This guide is for those new to composting and the following topics are covered:* Types of compost bins and the pros and cons of each (as well as "no bin" options)* Composting accessories and which are essential (answer: none!)* What to put in your compost bin -- and what to avoid (sorry, dog poop is out)* An easy way to balance carbon- and nitrogen-rich materials (no math involved!)* Compost troubleshooting -- common problems and how to solve them (from sulfur to slime - it's covered)Whether you just want a pile in the backyard, or the latest in compost tumbler technology, this guide will get you off to a great start.

    Paths of Desire is the enchanting, amusing, and moving account of making a garden -- and confronting the essence of suburban gardening, with its idiosyncratic ecosystem. This meant struggling with depraved skunks and raccoons, marauding teenagers, plastic jungle gyms, toppling garbage cans, uncontrollable eyesores, potholed drives, and all the grinding, honking, and buzzing of the neighborhood. Browning's delightfully frank prose conveys the very sense of being deep in a garden, with all its organic smells and textures, and the myriad joys of deciding what to plant and watching as the vision is realized. It contains a rich store of advice and illustrative anecdotes for enthusiasts and novices alike, as Browning amusingly documents the missteps she took in the planning of her garden and the satisfactions of finally getting it right. In Paths of Desire she teaches us how to embrace our plots of land -- no matter their size, beauty, or proximity to the city -- and make them our own. But she also reminds us that the life of a garden can never be separated from the people who wander in and out of it: characters like the charming but useless children; the philosophical tree doctor and the band of Helpful Men; the neighbors -- legalistic on one side, aesthetically challenged on the other -- and, best and worst of all, the True Love. By the end of the book, Browning has transformed her garden -- and her life -- and has created a place of enchantment, which is most of all what a garden should be.

    Includes extensive nutrition charts, seed resources, and questions and answers with Sproutman.

    Her first book, Fresh Eggs Daily, was all about healthy, natural care for chickens. Now comes Duck Eggs Daily, an equally valuable guide to raising ducks for eggs and companionship. This is also a book for chicken keepers who want to add ducks to their flock. While ducks can live happily with chickens, ducks are different in many important ways. Steele provides an information-packed, beautifully photographed how-to for raising – and living with – happy, healthy ducks. She examines every aspect of her ducks’ lives, including duck houses and pools, health care, duck behavior and blending ducks into a chicken flock. She provides a breed chart and a selection of favorite recipes using duck eggs.

    You’ll learn the basics of photosynthesis, the science of light, how to accurately measure how much light a plant needs, and details about the most up-to-date tools and gear available. Also included are tips and techniques for helping ornamental plants (like orchids, succulents, bonsai, and more) and edible plants (arugula, cannabis, oregano, tomatoes, and more) thrive indoors. Whether you are a vegetable gardener who wants to extend the growing season, a balcony gardener short on outdoor space, or a specialty plant collector, Gardening Under Lights is a must-have.

    You CAN grow buckets upon buckets of food in Florida - and this book gives you the secrets to pulling it off year after year. Lots more food - for a lot less work! Whether you want to save money, feed your family, start a survival garden, garden year-round, go paleo or build a huge prepper garden, this is the book for you. Learn the cheap simple techniques that will kickstart your Florida gardening. Discover the crops that will always come through for you. Quit hating the sand and the bugs and start reaping abundant harvests like you've never had before! This book provides the answers for both beginners and experts, delivered with humor. If you want yet another boring gardening book - this isn't it. Through combining Back to Eden gardening, Square Foot Gardening, Biointensive gardening, container gardening and some of the most productive crops on the planet, you WILL succeed! This is easy Florida gardening like you've never seen before. Pick up a copy of Totally Crazy Easy Florida Gardening and turn your backyard patch of weeds and sand into a money-saving vegetable factory that will keep your family fed no matter what the economy does. Start gardening RIGHT NOW before it's too late! Expert Florida gardener David The Good shares how in Totally Crazy Easy Florida Gardening.

    Whaley's tiny, walled garden is said to be the most visited private garden in America. And no wonder. It is the life's work of a forceful, vibrant, sociable, opinionated, determined woman who has spent the last eighty-five years cultivating whatever life offered. Now, in conversations with award-winning lowcountry novelist William Baldwin, Mrs. Whaley takes us on a tour of her garden - and of her life. Each year since 1940, Mrs. Whaley has made her garden new again and herself through it. She yanks out annuals and perennials alike. She prunes with a vengeance. ("I never walk into my garden without my clippers in hand.") She is careful not to overdo. ("Remember! There's such a thing as too many dancing girls!") As an ever-evolving work of art, the garden reflects Mrs. Whaley's hard-headed determination to make the most of her own remarkable existence. William Baldwin captures and preserves in these pages an intuitive gardener's wisdom. And thanks to this gardener's bracing, positive attitude, we see how a practical personal philosophy might indeed grow out of one's beloved garden.

    But more people are discovering a very attractive alternative.Packed with practical tips and beautiful photographs, Front Yard GardensExplores the history of the lawn and our attachment to it Contains examples of front yard gardens from more than seventy gardens across North America Provides step-by-step instructions to start and grow your own front yard garden Liz Primeau transformed her lawn in a quiet suburb to a mixed garden with a profusion of flowering plants, shrubs, and cacti. She now enjoys an eye-catching front garden that requires no chemicals and less watering than her lawn.This book includes overall planning and design, and outlines the steps for removing the grass, enriching the soil, and planting. The book is divided into several types of front yard gardens, including cottage, minimalist, secret, neighborhood, downtown, and natural. She discusses the key elements of each style, gives tips on how to create and maintain the garden, and provides a list of complementary plants.With more than two hundred beautiful photographs taken expressly for this book by Andrew Leyerle, Front Yard Gardens is a sensual treasure-trove of ideas.

