Discover everything you need to know to grow your garden in containers. Even if you only have a balcony or small patio, you can grow more than you ever thought possible in pots, wall planters and hanging baskets! This is your no-fuss guide to container gardening. Are you interested in making your outdoor space greener but don't know where to start? This urban gardening guide for beginners will help you choose and care for more than 80 different plant varieties, all specially chosen for their ability to thrive in containers. Discover the quickest way to bring nature into your home all year round! From suntraps to shady corners, this easy gardening guide will show you how to brighten up even the trickiest areas with beautiful plants. You don't have to be a horticulture expert to get started, this indispensable reference book will take you through every single step! It includes: - Tips on how to care for more than 80 different container plant varieties - Packed with practical, jargon-free know-how and simple gardening techniques - Easy-to-follow format to help grow your gardening knowledge Let It Grow! Gorgeous, full-colour photography provides plenty of inspiration and styling ideas! Expert tips and step-by-step instructions on every page help make sure that you care for your plants in the right way for them to flourish. Grow Containers shows you how to leverage every square inch of your gardening space. It's perfect for first-time gardeners, especially renters and small homeowners with paved-over gardens. Complete the Series: Make your green-fingered dreams a reality with the Grow series from DK. Learn how to sow, grow and harvest vegetables successfully in Grow Easy Veg, or discover how to garden more sustainably in Grow Eco-Gardening. Alternatively, there are more titles to explore such as Grow Pruning & Training and Grow Houseplants.

Ever wondered why supermarket potatoes are so bland and boring? In the Andes, where potatoes originate, there are thousands of varieties with bright colours, beautiful markings, unusual shapes and variations of flavour and cooking quality. In the modern world, industrialised monoculture has reduced all this diversity down to a handful of near identical varieties. However, it's incredibly easy to grow potatoes from seed, and every seed is full of unexplored diversity. Best known for her Daughter of the Soil blog, Rebsie Fairholm gives clear and practical instructions for how to make seeds from potato berries, how to cross different varieties, how to choose which ones to experiment with, and how to keep your newly created varieties growing into the future. She gives examples from her own experiences with all kinds of potatoes, from ordinary garden varieties to historic Scottish heirlooms and rare Andean landraces, and explores the different colour possibilities, from orange flesh to purple flesh. Our ancestors created their own vegetable varieties in their gardens and took it for granted as a completely normal thing to do; and then the commercial age came along and changed our habits, and so it became something of a lost art. This unique book is a small step towards changing that.

After years of living in awe of the mysterious fungi known as mushrooms -- chefs, health enthusiasts, and home cooks alike can't get enough of these rich, delicate morsels. With updated production techniques for home and commercial cultivation, detailed growth parameters for 31 mushroom species, a trouble-shooting guide, and handy gardening tips, this revised and updated handbook will make your mycological landscapes the envy of the neighborhood.

Planted freshwater aquariums combine the DIY aspects of terrariums with a sophisticated palette of gorgeous foliage plants. Sunken Gardens is packed with everything someone new to the hobby needs to know; it details the equipment needed to get started; surveys the best plants for aquascaping; and shows how to design, plant, and maintain an aquascape.

Since Rosalind Creasy popularized the concept of landscaping with edibles a quarter-century ago, interest in eating healthy, fresh, locally grown foods has swept across the nation. More and more Americans are looking to grow clean, delicious produce at home, saving money and natural resources at the same time. And food plants have been freed from the backyard, gracing the finest landscapes--even the White House grounds Creasy's expertise on edibles and how to incorporate them in beautifully designed outdoor environments was first showcased in the original edition of Edible Landscaping (Sierra Club Books, 1982), hailed by gardeners everywhere as a groundbreaking classic. Now this highly anticipated new edition presents the latest design and how-to information in a glorious full-color format, featuring more than 300 inspiring photographs. Drawing on the author's decades of research and experience, the book presents everything you need to know to create an inviting home landscape that will yield mouthwatering vegetables, fruits, nuts, and berries. The comprehensive Encyclopedia of Edibles--a book in itself--provides horticultural information, culinary uses, sources, and recommended varieties; and appendices cover the basics of planting and maintenance and of controlling pests and diseases using organic and environmentally friendly practices.

This practical, inspiring book will take the guesswork out of choosing the right plants for our Texas climate. Gardeners from all over the state will find this useful guide a vital part of selecting a wide range of garden plants. The plants are readily available, grow well and offer the best features in any garden. Plenty of tips and planting information.

