(Part 3) Best gardening & horticulture reference books according to redditors
We found 268 Reddit comments discussing the best gardening & horticulture reference books. We ranked the 70 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the products ranked 41-60. You can also go back to the previous section.
42. Improving Your Soil: A Practical Guide to Soil Management for the Serious Home Gardener
1 mention
I found TONS of great insight in the book The Woodland Homestead.
Written by a functional homesteader, who teaches forestry at a professional level.
Yes I do a lot of gardening. Flower gardens primarily and I was worried about it leaching into the soil. It's a controversial topic as far as beneficial strains of bacteria etc. in the success of plants. I can tell you though since I started using earthworm castings, mycorrhizae, humates and compost tea I've never had such success with plants taking root and just massive flower blooms and healthy plants. Maybe it's just I'm more experienced, at my age, but I'm pretty sure there's something to it. An interesting book if you have some time and are interested is Building Soil. Building Soil: A Down-to-Earth Approach: Natural Solutions for Better Gardens & Yards I've completely quit using chemical fertilizer and everything seems happier and more vigorous. YMMV of course....
Ich habe mir dieses Buch (Mason Bee Revolution) geholt und da steht von Standort, Lagerung und Umgang mit den Bienen im Winter alles drin. Leider nur bei Amazon gefunden.
Here's a serious tip. Buy a copy of the Ortho Home Gardener's Problem solver.
Given the publisher, you might think it's a book about how to sell more chemicals. But it's really not, it's useful to diagnose most things a home gardener is likely to encounter and has good pictures.
Barring that, you can bring a sample of whatever's going wrong in your garden (in a plastic bag) to your local nursery and ask them what's going on.
Don't overwater. Don't underwater.
https://www.amazon.ca/Reference-Manual-Woody-Plant-Propagation/dp/1604690046/ref=asc_df_1604690046/?tag=googlemobshop-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=293003695917&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=6732310301403138853&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1002265&hvtargid=pla-476646075092&psc=1
The reference manual for woody plant productions by dirr has a good section on grafting and covers all types of woody plant propagation.
https://www.amazon.com/Manual-Plant-Grafting-Techniques-Ornamentals/dp/1604694637
The manual for plant grafting technique also seems good but I do not own it so I'm not 100% on it.
If you want to breed veggies you want to breed sth. that you personally like eating (because you will need to taste all the trial grow outs), or sth. that doesn't exist yet.I grow dwarf tomatoes for window boxes and urban gardening that do not exist in Germany yet, black ones with old school flavours etc. The available varieties have little to no taste. In the US there are such varieties but not here. I also try to grow my own Pak Choi variety, a large green one that is hardy to both heat and very low temperatures, so I can grow it almost all season. Pak Choi is very expensive around here, and so I want to create a nice variety for the home gardener. I do some corn and potato breeding aswell, but this needs too much space, I am very limited at the moment.Secondly there are plants that are easier to breed than others. Or that need a higher number of individuals and thus much more space. The easiest plants to breed are such that are self-fertile and do not show inbreeding depression. Tomatoes and Chillies for example. Because if you want to stabilize a variety you need to make all your plants look the same, have the same genes. The fastest way to achieve this is by pollinating the plants with themselves, grow out the seeds, select what your looking for, take the self-pollinated seeds from this plant, grow them out again , select again... and so on. With every generation the traits become more and more stable, all the seeds from these plants look more and more alike. Corn for example is more difficult, because they quite quickly suffer from inbreeding depression. In other words, if you pollinate the plant with itself too much, or you just have too few plants to cross it with (a small gene pool) then the plants basically go retarded, their growth stunts, the fruit do not develop properly, they get sick. So here you need a higher number of individuals because they need to be outcrossed, somewhere between 100 and 500 individual plants, so this would need a small field already. Also, you would need to control pollination with bags and such, so they do not pollinate themselves, or get pollinated by plants from a field nearby that would destroy your efforts.
Another thing that can give you quick results are plants who are usually propagated by clones. Things you do not multiply from seed. Strawberries or potatoes for example. For example, If you want to make your own potato variety then, all you need to find are two compatible potatoe varieties that can produce viable seeds (many varieties have lost this ability) then you grow them into plants, and then you can plant the resulting small tubers for another generation and taste test them. If by chance, and there is large variability in potatoes because most are tetraploid, you created a variety that you really like then you do not need to stabilize the variety at all, just plant and multiply the potatoe tubers. They are literally clones of your first plant.
