50 in '08: 09
May. 8th, 2008 10:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sakon76Title: McGee and Stuckey's Bountiful Container: Create Container Gardens of Vegetables, Herbs, Fruits, and Edible Flowers
By: Rose Marie Nichols McGee & Maggie Stuckey
Another one I picked up from the library on the recommendation of Get Rich Slowly. Now, container gardening isn't my primary focus... but not having the desire to have certain herbs like mint run mad through my postage stamp backyard, I inevitably have some plants in pots. And given that I have this longing for dwarf fruit trees, it seems similarly inevitable that I'll eventually get more. Now, the book doesn't strictly adhere to my favored organic techniques... but neither does it go with the "spray this, that, and the other pesticide" traditional gardening route. It is, in fact, significantly closer to organic gardening methodology than "traditional" gardening practices. The book goes into what plants can do well in containers and has lots of suggested themes for plant groupings based on both culinary and aesthetic bases. The section on vegetables is fairly good and standard, as is the one on fruits. Where this book excels, though, is its sections on herbs and on edible flowers. It covers stevia, and borage, and saffron crocuses, just to name a few oddballs. I have NEVER seen information on growing your own saffron before!
Since the authors are based out of Portland, Oregon, their instructions contain a lot of information on overwintering plants, which is of practically no use to me here in Southern California. In fact, regarding some plants they blatantly say "unless you live in Florida or Southern California" which was kind of amusing me since, well, I do... but I recognize that I live in a rare mild and extremely favorable climate, and that this information will be of a lot of use to a lot of people. And, really, best that the authors write about what they know than conjecture about foreign climes. The tome is fairly hefty at 448 pages, but I think it's definitely worth picking up, and it's gotten put on my "to buy" list. Recommended.
By: Rose Marie Nichols McGee & Maggie Stuckey
Another one I picked up from the library on the recommendation of Get Rich Slowly. Now, container gardening isn't my primary focus... but not having the desire to have certain herbs like mint run mad through my postage stamp backyard, I inevitably have some plants in pots. And given that I have this longing for dwarf fruit trees, it seems similarly inevitable that I'll eventually get more. Now, the book doesn't strictly adhere to my favored organic techniques... but neither does it go with the "spray this, that, and the other pesticide" traditional gardening route. It is, in fact, significantly closer to organic gardening methodology than "traditional" gardening practices. The book goes into what plants can do well in containers and has lots of suggested themes for plant groupings based on both culinary and aesthetic bases. The section on vegetables is fairly good and standard, as is the one on fruits. Where this book excels, though, is its sections on herbs and on edible flowers. It covers stevia, and borage, and saffron crocuses, just to name a few oddballs. I have NEVER seen information on growing your own saffron before!
Since the authors are based out of Portland, Oregon, their instructions contain a lot of information on overwintering plants, which is of practically no use to me here in Southern California. In fact, regarding some plants they blatantly say "unless you live in Florida or Southern California" which was kind of amusing me since, well, I do... but I recognize that I live in a rare mild and extremely favorable climate, and that this information will be of a lot of use to a lot of people. And, really, best that the authors write about what they know than conjecture about foreign climes. The tome is fairly hefty at 448 pages, but I think it's definitely worth picking up, and it's gotten put on my "to buy" list. Recommended.
