The Humanure Handbook, third edition, will amuse you, educate you, and possibly offend you, but it will certainly pertain to you--unless, of course, your bowels never move. This new edition of The Humanure Handbook is:The Tenth Anniversary EditionRichly illustrated with eye-candy artworkPerfect for reading while sitting on the "throne"Revised, improved, and updated256 pages of crap

    Filled with brilliant before-and-after photography, it provides gardeners with complete information on how to create the garden of their dreams.

    They include not only tried and tested garden favourites, but also a selection of unusual species and cultivars. The plants are arranged alphabetically by botanical name. Common names are cross-referenced throughout, enabling plants to be found easily, even if the botanical name is unfamiliar. Synonyms are similaly cross-referenced. The introduction describes and explains the A-Z section, including detailed features on the plant kingdom, plant nomenclature, types and shapes. Basic concepts of hardiness, cultivation and propogation are set out in straightforward language. The A-Z section consists of individual descriptions of 15000 plants. Plants are arranged alphabetically by botanical name, with an introduction for each genus, as well as background data on the botanical family, geographical origin, native habitat, the range of plants within the genus and any unusual qualities. Symbols show the basic shape of all treees featured, while more detailed illustrations help to explain the range of flower shapes, leaf types and habitats within a particular group.

    Turn your backyard into a thriving permaculture garden.Inspired by her own training in permaculture, Linda Woodrow has devised a totally integrated organic system of gardening that combines science with common sense. In The Permaculture Home Garden she draws us into a warmly welcoming household where everyone shares the planting, helps to tend the hens, and relaxes after a satisfying day's work. Step-by-step instructions and helpful diagrams make it easy to plan and plant a garden to suit your taste and space – a garden that not only looks wonderful but also yields bountiful fruit, herbs and vegetables.

    Now, with this beautifully illustrated book, Cadfael fans can spend a typical year with their favorite monk, following him on his rounds as Shrewsbury's apothecary and healer, visiting his garden', and learning more about hundreds of herbs -- many of which are still cultivated today. Here is a succinct history of herbal remedies and monastic herb gardens like Cadfael's, as well as a complete A-to-Z guide to the medical uses for every herb and plant mentioned in the Ellis Peters books. For anyone intrigued by Brother Cadfael's medieval universe -- or interested in the recent boom in herbal remedies -- Brother Cadfael's Herb Garden is a marvelous guide to greater knowledge.

    This easy-to-use guide contains brilliant color photographs showing the early growth stages, mature plants and features for positive identification of each weed discussed. Learning to identify unwanted plants around the home, farm or ranch will be much easier with this book published by the Western Society of Weed Science.

    The columns were later collected into a set of books published between 1951 and 1958. Vita's extensive gardening knowledge, her intense passion for her subject and her lively literary flair make these classics of garden writing essential for any serious gardener's bookshelf. Volume 1 in a series of four anthologies reproducing the lively gardening columns by Vita Sackville-West. This volume covers 1946–1950.

    But all you really need is Howard Garrett’s Plants for Texas. In this one book, you'll find a virtual encyclopedia of over 500 Texas plants—trees, shrubs, flowers, vines, grasses, vegetables, fruits, weeds, and cover crops—along with complete, easily understood instructions for planting and maintaining them. Gardening expert Howard Garrett draws on years of landscaping experience to provide "all-you-need-to-know" about each plant:• Latin and common names• sun or shade requirements• mature height, spread, and recommended spacing• type of bloom and fruit• how propagated• habit and culture• recommended uses• problems• tips and notesTo help gardeners avoid costly mistakes, Garrett also specifically notes which plants grow very well or very poorly in Texas. In addition to the species descriptions (which are beautifully illustrated with color photos), the book includes reliable, easy-to-follow instructions for planting design, soil preparation, planting techniques, and plant maintenance. Garrett advocates a sensible organic gardening program that works with nature to create healthy yards and gardens. Whether you’re a first-time homeowner planting a new yard or a seasoned gardener looking for new ideas and information, Howard Garrett’s Plants for Texas is the book you need. Recycle all the others on your gardening shelf, and let this be your one-volume encyclopedia on Texas gardening.

    From a New York City Green Guerrilla to the Texas Rose Rustlers and a Colorado tomato fanatic, Chotzinoff serves up colorful profiles of americanca’s quirkiest, most fervent gardeners.

