For beginning gardeners and homeowners, this handbook shows you exactly how to plan, build, and plant a simple raised bed. Fully illustrated step-by-step instructions make it easy and ensure success! In just a weekend, using a few basic materials and minimal building skills, you can set up a complete garden bed adapted for vegetables, flowers, or herbs.

This is a new edition of a classic of early 17th-century food writing. The book was written by the Italian refugee, educator and humanist Giacomo Castelvetro who had been saved from the clutches of the Inquisition in Venice by the English ambassador, Sir Dudley Carleton in 1611. When he came to England, he was horrified by our preference for large helpings of meat, masses of sugar and very little greenstuff. The Italians were both good gardeners, and had a familiarity with many varieties of vegetable and fruit that were as yet little known in England. He circulated his Italian manuscript among his supporters, dedicating it to Lucy, Countess of Bedford, herself a keen gardener and patron of literature. Gillian Riley's translation of this hitherto unpublished document has been recognised as being fluent, entertaining and accurate from its first appearance in 1989. Castelvetro takes us through the gardener's year, listing the fruit and vegetables as they come into season, with simple and elegant ways of preparing them. Practical instructions are interspersed with tender vignettes of his life in his native city of Modena, memories of his years in Venice and reminiscences of his travels in Europe. He writes of children learning to swim in the canals of the Brenta, strapped to huge dried pumpkins to keep them afloat; Venetian ladies ogling passers-by from behind screens of verdant beanstalks; sultry German wenches jealously hoarding their grape harvest; and his intimate chats with Scandinavian royalty about the best way to graft pear cuttings and discomfort the Pope. English cooking was on a cusp. It had yet to absorb the new ways of Europe, although some of the best practice of Dutch and French gardening was having its effect on our diet. But there were still many new styles of cooking and recipes to absorb, as well as new plants to enjoy (for instance broccoli), and new ways to set them out on the table. This treatise anticipates many of the changes that were to come about over the next one hundred years. Castelvetro urges that we should eat more salads with the same enthusiasm that was evinced by John Evelyn in his book on salad-stuff of 1699. This edition is printed in two colours, has a graceful typography (using the Galliard typeface) and generous layout, and is equipped with a knowledgeable and informative introduction by the translator.

Using seasonal checklists and Charles Dowding's expert no-dig advice, this month-by-month journal helps you plan bumper harvests the no-dig way. From tomatoes to basil, carrots to coriander, Charles Dowding, the UK's leading no-dig guru shows you how to grow a year's worth of healthy, organic crops while preserving the soil's integrity in this complete and comprehensive guide. Follow simple steps to find success, growing more than 35 vegetables and herbs in a range of easy and accessible projects suited to all kinds of spaces and environments. Start a no-dig vegetable plot on virgin or dug ground, improve the soil and become an expert mulcher and weeder, as well as learning the techniques for intercropping, companion planting, seed viability and crop succession. This easy-to-follow step-by-step guide by one of Britain's top gardeners is illustrated with photos to help you learn how to plan a vegetable garden, construct a raised bed, sow seed indoors and outdoors in spring, grow on young crops, protect plants from the weather and pests through the season and, finally, celebrate the joy of harvesting. Organised monthly from January to December, this journal is full of key dates for sowing, staking, harvesting and storing, as well as time-saving monthly checklists to help ensure a successful no-dig harvest.

Grow your own beautiful multilayered food forest in your own backyard. Pippa Chapman is an RHS trained gardener who designs, plants and maintains abundant, biodiverse, edible and beautiful forest gardens. Here she shares her practical tips for realistically transforming your own plot, whatever its size, and with limited time, money and resources. A forest garden doesn't have to be big; you can grow a productive edible paradise in pots and containers too. Pippa explains how to create multiple layers on a small-scale to maximise your growing area, using polycultures and guilds for healthy, low-maintenance food. She shares how to use perennials for structure and for year-round food, and how to incorporate flowers for beauty, wildlife and for the kitchen. Chapters on permaculture design and forest gardening give practical advice on how to plan and plant your own garden, with guilds and plant profiles to give real-life examples to help you get started. Useful tips on propagation and seed saving help keep plant costs low and a handy chapter on the soil-food web will help you understand your own soil and how to keep it healthy.

An informative and inspirational guide aimed at anyone who fancies giving chilli growing a go. From 'Hungarian Hot Wax' to 'Red Savina', and 'Scotch Bonnet' to 'Elephant's Trunk', chillies come in dozens of shapes, colours and degrees of spiciness - from sweet and succulent to blow-your-head-off hot. RHS Red Hot Chilli Grower provides everything you need to grow your own chillies from scratch, with step-by-step instructions for sowing seeds, caring for the plants, harvesting the fruit and troubleshooting common problems. Chilli-lovers will also find plenty of background information, such as a short history of the chilli and a guide to Scoville heat units (the official measurement of spicy heat), as well as tasty tips for enjoying the fruits of your work. Packed with charts, checklists, photographs and illustrations, this is the perfect guide to the world of grow-your-own chillies.

