The fact-packed text is filled with scientific information, historical background, and myths and legends about medicinal plants.

    It's like thinking the unthinkable. After all, the farm population is dwindling. It takes too much capital to start. The pay is too low. The working conditions are dusty, smelly and noisy: not the place to raise a family. This is all true, and more, for most farmers. But for farm entrepreneurs, the opportunities for a farm family business have never been greater. The aging farm population is creating cavernous niches begging to be filled by creative visionaries who will go in dynamic new directions. As the industrial agriculture complex crumbles and our culture clambers for clean food, the countryside beckons anew with profitable farming opportunities. While this book can be helpful to all farmers, it targets the wannabes, the folks who actually entertain notions of living, loving and learning on a piece of land. Anyone willing to dance with such a dream should be able to assess its assets and liabilities; its fantasies and realities. "Is it really possible for me?" is the burning question this book addresses.

    With her unique combination of DIY/building savvy and gardening expertise, author Tara Nolan (Raised Bed Revolution) weaves you past the main pitfalls you may encounter when trying to fit a garden or gardens between your home and the street. This beautiful and comprehensive hardcover book shows how to accomplish several hardscape projects, such as building front patios, borders, edging, and walkways, as well as making your own raised beds, planting containers, trellises, rose arbors, privacy screens, and more—all custom-designed for the rigors of front-yard gardening.Gardening Your Front Yard is a garden book in every sense of the word, however. Choosing the right plants is even more important when you are dealing with a small, highly visible area with less than ideal growing conditions—all common traits of most front yards. You will find advice on training vines up brickwork and planting around foundation walls, planting boulevards/hell strips, and you’ll even take a trip into the side yard. Shade gardens, privacy screening, and security dos and don'ts are covered, plus how to intermingle edibles and landscape plants, cactus and succulent gardens, birdbaths, and much, much more. With the sage advice and step-by-step projects of this comprehensive guide, convert your front yard from a bland grasscape to a vital living space.

    From starting seeds to preserving produce, Hart’s advice ensures that you won’t waste time and money while growing your own vegetables, flowers, houseplants, or landscape foliage. Perfect for thrifty gardeners of all levels, The Dirt-Cheap Green Thumb covers everything you want to grow, indoors and out.

    Color photographs and line drawings help you identify and learn about the fascinating plants of the Pacific Northwest coast. Engaging notes on each species describe aboriginal and other local uses of plants for food, medicine and implements, along with the unique characteristics of each plant and name origins.

    Whether it’s a statement-making fiddle-leaf fig or a tiny tabletop succulent, a houseplant instantly elevates the look of your home. But where to begin? In Decorating with Plants, Baylor Chapman walks readers through everything they need to know to bring houseplants into their home. First, there’s Plant Care 101: from how to assess light conditions to tricks for keeping your plants alive while on vacation, Chapman gives readers the simple, foundational info they need to ensure their plants will thrive. Then she introduces us to 28 of her favorites—specimens that are tough as nails but oh-so-stylish, from the eye-catching Rubber Tree to the delicate Cape Primrose. Finally, she guides readers through the home room by room: Place an aromatic plant like jasmine or gardenia to your entry to establish your home’s “signature scent.” Add a proper sense of scale to your living room with a ceiling-grazing palm. Create a living centerpiece of jewel-toned succulents for a dining table arrangement that will last long after your dinner party. From air purification to pest control, there’s no limit to what houseplants can do for your home—and Decorating with Plants is here to show you how to add them to spaces big and small with style.

    Covers questions people ask, more about mulch than you probably want to know, all about flowers, vegetables and more. A treasure-trove of organic gardening know-how.