    Make the most of the Golden State's unique climate and planting conditions.

    Learn the Australian Shepherd breed Standard, history and lineage, how to select a puppy, grooming, care, genetics and breeding, herding, showing, training for obedience, agility and stock work, raising puppies, and more. This book is a must for every owner or prospective owner or breeder of Australian Shepherds.

    Make your garden the talk of the neighborhood with tasty veggies that everyone says won't grow in your area Practical, no-nonsense advice for garden design, soil and fertilizer, insect control, recommended varieties, when and how to plant, harvesting and storage tips, recipes and nutritional information.

    Your Backyard Herb Garden by Miranda Smith will teach you everything you need to know about growing your favorite herbs using safe, natural, all-organic methods!Practical tips and advice on all aspects of successful herb growing.A wealth of great ideas and helpful how-to on using herbs in cooking, crafts, cosmetics, health care, insect repellents, and more.Illustrated herb directory featuring all the most popular herbs-- from aloe to yarrow-- each with complete information on growing, care, harvesting, and uses.

    In Justin Matott's garden, sweet peas, larkspur, peppermint, peas, corn, tomatoes, and a hundred other sweetly-scented and delicious things bloom and ripen daily -- gifts of earth's bounty.One day in that garden a very special miracle occurred. Justin felt the loving presence of his mother, who had left this earth five years before. Why had she come? What could her invisible but palpable presence mean?As he sowed, weeded, and harvested, he listened to his visitor's silent communications and felt the movement of change and growth within himself. In the forget-me-not, he was reminded of the precious uniqueness of his mother -- and every other part of creation. Along with crocuses and daffodil, memories of childhood blossomed. The cycle of garden life impressed upon him the eternal flow of beginning, renewal, loss, and new beginning.At first, Justin hesitated to mention these mysterious, wordless colloquies, but when he did, family and friends urged him to write about them. So now we have this wonderful book, which invites us into the author's beautiful garden to share the love and wisdom that flowered among poppies and bean poles.Illustrated with fifteen radiant full-page watercolors, My Garden Visits inspires us to cultivate our own inner gardens and lift our hearts in praise of earth and heaven.

    Short, easy-to-understand entries with over 1700 how- to illustrations, photographs, charts and checklists are organized in an A-Z format for easy reference.

    A complete guide to planting, growing, and making herbal remedies for many common ailments -- and all the plants can be grown in small containers.

    Includes detailed information on grading, adding water, planting, and choosing furniture and sculpture.

    Each portrait is illustrated with color botanical illustrations and photographs, detailing the characteristics, landscaping use, and growing conditions of the plant. With the increasing national concern over water consumption, gardeners and landscapers will find Xeriscaping a practical approach to creating a landscape in tune with the environment.

    400 color photos.

    Creating a Family Garden inspires with clever ideas and then explains how to put them into practice. A chapter on design and planning illustrates how to select key features and achieve a satisfying balance incorporating the requirements of each member of the family. Beautifully illustrated and clearly described step-by-step sequences explain how to make exciting garden features and play equipment, including a treehouse, a double swing covered with attractive climbers, and a barbecue ideal for family parties. Plants are covered in some detail including such practical suggestions as placing tough shrubs along children's "runways" and planting dwarf hedges along the border edge to shield the delicate plants from wayward balls. In addition, there are delightful planting ideas for wildlife and wildflower and water gardens.

    “Lots of inspiring gourd crafting techniques and ideas—I highly recommend The Complete Book of Gourd Craft...its 300 color photos... depict many...amazing things you can create...plenty of detailed information.”—Organic Gardening.

    7 1/4" x 10 1/4". Color illus.

    Illustrations.