A Produce Reference Guide to Fruits and Vegetables from Around the World: Nature?s Harvest answers the many questions consumers have about various fruits and vegetables. Providing basic, clear, and understandable information for each produce item, this reference guide gives you a synopsis of the fruit or vegetable, a short history of the item, the common and uncommon name, what it looks and tastes like, how it is used, and the time of year it is available. Information on nutrition, serving sizes, yields, and optimal storage conditions is also provided. From potatoes to shepherd?s purse and from grapes to the Clementine tangor, A Produce Reference Guide to Fruits and Vegetables from Around the World covers both the familiar and the exotic. Other than the obvious fruits and vegetables (such as 12 varieties of cherries and 10 different kinds of squash) you?ll also read about herbs, mushrooms, sprouts, and nuts. A Produce Reference Guide to Fruits and Vegetables from Around the World is packed with useful information. From practical advice to interesting trivia, some of the things you?ll learn include: You should not eat any green parts of potatoes--it will make you sick. How to classify a peach--clingstone vs. freestone and white vs. yellow. The Texas 1015 Supersweet onion is named after its recommended planting date, October 15. Kiwis (originally from China, not Australia) contain an enzyme that tenderizes meat. Women in China once made a dye from the skin of eggplants to stain their teeth black. The famous mutiny by Captain Bligh?s crew was caused by breadfruit. Gourds may have spread between continents by floating in the ocean, as they can float in sea water for 220 days without losing seed viability. The two nuts mentioned in the Bible--almonds and pistachios.As new methods in farming, storing, and shipping are allowing exotic fruits and vegetables unheard of a few years ago to becom

"Grow Now is an earth manual that applies to everyone, everywhere. Regenerating life begins with our hands, the soil, and our heart. Take this book and go outside, stay outside, and transform." --Paul Hawken, author of Drawdown and Regeneration Did you know you can have a garden that's equal parts food source and wildlife haven? In Grow Now, Emily Murphy shares easy-to-follow principles for regenerative gardening that foster biodiversity and improve soil health. She also shows how every single yard mirrors and connects to the greater ecosystem around us. No-dig growing, composting and mulching smartly, and planting a variety of edible perennials that attract bees and butterflies are all commonsense techniques everyone can use to grow positive change. You'll also find detailed advice on increasing your nature quotient, choosing plants that cycle more carbon back into the soil, selecting a broader variety of vegetables and fruits to improve overall soil fertility, rethinking space devoted to lawns, and adding companion plants for pollinators to rewild any plot of land. Exquisitely photographed and filled with helpful lists and sidebars, Grow Now is an actionable, hopeful, and joyful roadmap for growing our way to individual climate contributions. Gardening is climate activism!

Use this book to grown your own fruits and berries, and you will discover the joys of tree-ripened peaches and vine-ripened cantaloupe just bursting with farm-fresh flavour. Suitable for both beginners and experts, it is the perfect resource for anyone engaged in gardening. Not only do you learn how to grow your own fabulous fruits and berries, this book will tell you what to do with all the produce you harvest.

It is one thing to produce tomatoes or pumpkins - or any other fruit or vegetable for the table - as they come into season, but it becomes another when you realise that most crops in the garden arrive in gluts with no more to be had for another year unless you do something about it. This book shows you how to make the best use of your highly nutritious, home-grown produce. Bob begins in the garden, showing you how to achieve a more continuous crop as well as how to extend your harvest. He then steps into the kitchen to demonstrate the best way to preserve and cook your crop by bottling, drying, jamming and smoking it. He uses his intimate and comprehensive knowledge of each crop to advise you on how best to treat it and store it. Try making fruit leathers, which are great for kids; freeze your own apple juice so you can have it every day of the year; experiment with making liqueurs and wines; preserve nuts in chocolate, and many, many more ingenious ideas.

'Brilliant ... Equal parts irreverent, cheeky and vitally important ... Charming ... Much too valuable to tuck away until the zombies come ... A gardening manual that you can put to use immediately, regardless of your situation' Zombie Research Society. Climate change? Brexit? Screaming brain-biters? Don't lose the plot, this book can help! Irreverent, straightforward and useful, it shows even complete beginners how to grow enough of their own food to survive when Armageddon arrives and imports collapse. Or even if they don't. A grow-your-own guide for the generation who'd rather eat compost than watch Gardeners' World, it tells you how to sow and grow 20 key crops, whether you have two pots, a patio or a whole allotment to play with. It takes you through what seeds, tools and other kit you'll need, teaches you how to plan and plant your site for maximum nutrition, and suggests gardening projects to get underway while civilization still stands, from growing dinner in a dustbin to a juice bar on a balcony. All while sticking a garden fork in the eye of the undead. Gardening for the Zombie Apocalypse: surviving has never been so much fun.