    The problem, according to botanist James Wong, is that many conventional gardening practices are based on pure myth or faulty science. They create bumper crops at the expense of flavor and nutrition. It doesn't have to be that way.After trial and error of cutting-edge horticultural techniques and extensive review of more than 2,000 journal papers from around the globe, Wong turns the tables on old-school advice with a radical new system that transforms the flavor and nutrition of homegrown produce."Grow for Flavor" shows the simple steps and innovative methods that yield tasty harvests beyond dreams and, best of all, the methods involve less effort, are strictly organic and can be mastered easily by newbie gardeners. The goal is maximum flavor with minimum labor.Consider these examples: For tomatoes 150 percent sweeter with 50 percent more vitamin C, ditch the tomato food and use molasses, aspirin sprays, and a bit of salt water. For strawberries 20 percent bigger with 100 times the aroma, plant in acidic soil in full sun with a skirt of red plastic mulch. For super-healthy berries with 300 percent more antioxidants than grocery store varieties, plant Rubel blueberries. For maximum flavor and sweetness, harvest beets early and carrots late."Grow for Flavor" is more than tips from a gardening expert. It overflows with practical information and inspirational advice -- an essential for all gardeners.

    This second edition of her definitive illustrated guide adds 40 percent new material, with more coverage of different kinds of trees, shrubs, and ground covers and how to prune them for health and aesthetics. The book is organized around the most common types of plants found in Northwest gardens: evergreen and deciduous shrubs; bamboos and tea roses; rhododendrons, camellia and other tree-like shrubs; hedge plants like boxwood and heather; clematis, wisteria and all those vines; and detailed information on trees by species from dogwoods to weeping cherries. In her trademark witty style, Turnbull also addresses tools, landscape renovation, and design errors. Included too are her amusing Ten Commandments for gardeners, which feature such treasures as "Thou shalt not weed-whip the trunk of thy tree, nor bash it with thine mower, nor leave anything tied on thy tree or the branches of thy tree, as is done in the land of the philistines."

    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

    DK's elegant introduction to botany is packed with sumptuous photos and crystal-clear artworks that explain the mechanics of photosynthesis, why leaves change colour, how cacti store water, and how seeds know when to grow.Filled with fascinating stories of how plant roots and leaves communicate with their neighbours and how flowers use colour and scent to interact with - and manipulate - the creatures around them, Flora is a fresh and engaging introduction to the mysterious inner workings of the plant world.

    For decades people have unquestioningly accepted the idea that our goal is to preserve nature in its pristine, pre-human state. But many scientists have come to see this as an outdated dream that thwarts bold new plans to save the environment and prevents us from having a fuller relationship with nature. Humans have changed the landscapes they inhabit since prehistory, and climate change means even the remotest places now bear the fingerprints of humanity. Emma Marris argues convincingly that it is time to look forward and create the "rambunctious garden," a hybrid of wild nature and human management.In this optimistic book, readers meet leading scientists and environmentalists and visit imaginary Edens, designer ecosystems, and Pleistocene parks. Marris describes innovative conservation approaches, including rewilding, assisted migration, and the embrace of so-called novel ecosystems.Rambunctious Garden is short on gloom and long on interesting theories and fascinating narratives, all of which bring home the idea that we must give up our romantic notions of pristine wilderness and replace them with the concept of a global, half-wild rambunctious garden planet, tended by us.

    In recent years, the shrinking of green spaces has endangered the honeybee. Now Planting for Honeybees shows you how you can help these delightful pollinators to flourish by creating a garden as habitat for them. No matter how small or large your space – from a window ledge in the city to a country garden – Sarah Wyndham Lewis offers practical advice on which plants to grow and when and where to plant them. Charmingly illustrated with delicate drawings, this a jewel of a guide to treasure.

    Authors Lewis Hill and Leonard Perry provide everything you need to know to successfully grow delicious organic fruit at home, from choosing the best varieties for your area to planting, pruning, and harvesting a bountiful crop. With tips on cultivating strawberries, raspberries, grapes, pears, peaches, and more, this essential reference guide will inspire year after year of abundantly fruitful gardening.

    Writing in a delightfully personal and down-home style, Green emphasizes the point that herbal medicine-making is fundamental to every culture on the planet and is accessible to everyone. So, first head into the garden and learn to harvest your own herbs, and then head into your kitchen and whip up a batch of raspberry cough syrup, or perhaps a soothing elixir to erase the daily stresses of modern life.