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Full Product Details

Author:   Charlie Nardozzi ,  The Editors of the National Gardening Association
Publisher:   John Wiley and Sons Ltd
Imprint:   John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Edition:   2nd Edition
Dimensions:   Width: 19.10cm , Height: 2.10cm , Length: 23.80cm
Weight:   0.726kg
ISBN:  

9780470498705

ISBN 10:   0470498706
Pages:   384
Publication Date:   04 September 2009
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Unknown
Availability:   In Print  
Limited stock is available. It will be ordered for you and shipped pending supplier's limited stock.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1 About This Book 1 Conventions Used in This Book 1 What You’re Not to Read 2 Foolish Assumptions 2 How This Book Is Organized 3 Part I: Digging Into the Basics of Vegetable Gardening 3 Part II: Vegging Out 3 Part III: Getting Down and Dirty in Your Vegetable Garden 3 Part IV: The Part of Tens 3 Icons Used in This Book 4 Where to Go from Here 4 Part I: Digging Into the Basics of Vegetable Gardening 5 Chapter 1: Vegetable Gardening 101 7 Why Have Your Own Vegetable Garden? 7 The Basics of Planning a Veggie Garden 8 A Cornucopia of Vegetables to Grow 8 Tomatoes 9 Peppers and eggplants 9 Carrots, onions, and potatoes 9 Peas and beans 10 Cucumbers, melons, pumpkins, and squash 10 Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, and cauliflower 11 Lettuce, spinach, Swiss chard, and specialty greens 11 An assortment of other great veggies 12 Non-vegetable edibles 12 Getting Down to Growing 12 Choosing between seeds and transplants 12 Working the soil 13 Keeping your garden growing and enjoying the rewards 13 Trying tips for an even bigger bounty 14 Chapter 2: The Popularity and Benefits of Vegetable Gardening 15 Food Gardening: It’s Popping Up Everywhere 15 A Few Good Reasons to Grow Your Own Food 16 Improve your health 17 Save some cash 17 Help the environment 19 Increase your quality of life 20 Chapter 3: Planning Your Veggie Garden 21 Deciding Where to Put Your Vegetable Garden 21 Considering different sites 22 Letting the sun shine on your plot 23 Checking your soil’s drainage 24 Understanding Veggie Varieties 25 Timing Your Planting Wisely 27 Some like it cool, some like it hot 28 Frost dates and the length of the growing season 28 Designing Your Garden 30 Deciding on hills, rows, or raised beds 30 Spacing your plantings properly 33 Following the paths 33 Sketching it out 34 Part II: Vegging Out 39 Chapter 4: Tomatoes: The King of Veggies 41 Checking Out Tomato Varieties 41 Enjoying classic red, round tomatoes 44 Surveying all the other colors of tomatoes 45 Sweetening the pot with cherry, grape, and pear tomatoes 46 Studying some saucy tomatoes 47 Introducing the tomato’s relatives 48 Growing Tomatoes with Ease 49 Jump-starting tomatoes 49 Planting, trellising, and pruning 49 Fertilizing and maintaining your plants 52 Eliminating pests and other problems 53 Harvesting tomatoes 56 Chapter 5: Meeting the Tomato’s Cousins: Peppers and Eggplants 57 Producing Plenty of Peppers 58 Those sweet bells 58 Long and round sweet peppers 60 Peppers that turn on the heat 61 Pretty peppers: The ornamentals 64 Distinguishing Eggplants by Shape 65 Large and oval 65 Cylindrical 65 Small and round 66 Growing Peppers and Eggplants 67 A few guidelines for starting and planting 67 Fertilizing and watering tips 68 Pest patrol 69 Harvesting tips 69 Chapter 6: Growing Underground Crops: Carrots, Onions, and Potatoes 71 A Rabbit’s (and Gardener’s) Favorite Root: Carrots 71 Classifying carrots by type 72 Examining some carrot varieties 73 Onions: The Bulbs with Layers of Sweet and Pungent Goodness 74 Choosing your onion varieties 75 Looking at scallions and perennial onions 76 Potatoes: No Longer a Boring Spud 78 Potatoes classified 78 Selecting a few potato varieties 79 Growing and Gathering Root Crops 80 General guidelines for all your root crops 80 Cultivating carrots 81 Growing onions 82 Producing potatoes 83 Keeping Your Root Crops Healthy and Pest-Free 86 Chapter 7: Sweet and Simple: Beans and Peas 89 A Bevy of Beans: Filling Your Rows with Bean Family Plants 90 Bushels of bush beans 91 Pole beans: The long and tall crop 92 The versatile shell and dried beans 93 Miscellaneous beans not to be forgotten 94 More Peas, Please! 