In this continuing series, the topic of vegetables embraces a wide range of pieces from English, American and overseas scholars. Their treatments encompass both a broader consideration of the vegetable diet and the history of the cultivation and consumption of specific varieties. Cookery and consumption are not highlighted at the expense of cultivation, so there are some interesting essays on allotments, market gardening in the Paris region, early-modern vegetable gardening in England and the development of markets in India. The theme has been treated with admirable latitude in contributions on vegetables and diplomacy, vegetable carving, and vegetables in Renaissance art. Essays include: (Don't) Eat Your Vegetables: A Historical Semiotics of Carving Legumes (Julia Abramson); The War of Vegetables: The Rise & Fall of the English Allotment Movement (Lesley Acton); The First Scientific Defense of a Vegetarian Diet (Ken Albala); Mukimono & Modoki: Japan's Culinary Trompe l'oeil (Elizabeth Andoh); The Bitter - and Flatulent - Aphrodisiac: Synchrony and Diachrony of the Culinary Use of Muscari Comosum in Greece and Italy' (Anthony Buccini); Eat Your Greens: Traditional Leafy Vegetables for Better Nutrition (Jeremy Cherfas); 'We Talked About the Aubergines: Some Minor Pleasures of European Diplomacy (Andrew Dalby); Akkoub ( Gundelia Tournefortii - Tournefort's gundelia): An Edible Wild Thistle from the Lebanese Mountains (Anissa Helou); Is There Salvation in Sweetness? Sugar Beets in America (Cathy Kaufman); The Potato in Irish Cuisine and Culture (Mairtin Mac Con Iomaire & Padraic Og Gallagher); Sweet As Notes on the Kumara or New Zealand Sweet Potato as a Taonga, or Treasure (Ray McVinnie); Wild Thing: The Naga Morich Story (Michael & Joy Michaud); 'Per rape et porri et per spinachi': Re-examining the Realities of Vegetable Consumption at the Monastery of Santa Trinita in Post-Plague Florence (Salvatore Musumeci); Les Maraichers - Market Gardeners of the Ile de France (Lizbeth Nicol); Keeping the Home Fires Burning: Culinary Exchanges, Sustainability and Traditional Vegetable Markets in India (Krina Patel); The Los Angeles Vegetable Cult (Charles Perry); From the Plate to the Palate: Visual Delights from the Vegetable Kingdoms of Italy (Gillian Riley); But Did the English Eat Their Vegetables? A Look at English Kitchen Gardens and the Vegetable Cookery they Imply, 1650-1800 (William Rubel); Renaissance Italy and the Fabulous, Flamboyant Inslata (June di Schino); Pomtajer (Karin Vaneker); A Vegetable Zodiac from Late Antique Alexandria (Susan Weingarten).

"Wonderfully written, beautifully illustrated, and everything you need to know to get more productivity out of your food garden." --Joe Lamp'l, creator and executive producer, Growing a Greener World Discover how to get more out of your growing space with succession planting--carefully planned, continuous seed sowing--and provide a steady stream of fresh food from early spring through late fall. Drawing inspiration from succession in natural landscapes, Meg McAndrews Cowden teaches you how to implement lessons from these dynamic systems in your home garden. You'll learn how to layer succession across your perennial and annual crops; maximize the early growing season; determine the sequence to plant and replant in summer; and incorporate annual and perennial flowers to benefit wildlife and ensure efficient pollination. You'll also find detailed, seasonal sowing charts to inform your garden planning, so you can grow more anywhere, regardless of your climate. Plant Grow Harvest Repeat will inspire you to create an even more productive, beautiful, and enjoyable garden across the seasons--every vegetable gardener's dream.

For those without the time or stamina to spend hours maintaining a garden, well-known experts Alan and Gill Bridgewater offer an easy-care method with minimal digging and weeding. They show how to make raised beds, build up soil with mushroom compost, cover weeds with mulch, and protect plants with nets and plastic--all using organic methods whenever possible. A must for every gardener.

Build healthy soil and grow better plants Robert Pavlis, a gardener for over four decades, debunks common soil myths, explores the rhizosphere, and provides a personalized soil fertility improvement program in this three-part popular science guidebook. Healthy soil means thriving plants. Yet untangling the soil food web and optimizing your soil health is beyond most gardeners, many of whom lack an in-depth knowledge of the soil ecosystem. Soil Science for Gardeners is an accessible, science-based guide to understanding soil fertility and, in particular, the rhizosphere - the thin layer of liquid and soil surrounding plant roots, so vital to plant health. Coverage includes: Soil biology and chemistry and how plants and soil interact Common soil health problems, including analyzing soil's fertility and plant nutrients The creation of a personalized plan for improving your soil fertility, including setting priorities and goals in a cost-effective, realistic time frame. Creating the optimal conditions for nature to do the heavy lifting of building soil fertility Written for the home gardener, market gardener, and micro-farmer, Soil Science for Gardeners is packed with information to help you grow thriving plants.

As the name suggests, root vegetables are vegetables whose roots form the edible parts. These vegetables are highly nutritious and they are particularly tasty if they are home-grown and eaten soon after harvesting. In this book, the main types of root vegetables are described, with useful information about the different varieties that can be grown, their history, cultivation requirements and cooking uses. There is key advice on preparing the soil for new crops, growing root vegetables from seed, and making compost. A must for the novice grower, the book also provides information for the experienced gardener who wants to experiment with new varieties.