Vegetables from your own farm to your own table We all love good food, and the fresher it is, the better! And what could be fresher than farm-to-table terms than vegetables you've grown at home? The new edition of Vegetable Gardening For Dummies puts you in touch with your roots in a thousands of years old farming tradition by demonstrating how easy it is to grow your own. And there's no need to buy a farm: all you need to become a successful cultivator of the land is this book and a small plot of soil in the yard, or a container set aside for some tasty natural edibles. Add water and some care, love, and attention--et voila! In a friendly, come-relax-in-my-garden style Charlie Nardozzi--leading horticultural writer and guest expert on shows such as Martha Stewart Living Radio--shares the nutritious results of a lifetime of vegetable-growing experience to delve into the nitty-gritty of micro-farming. It's not rocket science--quite the opposite--but you do need a bit of patience before you can reap your first glorious harvest. This book shows you how to master that, as you get down and dirty with the enjoyable work of building soil, starting seeds, controlling pests, and maintaining your garden. And as your early efforts turn to green shoots, you can dig deeper into information on special tips and tricks, as well as hundreds of vegetable varieties--many of which are beautiful to behold as well as tasty to eat! Plan out your garden Know your veggies, from tomatoes to chard Keep your plants happy and healthy Harvest, store, and preserve your crops Whether your thumb is a fertile green or you've never put plant-to-pot before, this book will bring out your inner farmer: you'll find everything required to transform your garden into a self-renewing larder--and complement every meal with a crisp, healthy, home-grown treat.

Fruit production is one of the most challenging areas of organic growing, and those wanting to grow fruit organically have often found it difficult to obtain the necessary technical information. Essential reading for serious gardeners, smallholders, small-scale organic growers and farmers wishing to diversify their crop range, this book covers the organic cultivation of all of the most popular pome and stone fruits, strawberries, cane and bush fruits. For each fruit crop, advice and information is given on the latest suitable varieties and rootstocks, growing systems, pruning and training, crop care, harvesting, storage, pest and disease management. Individual chapters cover organic principles and conversion, soil fertility, crop nutrition, weed and habitat management, and protected production. Also the market for organic fruit, retail opportunities and other important outlets is analysed. A chapter by Roy Cook is provided on the important subject of viticulture.

Practical, beautiful and an invaluable gardening reference, "Organic Kitchen Garden" shows you how to grow your own food and discover the taste of really fresh fruit and vegetables, and more. This book explains how to set up your vegetable patch, how to prepare the soil, choose and care for your crops and stagger your harvest across the seasons. Each chapter covers a different crop, from salads, beans and brassicas to onions, potatoes and root vegetables, as well as more unusual crops such as fennel, pak choi and seakale. It also includes helpful monthly lists to remind you which jobs need doing when and tips on composting, weed control, plant health care, pest and disease control and watering.Photographed in the 18th-century walled kitchen garden of Audley End in Essex, stunning photography demonstrate the various techniques and processes used in organic gardening. Digging up your first ever homegrown potatoes is said to be a life-changing experience; but eating them is even more of a thrill. Once you've tasted really fresh produce, you'll never go back. And not only do really fresh fruit and vegetables taste better, but they also have greater levels of vitamins, making them one of the best ways to a healthy diet. Written by expert gardener and journalist Juliet Roberts, "Organic Kitchen Garden" contains all the information you'll need to ensure a constant stream of produce from your garden to your kitchen.

Take a walk in the woods with Mike Krebill. When Mike tells you a story about his experiences with a wild plant or mushroom, you're getting far more than guidebook data - you're getting a lifetime's worth of keen observing, experimenting and, sometimes, close calls. Mike is one of America's most acclaimed foragers and wild food educators, a living encyclopedia of all things wild and edible. A Forager's Life is about a life spent in nature and in the classroom - from the thousands of wild edible forays with adults and young people, to the legendary Euell Gibbons and the first Earth Day, to the rise of today's great foraging wave, a wave that is bringing city folks and country folks together in search of that most basic of life's pleasures: wild foods. It's about waking up to the natural world, with the nurturing help of great mentors along the way. At its heart, it's the story of a natural-born teacher who never stopped being a curious little boy, and who knows how to appeal to the curious kid in all of us. That's what earned him multiple awards during his long career as a middle-school science teacher, environmental educator and naturalist. Are there recipes? Yes, lots of them, all kid-tested and kid-approved. You might like to try the Queen Anne's Lace pancakes, for starters.