96 English peas: The reliable standby 96 Sweet and tender snap peas 97 An earlier harvest: Snow peas 98 Get ’Em in the Ground: Growing Beans and Peas 98 Planting legumes for an ample harvest 99 Thwarting pests and diseases 102 Keep on pickin’: Harvesting your crop 103 Chapter 8: Vigorous Vines: Cucumbers, Melons, Pumpkins, and Squash 105 Checking Out Cool Cukes 106 Before you choose: Brushing up on some cucumber vocabulary 106 Surveying common cucumber varieties 107 Melons: The Sweet, Juicy Vining Plant 108 Distinguishing different types of melons 109 Perusing popular melon varieties 109 Unearthing the Humble Squash 111 Different squash types 111 Popular squash varieties 113 Great Pumpkins: Counting the Uses for This Versatile Squash 114 Growing Those Vines 116 Planting and feeding 116 Water, water, water! 118 Ensuring proper pollination 118 Controlling pests and diseases 120 Harvesting your vining crop 121 Chapter 9: Cool Weather Staples: Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Cabbage, and Cauliflower 123 Paying Attention to the Often-Overlooked Cole Crops 123 Easing into cole crops with broccoli 124 Brussels sprouts: The little cabbages 126 Choosing cabbage: The age-old and dependable cole crop 127 Considering cauliflower in a rainbow of colors 129 Growing Your Own Cole Crops 130 Giving cole crops what they want 130 Nurturing cole crops 132 Putting a stop to pesky pest problems 133 Harvesting cole crops 134 Chapter 10: A Salad for All Seasons: Lettuce, Spinach, Swiss Chard, and Specialty Greens 137 Lettuce Get Together 138 Crisphead lettuce 138 Romaine lettuce 140 Loose-head lettuce 140 Loose-leaf lettuce 141 Popeye’s Pal: Spinach 141 Savoy spinach 142 Smooth spinach and some spinachlike friends 142 The Attractive and Hardy Swiss Chard 143 Going Wild with Specialty Greens 144 Growing Great Greens 146 Timing is everything: Determining when to plant your greens 146 Putting your greens to bed 148 Adding nitrogen-rich fi shy fertilizer 148 Thin and bare it: Thinning your greens 148 Watering to win the war against wilt 149 Working out the bugs (and other common ailments) 149 Your bowl runneth over: Harvesting greens 150 Chapter 11: Sweet Corn and an A to T of Other Worthy Veggies 151 Sweet Corn and Its Relatives 151 Sweet corn 152 Popcorn 154 A Variety of Other Great Vegetables 155 Arugula 155 Asparagus 156 Beets 158 Broccoli raab 159 Celeriac 160 Celery 160 Chinese cabbage 161 Collards 162 Endive 162 Escarole 163 Florence fennel 163 Garlic 164 Globe artichokes 166 Gourds 167 Horseradish 168 Kale 168 Kohlrabi 169 Leeks 170 Mizuna 171 Okra 171 Pac choi 172 Parsnips 172 Peanuts 173 Radicchio 174 Radishes 175 Rhubarb 176 Rutabagas 177 Shallots 178 Sunflowers 178 Turnips 179 Chapter 12: Growing Berries and Herbs for an Edible Landscape 181 Sweetening Your Landscape with Berries and Fruits 182 Strawberries 182 Blueberries 183 Blackberries and raspberries 183 Unusual fruits 184 Spicing Up Your Landscape with Herbs 185 Basil 186 Chives 187 Cilantro 188 Dill 189 French tarragon 190 Mint 190 Oregano 192 Parsley 192 Rosemary 193 Sage 194 Thyme 195 Making Your Landscape Blossom with Edible Flowers 196 Part III: Getting Down and Dirty in Your Vegetable Garden 197 Chapter 13: On Your Mark, Get Set Grow! 199 Choosing Seeds or Transplants 200 Deciding on Your Seeding Method and Decoding a Seed Packet 201 Starting Seeds Indoors 202 Picking a pot to plant in 203 Using a mix that doesn’t include soil 204 Sowing your seeds 204 Providing the right amount of light and heat 206 Watering your seedlings 207 Thinning and transplanting indoors 208 Feeding your seedlings 209 Transplanting Indoor Seedlings and Starter Plants 210 Buying starter plants 210 Toughening up all types of transplants 211 Making the big move to the ground 212 Sowing Seeds Directly in Your Garden 214 Deciding on a seed-planting method 214 Thinning seedlings in your garden 218 Chapter 14: Workin’ the Dirt 219 Razing Your Garden Spot 219 Killing weeds and aggressive grasses 220 Stripping