So yeah, there is alot to read about selection methods, pollination tactics, genetics... I heard good things about a book I might buy myself one day called "Breed Your Own Vegetable Varieties: The Gardener's and Farmer's Guide to Plant Breeding and Seed Saving, 2nd Edition" by Carol Deppe" , that's a good start I think. Other than that just pick sth. you like and find out how it is being bred professionally, all plants have their unique quirks and need different strategies to be bred.
I suggest you find a wiring schematic. Sounds like someone has made a mess of things. You can order the rebuild manual for the motor on Amazon. Mine had already been winterized and covered up otherwise I would take a peak and see what I have for wiring.
Evinrude/Johnson 85-300 HP... https://www.amazon.com/dp/0892878576?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share
Probably a lot depends on how much effort you want to devote to it. If you’re using your own soil then I would start by learning what kind of quality and capabilities your soil can support as well as looking into historical weather information to get an idea of what to expect temp and humidity wise.
Here’s a book I recommend for learning the soil
Improving Your Soil
This book would help me out a ton. Thanks for the contest!
Here is a good starter book http://www.amazon.com/dp/1591865484
You can use this method for small containers that you put on your balcony.
And a good reference book http://www.amazon.com/dp/1603424768
Good luck!
I bought this one and for me it seems like a really good introductory book. It covers the basics. And has tips for saving money, which is always nice!
The Dirt-Cheap Green Thumb: 400 Thrifty Tips for Saving Money, Time, and Resources as You Garden https://www.amazon.com/dp/1603424415/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_LN9GzbP2EPE43
I had this as a kid. It's big, illustrated, and really got me going in botany.
https://www.amazon.com/Botanica-Illustrated-Z-Garden-Cultivate/dp/1566491754
Check out The All You Can Eat Gardening Handbook. It's a great next step up from the square foot gardening and probably more tuned to the space you have. Also, the entire last half detailed plants varieties, pests, tips for success, and other useful information.
I'd also check out some of the information on companion planting, but in reality companion planting seems to vary widely depending on where exactly you are and so doesn't always work the way you'd expect.
I like: http://www.amazon.com/Your-Farm-City-Urban-Dwellers-Growing/dp/1579128629
I can highly recommend, How Plants Work, when you're done with those. So much to learn!
Northwest Gardening Made Easy by Ed Hume is one of my favorite gardening books. I picked it up when I moved to the Portland area and I use it every season.
I am in 5A (not that far off) and I found this book to be pretty comprehensive, but still manageable and well organized.
I had about 1,000 worms in each of my bins and I did 3 bins.
I think these are the ones I got
https://www.lowes.com/pd/COMMANDER-17-Gallon-68-Quart-Black-Tote-with-Standard-Snap-Lid/1000198647
They are a bit big but I wanted to go bigger than smaller. I won't know how well they did till Spring when I can clean them out and weigh my worms. But it seems to me like I have a lot more and I haven't had them for even a full year yet.
I got this book and it really helped me.
https://www.amazon.com/Worms-Eat-Garbage-35th-Anniversary/dp/1612129471/ref=pd_sim_14_5/132-2530735-0125645?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1612129471&pd_rd_r=96a66bfb-2fd1-11e9-830a-437408ec868c&pd_rd_w=NDVs6&pd_rd_wg=iwN5o&pf_rd_p=90485860-83e9-4fd9-b838-b28a9b7fda30&pf_rd_r=Z1RKN2FVJ9CDD789VSD9&psc=1&refRID=Z1RKN2FVJ9CDD789VSD9
http://www.amazon.com/Gardening-Free-Range-Chickens-Dummies-Bonnie/dp/1118547543/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1458198551&tag=hotogobr-20&sr=8-4&keywords=how+to+garden+for+dummies
And this guy:
http://www.amazon.com/Wilderness-Survival-Dummies-Cameron-Smith/dp/0470453060?tag=hotogobr-20&sr=8-4&keywords=how+to
Also some related ebooks on popular torrent sites