This step-by-step bonsai book shows you how to craft super mini bonsai--the smallest form of bonsai! Miniature Bonsai reveals the Japanese art of super-mini bonsai gardening. As rewarding as full-scale bonsai cultivation is, mini bonsai is affordable, straightforward to learn and kind to your busy schedule. It's a complete gardening experience--a plant raised from seed or cutting, carefully potted, grown and maintained over time--a world of green in a pot no bigger than a demitasse or a thimble. From mixing the right growing medium to choosing the perfect pot to displaying your mini bonsai, this Japanese gardening book gives you basic techniques and valuable tips to help you grow miniature: flowering trees pines maples oaks junipers and other varieties of tiny trees and potted plants that are readily available and last for years With Miniature Bonsai you'll learn how to: Select plants that thrive as mini bonsai Work with seeds and small cuttings Match the right plant to the right pot Buy and prepare the growing medium Maintain and drain your miniature bonsai Display and enjoy your prized bonsai plants And much more! A pleasant pastime, a perfect gift, a beautiful addition to spaces small and large--Miniature Bonsai will show you how to make it happen.

Pruning is essential to keeping trees, shrubs, and other plants healthy and beautiful. Not only does pruning keep plants from getting unwieldy and large, it also allows light and air to reach more branches, encourages fruit and blossom growth, removes diseased branches, and adds structural strength to plants. But many homeowners and gardeners feel overwhelmed by pruning. When is the right time to prune? How much should be removed? What's the difference between pinching and heading back? What tools should be used? How can a homeowner ensure that pruning ultimately enhances -- and doesn't harm -- the plant?
For all these questions and more, "The Pruning Answer Book" has the answer. Written by two highly respected garden writers with years of experience in providing pruning advice, this book is sure to become a tool as essential as the pruning shears themselves. With clear, concise advice, a browsable format, a friendly tone, and how-to illustrations, the book provides everything a homeowner needs to safely achieve attractive, long-lasting, and healthy plants.
The latest in Storey's enormously popular Answer Book series, "The Pruning Answer Book" demystifies the subject, helping even novices successfully prune a variety of woody plants -- flowering trees, fruit and nut trees, shrubs, brambles, evergreens, vines, and groundcovers. Homeowners will feel as if they have a master arborist by their side, helping them bring out the best in their greenery.

Originally published in 1936, this book is a detailed guide to the cultivation of the mushroom. Full of detailed information and instruction on growing and harvesting, this book is still of great practical use to today's grower. Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Hesperides Press are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork. Contents Include : Introduction - The Nature of the Mushroom - Site and Soil - Buildings - Manures - Spawns - Making up Beds - Care of Beds - Diseases and Pests and Their Control - Picking and Packing - Exhibiting - Some Companion Crops - Marketing and Costings - Cooking Recipes

Bonsai are ornate, exquisitely formed trees; they are not merely plants, but elaborate works of art. In this practical and handy-sized guide, the intricate process of bonsai is demystified and made accessible to everyone. The book is packed with projects on how to grow and care for these miniature trees. Practical advice on how to start a bonsai from seed or from cuttings is given, as well as detailed steps on how to prune and shape different tree types. Guidance is offered on how to care for your trees through the seasons, and what tools and materials to work with. There are also useful tips on what pots and containers should be used to create the best effects. With its accessible step-by-step format, this book provides all the information gardeners will need to master this intriguing, stimulating and spiritually creative art.

Garden Wildlife is a book that looks at the habitats in our gardens from the point of view of wild animal and plants. If we understand our gardens in this way, then we can appreciate that different parts of our gardens essentially mimic wild habitats in microcosm. This means that we can provide places for wild animals and plants to flourish in our gardens, whether they happen to be in rural, suburban or urban settings. Above all, we need to get away from the current obsession with tidiness and sterility in our gardens, and allow odd corners to go wild, so that our native species can live alongside us in the modern world. Without wildlife to discover and observe in our gardens, our lives are impoverished, so we have a duty to ourselves and our children to invite nature back into our outside spaces.

2020 Independent Press Award Winner--Home & Garden Category Turn water scarcity into water abundance! Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond, Volume 1, 3rd Edition is the best-selling, award-winning guide on how to conceptualize, design, and implement life-enhancing water-, sun-, wind-, and shade-harvesting systems for your home, landscape, and community. This book enables you to assess your on-site resources, gives you a diverse array of strategies to maximize their potential, and empowers you with guiding principles to create an integrated, multi-functional plan specific to your site and needs. Clearly written with more than 290 illustrations, this full-color edition helps bring your site to life, reduce your cost of living, endow yourself and your community with skills of self-reliance and cooperation, and create living air conditioners of vegetation growing beauty, food, and wildlife habitat. Stories of people who are successfully welcoming rain into their life and landscape will invite you to do the same.