sod 222 Analyzing and Improving Your Soil 223 Distinguishing different types of soil 223 Testing your soil 225 Adjusting soil pH 226 Adding organic matter (aka the dead stuff) 228 Turning Your Soil 231 Making Your Own Compost 232 Building a compost pile 233 Avoiding materials that don’t belong in a compost pile 234 Moistening and turning your compost pile 235 Chapter 15: Maintaining Your Vegetable Garden 237 Introducing Your Inner Gardener to the Watering Basics 238 Knowing when your veggies need a drink 239 Discovering ways to water your vegetable garden 240 Conserving water with a few handy tips 246 Keeping Your Plants Cozy and Weed Free with Mulch 247 Spreading organic mulch 247 Laying inorganic mulch 249 Deciding which mulch to use 251 Determining Important Nutrients Your Soil Needs 252 Macronutrients 252 Secondary nutrients and micronutrients 254 Fertilizing Your Vegetable Garden 254 Examining a fertilizer label 255 Choosing a fertilizer 256 Side-dressing 257 Give ’Em Something to Lean On: Supporting Your Vegetables 260 Beans and peas 260 Melons and cucumbers 262 Tomatoes 262 Fighting Weed Wars 263 Making a preemptive strike on weeds 263 Battling weeds after planting 264 Chapter 16: Surveying Some Cool Farmer Techniques 265 Adding Nutrients and Stability with Cover Crops and Green Manures 265 Choosing cover crops 266 Planting cover crops 267 Giving Your Plants Some Friends: Companion Planting 268 Making Your Garden Work Double Time with Intercropping 270 Succession Planting for an Extended Harvest 270 Rotating Crops to Preserve Soil Nutrients and Maintain a Pest-Free Bed 272 Planting by the Phases of the Moon 273 Chapter 17: Keeping Your Plants Healthy 275 The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Controlling Pests 275 In with the good bugs 276 The bad-bug roundup 277 Methods of attack 282 Gardening to Eliminate Diseases 285 Avoiding diseases with good habits 285 Watching out for common diseases 286 Keeping the Animal Kingdom at Bay 287 Chapter 18: Containing Your Veggies 291 Considering a Few Container Characteristics 292 Filling Up Your Container: Potting Soil Made Simple 294 Knowing Which Vegetables Grow Well in Pots 294 Some common container veggies 295 Some bee-u-tee-ful vegetable combos 297 Planting Your Veggies in Pots 297 Caring for Container Veggies 298 Experimenting with Greenhouses, Hoop Houses, and Hydroponics 300 Chapter 19: Harvesting, Storing, and Preserving Vegetables 301 Knowing When to Harvest 301 Putting Away Your Vegetables 304 Freezing, Drying, and Canning Veggies 307 Saving Vegetable Seeds 308 Part IV: The Part of Tens 311 Chapter 20: Ten Tools of the Trade 313 Watering Hoses and Cans 314 Hand Trowels 314 Hand Cultivators 315 Garden Hoes 315 Spades and Shovels 316 Garden Forks 317 Garden Rakes 317 Buckets, Wagons, and Baskets 317 Wheelbarrows and Garden Carts 319 Power Tillers 319 Chapter 21: Nearly Ten Ways to Extend Your Growing Season 321 Choose Clever Planting Locations 321 Time Your Planting Wisely 322 Protect Plants with Hot Caps 322 Add Elegance to Your Garden with Glass Cloches 323 Buy or Build Cold Frames 323 Drape Row Covers over Veggies 325 Place Wall O’ Waters around Plants 325 Try Portable Greenhouses and Hoop Houses 326 Appendix: Planning Guidelines and Other Resources 327 Guidelines for Planting 327 Frost Dates and the Length of the Growing Season 332 Hardiness Zones in North America 335 Where to Find Seeds and Other Resources 336 Vegetables, herbs, and flowers 336 Seed savers 341 Fruits and berries 342 Tools and supplies 343 U.S. and Canadian Master Gardeners 345 Web Sites about Vegetables 348 State sites 349 Cyber veggies 350 Index 351

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Charlie Nardozzi has worked for more than 20 years bringing expert gardening information to home gardeners through the printed page, the Internet, radio, and television. He is currently a radio show host and a guest expert on many nationally syndicated radio shows such as Martha Stewart Living Radio. He was the host for PBS's Garden Smart and has been a gardening expert on other television shows such as HGTV's Today at Home.

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