When I told my mother (a master gardener) that I was going to get serious about gardening, she told me to go find this book by Mel Bartholomew and she'd send me the money to buy it. That's a pretty amazing recommendation! It truly is a new approach to gardening - no tiller, no hoeing, no back-breaking work - all in a quarter of the space. Obviously, I haven't used all of his techniques yet (hey, this is just my first year of serious gardening), but every one I have used has worked! The soil is amazing! My only complaint is that the vermiculite is expensive, but it is a one time per garden investment. Next year when I put in another square foot garden (or as the author refers to it, SFG), I'll buy the vermiculite online - I found it cheaper there. There really is very little weeding and it's a snap with this soil. I have a huge elm tree which, with the help of the OKC winds, deposited tons of seeds in my garden and, in my new fertile soil, they immediately sprouted; but you really can pull them out with just two fingers. Every time I passed my garden I'd just reach down and pick out a few, so they never became a problem. Basically everything I've tried from this book really does what the author says it will do - makes gardening easy (or, in my case, easier) and a lot more fun and productive. I didn't use his vertical gardening technique on my tomatoes and wished I had. I didn't make the same mistake on the cantaloupe; it's growing right up an SFG frame as I write. I'm going to take the author's advice, get out my SFG book this winter, and plan next year's garden in advance - using as many of his techniques as I can. (Oh yes, there's also an SFG video I checked out from the library, which was very helpful for a visual learner like me.)
Monday, July 11, 2011
All New Square Foot Gardening (Review)
***** (RM) If you can only get one gardening book, get this one.
When I told my mother (a master gardener) that I was going to get serious about gardening, she told me to go find this book by Mel Bartholomew and she'd send me the money to buy it. That's a pretty amazing recommendation! It truly is a new approach to gardening - no tiller, no hoeing, no back-breaking work - all in a quarter of the space. Obviously, I haven't used all of his techniques yet (hey, this is just my first year of serious gardening), but every one I have used has worked! The soil is amazing! My only complaint is that the vermiculite is expensive, but it is a one time per garden investment. Next year when I put in another square foot garden (or as the author refers to it, SFG), I'll buy the vermiculite online - I found it cheaper there. There really is very little weeding and it's a snap with this soil. I have a huge elm tree which, with the help of the OKC winds, deposited tons of seeds in my garden and, in my new fertile soil, they immediately sprouted; but you really can pull them out with just two fingers. Every time I passed my garden I'd just reach down and pick out a few, so they never became a problem. Basically everything I've tried from this book really does what the author says it will do - makes gardening easy (or, in my case, easier) and a lot more fun and productive. I didn't use his vertical gardening technique on my tomatoes and wished I had. I didn't make the same mistake on the cantaloupe; it's growing right up an SFG frame as I write. I'm going to take the author's advice, get out my SFG book this winter, and plan next year's garden in advance - using as many of his techniques as I can. (Oh yes, there's also an SFG video I checked out from the library, which was very helpful for a visual learner like me.)
When I told my mother (a master gardener) that I was going to get serious about gardening, she told me to go find this book by Mel Bartholomew and she'd send me the money to buy it. That's a pretty amazing recommendation! It truly is a new approach to gardening - no tiller, no hoeing, no back-breaking work - all in a quarter of the space. Obviously, I haven't used all of his techniques yet (hey, this is just my first year of serious gardening), but every one I have used has worked! The soil is amazing! My only complaint is that the vermiculite is expensive, but it is a one time per garden investment. Next year when I put in another square foot garden (or as the author refers to it, SFG), I'll buy the vermiculite online - I found it cheaper there. There really is very little weeding and it's a snap with this soil. I have a huge elm tree which, with the help of the OKC winds, deposited tons of seeds in my garden and, in my new fertile soil, they immediately sprouted; but you really can pull them out with just two fingers. Every time I passed my garden I'd just reach down and pick out a few, so they never became a problem. Basically everything I've tried from this book really does what the author says it will do - makes gardening easy (or, in my case, easier) and a lot more fun and productive. I didn't use his vertical gardening technique on my tomatoes and wished I had. I didn't make the same mistake on the cantaloupe; it's growing right up an SFG frame as I write. I'm going to take the author's advice, get out my SFG book this winter, and plan next year's garden in advance - using as many of his techniques as I can. (Oh yes, there's also an SFG video I checked out from the library, which was very helpful for a visual learner like me.)
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