association reports there are more than 67 million avid gardeners in the United States, the average being a female over the age of 45 with some college.
Each year, gardeners spend an average of $70 on their hobby and harvest $600 in food.
The median garden size is 97 square feet, and their crops in order of preference are tomatoes (79 percent), cucumbers (47 percent), and sweet peppers (46 percent).
Some gardeners are intuitive, of course, able to plop something into the ground and watch it grow. Others employ the time-honored method of perusing gardening books to learn the secrets of productive soil. And there's no shortage of such books, from basic how-to primers to tomes dedicated to a single type of flower, shrub, food crop, and such peripheral subjects as attracting bees or dissuading garden slugs.
Today we peruse a handful of horticulture books released in the last few months, each designed to take the guess work out of gardening. This is by no means a comprehensive list, merely a place to get you started.
The National Gardening Association reports there are more than 67 million avid gardeners in the United States, the average being a female over the age of 45 with some college.THE BLADE/JEREMY WADSWORTH Enlarge | Buy This Photo[1][2]
■ How to Plant A Garden by Matt James (Mitchell Beazley, $34.99). British horticulture lecturer James is less interested in edibles than visuals in this tome sanctioned by the Royal Horticultural Society. Whether you've got a little space or a lot, James offers tips on everything from measuring out your garden to the use of ferns, climbers, plant arrangement and how to tend your investment once it begins to flower.
■ High-Yield Vegetable Gardening by Colin McCrate and Brad Halm (Storey, $18.95). The authors are the founders of the Seattle Urban Farm Co., so they clearly know their subject. They encourage everyday gardeners to think like farmers, imparting tips on everything from plant calendar and source seeds to crop rotation. Want to know the difference between a hybrid and an heirloom seed? It's here, as well as info on setting up an irrigation system and monitoring your garden for pests and diseases.
■ The Bee Book by Fergus Chatwick, Steve Alton, Emma Sarah Tennant, Bill Fitzmaurice, and Judy Earl (DK, $25). In the wake of Colony Collapse Disorder, the authors tell us everything we need to know about bees, from what makes them such perfect pollinators to how you can employ container and border gardens to attract the vital insects. Lots of great photos of go-to plants for bees, as well as tips on building your own hive and harvesting honey.
■ Garden Design Bible by Tim Newbury (Hamlyn, $19.99). Some gardeners plant while others "design." This book, first published in 2007, is for the latter category, with more than three dozen designs for everything from retaining walls and miniature rock gardens to jungle motifs and Mediterranean-style gardens. There's even a nifty chapter on substitute plants that help you achieve that "grassless lawn" look.
■ Prize Winning Vegetables! by Jodi Torpey (Penguin Random House, $16.95). Want to grow "the biggest onion, the tastiest tomato, or the most perfectly shaped eggplant"? That's the goal of author Torpey, founding editor of Westerngardens.com[3], who offers tips on getting the most bang for your gardening buck. This is a book for gardeners who believe that size (and, yes, taste) matters.
■ The Rooftop Growing Guide by Ann Novak (Storey, $23). The sky's the limit for gardeners who forsake ground-based plots or just want to turn their rooftop or high rise patio into a sea of plenty. Novak offers tips for growing vegetables, herbs, flowers, and trees, offering basics on everything from pest management to hydroponics. Your biggest challenge may be getting all that soil up those flights of stairs.
■ Container Theme Gardens by Nancy J. Ondra (Storey, $19.95) Ondra claims to have designed 42 "foolproof" container gardens with her latest book, which covers myriad container shapes, sizes and materials, including clay, wood, metal and cement. She promises you can pull off most of these designs in a single afternoon, whether it be containers for growing tomatoes on your deck or fragrant flowers and berries. Expect lots of useful tips, including the fact that because plastic containers aren't porous, they dry out less quickly and thus the plants need less water.
■ The Water-Saving Garden by Pam Penick (Preguin Random House, $19.95). Gardening with Less Water by David A. Bainbridge (Storey, $14.95). Conservation is all the rage these days, even if you don't live in a drought area. Penick offers a directory of 100 plants perfect for drought-prone regions, including maintaining a reasonably green lawn. Bainbridge provides tips for using 90 percent less water in your garden, including harvesting rainwater and super-efficient irrigation systems. One key tip, he argues, is to minimize evaporation.
Contact Mike Pearson at: 419-724-6159 or mpearson@theblade.com[4].
References
- ^ The National Gardening Association reports there are more than 67 million avid gardeners in the United States, the average being a female over the age of 45 with some college. THE BLADE/JEREMY WADSWORTH (www.toledoblade.com)
- ^ Buy This Photo (toledoblade.mycapture.com)
- ^ Westerngardens.com (www.Westerngardens.com)
- ^< /sup> mpearson@theblade.com (www.toledoblade.com)
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