"She's stood in that stall for twelve years and given me thousands of gallons of milk."But Blossom the cow was too old now for milking, and the farmer needed to make room for a younger animal. So, sadly, he was sending blossom to market. At least, that's what he and the vet thought. But as James Herriot continued on his rounds to Mrs. Pickering and her Basset hounds, he was about to find that Blossom has a surprise in store...

    "Urban Homesteading" is the perfect back-to-the-land guide for urbanites who want to reduce their impact on the environment. Full of practical information, as well as inspiring stories from people already living the urban homesteading life, this colorful guide is an approachable guide to learning to live more ecologically in the city. The book embraces the core concepts of localization (providing our basic needs close to where we live), self-reliance (re-learning that food comes from the ground, not the grocery store; learning to do things ourselves), and sustainability (giving back at least as much as we take). Readers will find concise how-to information that they can immediately set into practice, from making solar cookers to growing tomatoes in a barrel to raising chickens in small spaces to maintaining mental serenity in the fast-paced city environment. Full of beautiful full-color photographs and illustrations, and plenty of step-by-step instructions, this is a must-have handbook for city folk with a passion for the simple life.a"

    Department of Agriculture. King traveled to Asia in the early 1900s to learn how farmers in China, Korea, and Japan were able to achieve successful harvests century after century without exhausting the soil — one of their most valuable natural resources. This book is the result of his extraordinary mission.A fascinating study of waste-free methods of cultivation, this work reveals the secrets of ancient farming methods and, at the same time, chronicles the travels and observations of a remarkable man. A well-trained observer who studied the actual conditions of life among agricultural peoples, King provides intriguing glimpses of Japan, China, Manchuria, and Korea; customs of the common people; the utilization of waste; methods of irrigation, reforestation, and land reclamation; the cultivation of rice, silk, and tea; and related topics.Enhanced with more than 240 illustrations (most of them photographs), this book represents an invaluable resource for organic gardeners, farmer, and conservationists. It remains "one of the richest sources of information about peasant agriculture [and] one of the pioneer books on organic farming." — The LastWhole Earth Catalog.

    216-page Softcover.Introduction to Permaculture is an updated and revised version of the first two permaculture books, Permaculture One (Mollison and Holmgren, 1978) and Permaculture Two (Mollison, 1979), and replaces them. New material by Bill Mollison and Reny Mia Slay has been inserted, along with excerpts from Permaculture: A Designers' Manual and information taken from permaculture design courses taught by Bill Mollison (1981, 1986) and Lea Harrison (1985). Some of the illustrations in this book have appeared in Permaculture Two and Permaculture: A Designers' Manual.

    This book will have you on your way to reading all types of music for guitar and piano. How to Read Music: Beginner Fundamentals of Music and How to Read Musical Notation is written by the #1 Amazon.com Bestselling author Erich Andreas. Erich's easy-to-understand teaching style has been known to get beginners on their way to mastering music reading. Inside the Book You Will Discover: - Everything to Reading Music - Musical Notation - Physics to Sound - Music theory for Beginners - Use the "Click to Look Inside" feature to check out the first few pages Scroll up and click on the "Buy Now" button to receive your How to Read Music book today.

    Not only are backyard vegetable plots popping up in places long reserved for lawns, but some renegades are even planting their front yards with food. People in apartments are filling their balconies with pots of tomatoes, beans, and basil, while others are gazing skyward and "greening" their rooftops with food plants. Still others are colonizing public spaces, staking out territory in parks for community gardens and orchards, or convincing school boards to turn asphalt school grounds into "growing" grounds.Woven through the book are the stories of guerrilla urban farmers in various cities of North America who are tapping city trees for syrup, gleaning fruit from parks, foraging for greens in abandoned lots, planting heritage vegetables on the boulevard, and otherwise placing food production at the centre of the urban community. Additional stories describe the history of urban food production in North America, revealing the roots of our current hunger for more connection with our food, and the visionaries who have directed that hunger into action.Throughout the book, sidebars offer practical tips for how to compost, how to convert a lawn into a vegetable bed, and what edible plants are easy to grow with children, among other topics.

