Starting with the basics of organic gardening, such as how to prepare soil and the importance of cover crops and organic fertilizer, here—in full-color—are the principles of companion planting, how plants interact, and how to cultivate a healthy garden.Companion planting techniques have been used for centuries to facilitate better, more nutritious, and more abundant crops. Did you know:Beets will grow better if surrounded by mint or garlic,T...

A practical and beautiful guide to companion planting for organic gardening successCompanion planting techniques have been used for centuries to facilitate better, more nutritious, and more abundant crops. With Companion Planting, you’ll have all the information you need in clear, concise terms and with charts and garden plans you can copy or modify to suit your family’s needs.Starting with the basics of organic gardening, such as how to prepare qu...

Using this simple step-by-step guidebook discover how to produce fresh, organic food for your family—all year round!This comprehensive guide to homesteading provides all the information you need to grow and preserve a sustainable harvest of grains and vegetables; raise animals for meat, eggs, and dairy; and keep honey bees for your sweeter days. With easy-to-follow instructions on canning, drying, and pickling, you’ll enjoy your backyard bounty all winter long....

Stretch the gardening season with intensive planting techniques, cold-weather care tips, and vegetable varieties picked for flavor and growing success.Even in winter’s coldest months you can harvest fresh, delicious produce. Drawing on insights gained from years of growing vegetables in Nova Scotia, Niki Jabbour shares her simple techniques for gardening throughout the year. Learn how to select the best varieties for each season, the art of succession planting, and...

"[A] step-by-step approach to container gardening . . . Smith's practical, assuring, timely, and handsomely produced how-to will see brisk traffic." — Booklist (starred review)Harvest tomatoes on a patio, produce a pumpkin in a planter, and grow broccoli on a balcony! Bestselling author Ed Smith shows you everything you need to know to successfully create and care for an edible container garden, from choosing the right pla...

In this authoritative guide, Ed Smith shares how to grow a thriving and bountiful vegetable garden through his high-yield method that emphasizes wide rows, organic methods, raised beds, and deep soil.Succeed with fussy plants, try new and unusual varieties, and learn how to innovatively extend your growing season. With thorough profiles of hundreds of popular varieties, The Vegetable Gardener’s Bible provides expert information and an inspiring roadmap for...

Learn how to artfully incorporate organic vegetables, fruits, and herbs into an attractive garden design with this stylish, beautifully photographed guide.We’ve all seen the vegetable garden overflowing with corn, tomatoes, and zucchini that looks good for a short time, but then quickly turns straggly and unattractive (usually right before friends show up for a backyard barbecue). If you want to grow food but you don’t want your yard to look like a farm, what can y...

The Weekend Homesteader is organized by month—so whether it’s January or June you’ll find exciting, short projects that you can use to dip your toes into the vast ocean of homesteading without getting overwhelmed. If you need to fit homesteading into a few hours each weekend and would like to have fun while doing it, these projects will be right up your alley, whether you live on a forty-acre farm, a postage-stamp lawn in suburbia, or a high rise.You'll learn about backyar...

Packed with step-by-step instructions, useful tips, time-honored wisdom, and both illustrations and photographs, this might just be the most comprehensive guide to back to basics living ever published. Fans of Back to Basics, Homesteading, and Self-Sufficiency have been asking for a one-stop resource for all the subjects covered in that successful series. In response, Gehring has compiled a massive, beautifully presented, single volume that covers canning and pre...

This compact guide provides advice, tips, and step-by-step instructions for hundreds of projects, offering the entire family the tools they need to make the shift toward self-sufficient living. Readers will learn to dip candles, bake bread, make maple syrup, start a vineyard, and much more. With special features for young homesteaders, this is an essential family guide to self-sufficient living.- Bake Pies, Cakes, and Bread- Grow Vegetables yy Raise Chickens- Keep Be...

Don’t throw out your kitchen scraps—grow them! With clear illustrations and step-by-step instructions, this innovative guide shows you how to cultivate 68 common shoots, seeds, pits, roots, and tubers that might otherwise end up in the compost bin.Why throw away your food scraps when you could grow them into thriving plants? From carrots to caraway seeds and avocados to almonds, have fun transforming fruits, nuts, herbs, spices, and more into houseplants. Dozens of...

Do you live in an apartment with a balcony, fire escape or rooftop terrace? Most city dwellers neglect these spaces or use them for nothing more than hanging laundry and storing bicycles. And for a long time, so did I.Several years ago I decided to transform my under-used balcony from a lifeless concrete pad into a little garden in the sky. Every year I grow a small harvest of vegetables such as tomatoes, peppers, beans and peas, and more than enough herbs to satisfy our culinary n...