    Author Lisa Eldred-Steinkopf, known as the Houseplant Guru, shares the knowledge she’s gained tending to her own personal jungle of over 1,000 houseplants. Having a south-facing window doesn’t always guarantee you the best light to grow plants—especially if your window faces an alley or a tree-lined street. What’s the point of growing an urban jungle if tall buildings are blocking all your sunshine? This compact guide, designed to look as good on your shelf as it is useful, will help you learn how to make the most of your light so you can reap the physical and emotional benefits of living with plants. Detailed profiles include tips on watering your plants just right, properly potting them, and troubleshooting pests and diseases. You’ll also learn which plants are safe to keep around your pets. Whether you live in a shady top-floor apartment or a dungeon-y garden level, this book will help you grow your plant collection to its healthiest for its Instagram debut.

    On the other hand, gardening itself could be the culprit: elaborate, traditional perennial borders; water-hungry or disease-prone plants; needy lawns; and high-maintenance plants that require staking or clipping all suck up precious hours. Simply put, we need to start gardening in a whole new way. In this inspiring book, Val Easton shows exactly how to have a low-maintenance garden that doesn't sacrifice style. You won't have to give up your favorite plants or settle for expanses of ugly bark nuggets. You just have to unlearn some bad old habits and pick up some good new ones. So, how do you go about making a "new" low-maintenance garden? First, design your garden with maintenance in mind—good-looking hardscape will both save weeding time and showcase your favorite plants. Second, simplify your garden routines—learn the most efficient planting and maintenance techniques and don't get stressed if everything isn't letter-perfect. Third, learn how to work with nature rather than against it. And finally, embrace home-grown fruits, herbs, and vegetables; well planted containers; and thoughtfully chosen plants.The New Low-Maintenance Garden doesn't just tell you how to garden in a whole new way—it shows you, through profiles and beautiful photographs of real gardens that embody low-maintenance techniques. The pressures of life are not likely to ease up anytime soon, but the lessons of this timely book will help you banish guilt over undone garden chores and revel in your garden successes.

    Carol Wall, a white woman living in a lily-white neighborhood in Middle America, was at a crossroads in her life. Her children were grown; she had successfully overcome illness; her beloved parents were getting older. One day she notices a dark-skinned African man tending her neighbor's yard. His name is Giles Owita. He bags groceries at the supermarket. He comes from Kenya. And he's very good at gardening. Before long Giles is transforming not only Carol's yard, but her life. Though they are seemingly quite different, a caring bond grows between them. But they both hold long-buried secrets that, when revealed, will cement their friendship forever.

    But nothing is moreconvenient than grocery shopping in the backyard. A vegetable garden offers the best defense againstrising food prices, the most environmentally sound way to eat, and better exercise than any gym. It willturn anyone into a wonderful cook, since nothing tastes more vibrant than homegrown. And it can takeless time every week than a trip to the supermarket.In Grow the Good Life, Michele Owens, an amateur gardener for almost two decades, makes an entertaining and persuasive case for vegetable gardens. She starts with two simple but radical ideas: Growing food on a small scale is easy, and it is absurdly rewarding.With her wry, funny, and accessible approach, Owens helps beginning gardeners overcome obstacles that keep them from planting a few seedlings every spring. She explains why dirt isn't dirty; the health benefits of growing one's own food; and that vegetable gardens are not antithetical to the frantic pace of modern life, but simple and undemanding if intelligently managed.Grow the Good Life is not just another how-to. Instead, it will teach you the true fundamentals of vegetable growing: how to fit a garden into your life and why it's worth the trouble.

    Most techniques for growing what are commonly referred to as microgreens left him feeling overwhelmed and uninterested. There had to be a simpler way to grow greens for his family indoors. After some research and diligent experimenting, Burke discovered he was right there was a way! And it was even easier than he ever could have hoped, and the greens more nutrient packed. He didn t even need a south-facing window, and he already had most of the needed supplies just sitting in his pantry. The result: healthy, homegrown salad greens at a fraction of the cost of buying them at the market. The secret: start them in the dark.Growing Soil Sprouts Burke s own descriptive term for sprouted seeds grown in soil as opposed to in jars employs a method that encourages a long stem without expansive roots, and provides delicious salad greens in just seven to ten days, way earlier than any other method, with much less work. Indeed, of all the ways to grow immature greens, this is the easiest and most productive technique. Forget about grow lights and heat lamps! This book is a revolutionary and inviting guide for both first-time and experienced gardeners in rural or urban environments. All you need is a windowsill or two. In fact, Burke has grown up to six pounds of greens per day using just the windowsills in his kitchen! Year-Round Indoor Salad Gardening offers detailed step-by-step instructions to mastering this method (hint: it s impossible not to succeed, it s so easy!), tools and accessories to have on hand, seeds and greens varieties, soil and compost, trays and planters, shelving, harvest and storage, recipes, scaling up to serve local markets, and much more."

    Known world-wide for his connection with God’s world of nature, this authorized work explores the man and his wildly successful garden and orchard…while applying revealed principles to guide our daily lives as well. Home gardeners in 208 countries agree that you can grow better produce with much less cost and less work if you do it God’s way. CAUTION: this book may rock your worldview!

    There are now more than 170 titles in this series, and their remarkable popularity reflects the common desire of country and city dwellers alike to cultivate personal independence in everyday life.