    This behavior is very much different from what we humans are used to dealing with in our everyday lives, so naturally this subject is quite hard to comprehend for many. We believed that the best way to introduce the subject reliably is to start at the beginning, presenting the observations, thoughts and conclusions of each of the world’s greatest physicists through their eyes, one at a time. In this way we hope that the reader may take an enjoyable journey through the strange truths of quantum theory and understand why the conclusions of these great minds are what they are. This book starts with the most general view of the world and gradually leads readers to those new, unbelievable but real facts about the very nature of our universe.

     Recent years have witnessed a quiet, almost unnoticeable revolution: all around the world, drip coffee has been replaced by espresso, macchiato, and cappuccino, with a similar quality to those served in the best Italian coffee shops. The technological developments of espresso machines, moka-pot, French-press and other newfangled equipment has allowed the flourishing coffee market to enter the domestic kitchen, turning coffee into an integral part of everyday, modern life. However, despite its huge popularity and expanding markets, coffee remains uncharted terrain, known only to connoisseurs. No more. A Coffee Lover’s Guide is an accessible, comprehensive, easy-to-read and enjoyable guide, written with love and made especially for anyone drinking, making, selling or buying coffee. It is an easy, available, communicative and enjoyable way to learn and understand coffee and the coffee world better. >>>A recommended gift for any coffee lover! A Coffee Lover’s Guide includes a short, accessible and comprehensive synopsis of coffee’s history and origin, it’s types and varieties, different ways of brewing and grinding, coffee machinery, and even popular uses and traditions of coffee, including “coffee reading.” >>>All the answers in one place: the perfect guide for any coffee lover! Enjoy the read, and enjoy your coffee even more! Scroll up to grab your copy of A Coffee Lover’s Guide now!

    This comprehensive guide, written in charming prose from the perspective of an organic farmer, will appeal to readers who are interested in raising chickens, or simply want the best knowledge about how to cook them. With this in mind, farmer and animal expert Jennifer Megyesi discusses all the basic details of raising the birds—general biology, health, food, choosing breeds, and so on—and she cuts through the smoke to identify what terms like "organic," "free-range," and so on really mean for poultry farmers and consumers.No chicken book would be complete without information on how to show chickens for prizes, and this is no different, but The Joy of Keeping Chickens also stresses the importance of self-sustainability and organic living, and the satisfaction of keeping heirloom breeds. Readers will appreciate the comprehensive nature of this readable, informative guide, and Megyesi's enthusiasm about keeping chickens. Coupled with Geoff Hansen's gorgeous full-color photographs, this text makes for an instant classic in the category.

    In Bet the Farm, food writer Kaufman sets out to discover the connection between the global food system and why the food on our tables is getting less healthy and less delicious even as the the world's biggest food companies and food scientists say things are better than ever. To unravel this riddle, he moves down the supply chain like a detective solving a mystery, revealing a force at work that is larger than Monsanto, McDonalds or any of the other commonly cited culprits—and far more shocking.Kaufman's recent cover story for Harper's, "The Food Bubble," provoked controversy throughout the food world, and led to appearances on the NBC Nightly News, MSNBC, Fox Business News, Democracy Now, and Bloomberg TV, along with features on National Public Radio and the BBC World Service.Visits the front lines of the food supply system and food politics as Kaufman visits farms, food science research labs, agribusiness giants, the United Nations, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and moreExplains how food has been financialized and the powerful consequences of this change, including: the Arab Spring, started over rising food prices; farmers being put out of business; food scientists rushing to make easy-to-transport, homogenized ingredients instead of delicious foodsExplains how the push for sustainability in food production is more likely to make everything worse, rather than better—and how the rise of fast food is bad for us, but catastrophic for those who will never even see a McNugget or frozen pizza

    It is the most complete source of step-by-step information about growing, processing, cooking, and preserving homegrown foods from garden, orchard, field, or barnyard. This book is so basic, so thorough, so reliable, that it deserves a place in every home whether country, city, or in between. Carla Emery started writing The Encyclopedia of Country Living in 1969 during the back-to-the-land movement of that time. She continued to add content and refine the information over the years ad the book went from a self-published mimeographed document to a book published by Bantam and then Sasquatch. The 10th Edition reflects the most up-to-date and the most personal version of the book that became Carla Emery’s life work. It is the original manual of basic country skills that have proved essential and necessary for people living in the country and the city, and everywhere in between. The practical advice in this exhaustive reference tool includes how to cultivate a garden, buy land, bake bread, raise farm animals, make sausage, can peaches, milk a goat, grow herbs, churn butter, build a chicken coop, catch a pig, cook on a wood stove, and much, much more.