    There he designed and developed from bare ground a fully functioning ecosystem of exotics, a community which would maintain and rejuvenate itself according to the laws of nature, with only occasional interventions by the author and gardener. Replete with magnolias, camelias, tree peonies, rhododendrons and more than ten thousand species and varieties of plant, imported from friends and nurseries in Japan, Britain, the USA and New Zealand, this "community" has matured over the past quarter century into an enchanting display of interest and beauty, which Peter Smithers has captured on camera. Encouraged to do so by the Royal Horticultural Society, Peter Smithers here reflects upon the place of gardening in a busy life in the world of national and international politics. Starting with childhood gardens he traces the part which they played through his years at Oxford, service in Naval Intelligence, in Washington, in Mexico and in Central America, in England, France and Switzerland. Over the years he built up a global network of specialist gardening friends whose enthusiasm and expertise nourish one another across boundaries of geography and language. He and his friends have thus contributed substantially to the advancement of horticulture. This personal and captivating account is illustrated with sixty pages of colour photographs of plants, all of which were grown and photographed by Peter Smithers. It will interest the general reader as well as the knowledgeable gardener. It will amuse and inform them with advice empirically collated. How to eliminate earwigs nesting in bamboo canes, when not to prune magnolias, how to tackle refurbishing the Cathedral Close in Winchester with trees, the dangers of one particular orchid's symbiosis with a particularly aggressive ant ... Here are the entertaining ad

    This is a wonderfully entertaining resource book as well as a great gift for anyone from those who dabble in the garden to the greenest thumb. Photos.

    Yet Klaus describes far more than the toils and triumphs of tending vegetables, as his observations encompass the day-to-day changes in weather and wildlife as well as the life changes in his pets, his wife, and himself. As Patricia Hampl wrote, “Beneath the simplicity of this beguiling gardener's journal lies the captivating story of good life and true love. In the spirit of M. F. K. Fisher's writing about food and drink, Carl Klaus has found in his garden a model of the enduring passions of life and death.”

    Fisher and Vita Sackville-West, this beguiling memoir takes readers on a stroll through the many gardens which acclaimed writer Pat Welsh has cultivated and loved. Accompanied by a wonderful array of vintage photos, excerpts from letters, and other memorabilia, All My Edens also includes a wealth of practical advice for gardening enthusiasts. 86 halftone photos & illustrations.

    Our popular ongoing Gardener's Guide series offers first-rate authors, an approach that is neither superficial nor overly technical, and excellent photographs.

    Perfect for adults and children.

    The book also shows you how to use scented geraniums to flavor baked goods and make lovely topiaries, dried arrangements, and potpourri. With scents of rose, lemon, ginger, and chocolate mint, the pelargoniums are easy to grow and will enrich your life with fragrance. Scented geraniums recall the Victorian era of gracious living. Lining a walkway, they enchant passers by with their heady aroma. Inside, growing on a windowsill, they infuse a home with their scents.

    Gardeners who regarded Bennett's words as the only available wisdom on organic growing in climate-challenged sites often carried their well worn copies right into the vegetable patch. Today, gardening has earned a place as one of the continent's most popular pastimes, and with this completely redesigned and expanded edition, Bennett takes us with confidence into the next century of home gardening.The New Northern Gardener features not only an enhanced herb section and updated sources but an all-new chapter on perennial and annual flowers, including an annotated listing of more than 100 hardy species that will flourish in a northern garden. Like a trusted old friend who has gained fresh insight, The New Northern Gardener will serve as the leading reference for planting and maintaining vegetable, herb and flower gardens across Canada and the United States for years to come.

    Full of vivid color photos, this book features more varieties of tomato than you thought possible.

    Embracing British perennial beds, French intensive techniques, antique roses, heirloom vegetables, alternative lawns, and a bedrock philosophy of working with-not against-the ecosystem, this illustrated organic gardener's bible includes a 350-entry color plant guide and is written for all North American regions and hardiness zones.Readers will learn how to feed the dirt, achieve good tilth, create and use compost. How to plant in contours, manage water, plant outdoors. How to work with plants that not only come back every year, but bloom early and long, smell great, and even provide a pleasing silhouette in winter. There are sections on tools and gear, grooming and deadheading, winterizing and ornamenting the garden; digging and planting; propagating garden plants from seed; the secrets of maintenance. Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club's Country Homes & Gardens Club, the Newbridge Garden Book Club, and the Rodale Book Club. Over 140,000 copies in print.

