Gardening Books

We've spent lots of time this winter learning as much as we can about vegetable gardening. The internet has always been our main resource for learning new things.  (We enjoy do-it-yourself projects and spend time reading about what other people have done before attempting anything ourselves).

We quickly realized that many websites didn't seem as easy to navigate as books. (Or maybe we just haven't found a website that we really like yet). I think that since we are starting from the beginning, we need information organized in different manner. It's so easy to get distracted and jump ahead on a webpage. A book is organized so you can very easily navigate through the whole process and find where you were if do happen to jump ahead.

So far we've been using two main books to guide us through our planning and research.

1. Gardening with Ed Hume: Northwest Gardening Made Easy, written by Ed Hume

This book has been really helpful since the focus is on the region we live in. We're learning what plants might not grow as well here, which plants should grow well, when to plant everything and various other tips. We haven't read this book cover to cover. Whenever we have a question we just flip through to find the answer. (Although, then we usually end up reading extra sections because we think of new questions). This seems to work the best for us right now - it makes the learning process less overwhelming.

2. The Vegetable Gardener's Bible: Discover Ed's High-Yield W-O-R-D System for All North American Gardening Region, written by Edward C. Smith 

As you can see on the front cover to the left, Ed Smith's W-O-R-D system is an acronym for Wide Rows, Organic Methods, Raised Beds, and Deep Soil. We have noticed that his recommendations for spacing between plants is larger than some of Ed Hume's recommendation or those that we find online. We usually take the average of all the recommendations. It isn't often that the sources recommend the same. We've really enjoyed this book. It's helping us learn the whole process of planning, organizing, and growing a vegetable garden. Information is very easy to find.

Over the weekend we went to a bookstore to browse other gardening books. Here's a small list of the things we like to see in books:

-  Chapters organized in a logical manner (ie, the process of gardening from beginning to end).

-  Pictures. I feel like a child wanting a picture book but I think it's really helpful for the beginning gardener.

-  The average yield from each plant. This is probably the information that has been the most difficult to find! A lot of books recommend X amount of feet of plants per person, but we want to know how much to expect off each of those plants. We plan on keeping track of our yield this year. 

-  Key information boxes for each plant. These boxes allow for the reader to quickly find answers to their questions and are a way to keep important information organized. This box often contains information such as companion planting, spacing between plants, and the required hours of sunlight. 

-  A long-term source. Some of the books were so simplistic we don't think it would be useful after a year or two. While we do admit we're beginners, we also want a book that we can grow with as we gain experience. We don't want to have to purchase a new book every few years. 

What gardening resources do you use? Do you have a website you love? Are there any books you recommend (especially for beginners!)?