    They erode soils, pollute air and water, damage riparian areas, and decimate wildlife populations. The UN s Food and Agriculture Organization bolstered the credibility of this notion with its 2007 report that declared livestock to be the single largest contributor to human-generated climate-change emissions.But is the matter really so clear cut? Hardly. In her new book, Defending Beef, environmental lawyer turned rancher Nicolette Hahn Niman argues that cattle are not inherently bad for the Earth. The impact of grazing can be either negative or positive, depending on how livestock are managed. In fact, with proper oversight livestock can actually play an essential role in maintaining grassland ecosystems by performing the same functions as the natural herbivores that once roamed and grazed there. Grounded in empirical scientific data, Defending Beef builds the most comprehensive and convincing argument to date that cattle could actually serve as the Earth s greatest environmental benefactors by helping to build carbon-sequestering soils and prevent desertification.Defending Beef is simultaneously a book about big issues and ideas and the personal tale of the author, who starts out as a skeptical vegetarian and eventually becomes involved with sustainable ranching. She shows how dispersed, grass-based, smaller-scale farms can and should become the basis for American food production. And while no single book could definitively answer the thorny question of how to feed the Earth s growing population, Defending Beef makes the case that, whatever the world s future food system looks like, livestock can and must be part of the solution."

    It's a great project for families and foodies alike, and all you need to start off is this book, a specialist mushroom growing kit, and a small space in which to grow them!In this book I aim to teach you the basics that you need to know to grow mushrooms at home. You'll take a step back in time and learn about the history of mushrooms as food, and why it has taken centuries for home mushroom growing to really catch on. I'll let you know exactly which are the best types of mushrooms for you to start with. If you aren't sure what tools you'll need, don't worry - this book has that covered too. And I'll explain how to make sure that your mushrooms grow quickly and pest free, and the best ways to harvest, preserve and store your crop.But where should you grow your mushrooms? That's a good question! Contained within the pages of this book are tips on how to set up a mushroom patch in your back yard, as well as how to grow them inside. Is it really better to grow them completely in the dark? You are about to find out!So, whether you like shiitakes, portobellos or oyster mushrooms, stop buying them in stores. I'll teach you how to grow your own and keep your entire family well supplied.In as little as a few weeks you can have the perfect fresh mushrooms grown and ready to eat. Yum!This easy to read, beginners book, summarizes the essential information I have learned over the years, and is written to help you decide if mycology is for you, and if so, which route to take.

    Python is a beautiful computer language. It is simple, and it is intuitive. Python is used by a sorts of people – data scientists use it for much of their number crunching and analytics; security testers use it for testing out security and IT attacks; it is used to develop high-quality web applications and many of the large applications that you use on the internet are also written in Python, including YouTube, DropBox, and Instagram. Are you interested in learning Python? Then settle in and learn the basics in just 7 days - enough for you to be comfortable in moving on to the next level without any trouble.Are you interested in learning Python? Then settle in and learn the basics in just 7 days - enough for you to be comfortable in moving on to the next level without any trouble. In this book you'll learn: Setting Up Your Environment Let’s Get Programming Variables and Programs in Files Loops, Loops and More Loops Functions Dictionaries, Lists, and Tuples The “for” Loop Classes Modules File Input/Output Error Handling and much more! Now it's time for you to start your journey into Python programming! Click on the Buy Now button above and get started today!

    In Fields of Plenty, respected farmer, teacher, and ecology advocate Michael Ableman seeks out these innovative and committed farmers to reveal how the fruits of those who till the soil go beyond taste. From Knolls farm in California, famous for succulent figs tree-ripened to perfection, to an urban farm in Chicago that sustains an entire community, his odyssey takes him to farmers who are trying to answer questions of sustenance philosophically and, most importantly, in practice. Illustrated with evocative color photographs of the land and the people who work it, and accompanied by a bountiful selection of recipes, this beautifully written memoir reveals the power of food as a personal and cultural force.