Greenhouses fuse together cultures and countries under one glass roof. In their debut book, photographers India Hobson and Magnus Edmondson take you on a worldwide journey through their favourite botanical spaces.

The Haarkon Greenhouse Tour began as a self-initiated adventure in Oxford s botanic garden four years ago. Since then, Magnus and India have visited countless locations in the UK, Europe, America, Asia and beyond in search of dream glasshouses and greenhouses, capturing dramatic palm houses, tropical hothouses and private potting sheds along the way.

Divided into seven thematic chapters History, Specimen, Community, Research, Pleasure, Hobbyist and Architecture the featured spaces in Glasshouse / Greenhouse are depicted via a series of photo-essays that draw out the style, plant collections and character of each space.

Stinging nettles are, for many of us, nothing more than persistent weeds with a painful sting. But apart from having an important role in the web of life, nettles are an incredibly useful plant to mankind. They have been put to myriad uses by our ancestors, and many of these are still valid today. Already stinging nettle products are growing in popularity in the field of alternative medicine, as their wide range of health benefits becomes better known. This unique book explores the diverse uses of this fascinating plant - in the garden and the kitchen, for their medical and fibrous properties and so on. It is packed with practical suggestions, as well as a guide to the botany of stinging nettles, and how to collect and store them. For example, you will discover how to use nettles to: make a liquid plant fertiliser brew an unusual beer make a dandruff treatment protect beehives flavour an omelette make friendship bracelets repel flies naturally make green or yellow fabric dyes keep yourself warm in the winter and much more ... The many health benefits of taking nettles in various forms include relief from: hay fever and other allergies; acne and other skin conditions; arthritis and rheumatism; asthma; stress; high blood pressure; depression; enlarged prostate gland. The book also features Digital Nettle Art

Vegetable gardening is happening every-where in cities and suburbs, in farms and schools, in community gardens and at the White House. And it s happening in houses and apartments, on balconies and porches, and anywhere else people can find the space.

Small-Space Vegetable Gardens explains the basics of growing a bounty of edibles in a minimal amount of space. Andrea Bellamy, author of the award-winning blog Heavy Petal, shares all the knowledge she s gained from years of gardening small: how to find and assess a space, and how to plan and build a garden. Bellamy also highlights the top sixty edible plants and offers complete information on how to sow, grow, and harvest them.

This hardworking and enthusiastic guide teaches gardeners how to take advantage of the space they have whether it s a balcony, a patio, a plot in a community garden, or even a small yard to create the food garden of their dreams."

This friendly, practical guide includes everything you need to know to pick up a spade, put in a pond and help wildlife flourish right outside your back door. Ponds are vital oases for nature. They are nursery grounds, feeding stops and bathing spots. They are genetic superhighways and vibrant ecosystems each brimming with life, interactions and potential. And they are for everyone. In The Wildlife Pond Book, Jules Howard offers a fresh perspective on ponds and encourages gardeners to reach for a garden spade and do something positive to benefit our shared neighbourhood nature. As well as offering practical tips and advice on designing, planting up and maintaining your pond, Jules encourages readers to explore the wildlife that colonises it with a torch, a microscope or a good old-fashioned pond-dipping net. With a foreword by award-winning wildlife-gardening author, Kate Bradbury, this helpful new guide includes a section outlining the hundreds of organisms that may turn up in your pond and is packed with creative ideas that have been tried and tested by author Jules Howard, an avid pond-builder, prolific pond-dipper and passionate voice for freshwater conservation for more than fifteen years. So, no matter how big your outdoor space is, The Wildlife Pond Book is the guide you need to create your very own haven for nature.

Waterfalls pouring from a stone wall onto rocks below. Water jets spurting over a pond. A small fountain splashing and bubbling onto a pebble base. Who can resist the calming appeal of water? You don't have to: it's easy to bring this dazzling feature into your garden, thanks to the sound advice and full color photographs packed into this inspirational, practical guide. It's an invaluable reference for every aspiring water gardener, with all the construction instructions and facts on liners, pumps, filters, season-by-season maintenance, and projects. After learning how to get started, you'll find out about extras to include, cleaning the water, adding hardy fish, keeping koi, and attracting wildlife. An illustrated A-to-Z directory of water plants rounds out the discussion.