    Often organic materials which may have limited beneficial use in their raw state or have regulatory disposal constraints can be transformed by composting into marketable products. The limits on beneficial reuse may be regulations or they may be due to the potential for materials to be putrescible or pathogenic. Composting can be a solution for each of these.The implementation of composting on a large scale (in contrast to home or backyard composting) involves materials handling. Technological implementation of composting must be consistent with the biological demand of the system. If the biological system is violated, conditions will not be optimized for composting, and problems such as odor generation, insufficient aeration or moisture, or a combination of these conditions may result. Past problems and closure of facilities have been largely due to violations of the biological systems. Product quality with respect to particle size, inclusions, moisture content and other physical aspects are a function of engineering design. A well designed system must have the biological and engineering principles in harmony at all times.

    Illuminating all the most popular herbs ant their uses, this book is an invaluable and comprehensive resource to home cultivation that everyone, from herbal enthusiasts to novice gardeners, will appreciate. The book is divided into two sections. The first clearly explains both modern and traditional techniques for successful and rewarding gardening at home, from planning and designing a beautiful herb garden; combining herbs for fragrance, healing and cooking; producing a perfect container garden; and how to grow and store herbs indoors. The second section is a botanical A-Z encyclopedia of herbs, detailing over 150 common and lesser-known varieties of plants and providing growing tips and essential information on their many beneficial properties. Clear information on every herb listed and descriptions of related species provides instant recognition and identification for perfect herbal cultivation.

    There are also separate sections on gardening skills and a complete index of common names.

    

    The overall theme of this text is the role of plants in the biosphere - and in keeping with that theme, related environmental issues are integrated into each chapter. The environmental emphasis, which is unique among introductory botany texts, provides students with relevancy and kindles their interest in plants. A second theme, botany as a scientific process, is also stressed throughout.

    She also includes information on the soil, light, climate and moisture conditions required for success.

    Patrick Bowe, a landscape/garden designer, is author of many books, including The Gardens of Ireland. Cynthia Woodyard is a well-known garden photographer whose credits includeAnnuals for Connoisseurs. 125 photos. 20 full-color line drawings.

    Did you know that some chickens lay dark reddish brown eggs and others lay eggs with blue shells? And that there are breeds as small as a quail, which can be kept in a small cage on a balcony? These are just a few of the topics discussed in The Complete Encyclopedia of Chickens. The book has been specially written for people who do not yet know much about chickens, but who are already keeping some. The text and pictures provide practical information on the feeding, care, and breeding of chickens, as well as the laying of eggs and the kind of shelter the birds require. You will also find clear information about common diseases and disorders, the chicken's anatomy, and an overview of the main color variations.

    This authoritative, illustrated history of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew traces a remarkable evolution over more than two centuries, from the time of Queen Caroline to the present. This is the first history of Kew to make extensive use of the gardens' archives for its research. Some of England's most distinguished garden designers, including Charles Bridgeman, Capability Brown, and W. A. Nesfield, worked at the gardens, as did such eminent architects as William Kent, Sir William Chambers, James Wyatt, and Decimus Burton. These last added garden features, glasshouses, a pagoda, and a Gothic palace. It is not only in the field of garden design and architecture that Kew has found renown; Ray Desmond outlines its significant contributions to scientific developments at home and abroad, underscoring Kew's primary objective as "the better management of the Earth's environment by increasing knowledge and understanding of the plant kingdom."

    End your worries about garden problems with safe, effective solutions from The Organic Gardener's Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control!* Easy-to-use problem-solving encyclopedia covers more than 200 vegetables, fruits, herbs, flowers, trees, and shrubs* Complete directions on how, when, and where to use preventive methods, insect traps and barriers, biocontrols, homemade remedies, botanical insecticides, and more* More than 350 color photos for quick identification of insect pests, beneficial insects, and plant diseasesNewly revised with the latest, safest organic controls.A New York Times Best Gardening Book

    Includes a color and season directory for over 850 plants.

    

    This beautifully illustrated guide shows a distinguished plantsman-photographer's personal favorites for every season and garden use.Published at $17.95 Available Now at $8.98

    From the traditional favorites of building scarecrows and growing sunflowers to freezing edible flowers in ice cubes, Ready, Set, Grow is the ideal guide to introduce children to the garden.Ready, Set, Grow is replete with listings of the easiest, quick-result plants and vegetables, along with special gardens designed to attract butterflies and hummingbirds. For the child enamored with bugs, there is a special section devoted to the best insects for the garden. Loaded with full-color photography, this book is sure to get children involved.