Product Description

Here's a fully revised edition of this regional bestseller- considered to be the definitive food gardening manual for the Pacific Northwest. This is the bible of vegetable gardening for anyone turning the soil west of the Cascade Mountains-from Western British Columbia to Northern California. It includes the basics of soil, when best to plant, the art of composting, what varieties grow well here, which seed companies are reliable, information on handling pests, and an extensive section on the cultivation of each vegetable.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #561229 in Books
• Published on: 2002-01-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 368 pages

About the Author
Steve Solomon started the Territorial Seed Company and became a recognized expert on organic vegetable gardening. He has gardened in California and Oregon, and he continues to research the art and science of vegetable gardening.

Customer Reviews

The one essential book for the Northwest vegetable garden.
Steve Solomon, who founded Territorial Seed Company in 1980, is arguably the world's leading authority on non-commercial-scale organic vegetable gardening in the Pacific Northwest. Mr. Solomon has experimented with all of the variables in vegetable gardening, in our mild Maritime climate, and he reports the results with an admirable degree of honesty and integrity. His book - plus the Territorial Seed catalog - is all that's needed to achieve excellent garden results (for the first few years) with the least input of capital and labor.

That said, I've gardened in Seattle for 15 years, and Mr. Solomon's book has two serious flaws:

1. As other reviewers have noted, Mr. Solomon is dismissive of city gardening on a 200 or 400-square-foot plot. The city gardener must sift through many chapters of advice that applies only to homestead gardens of 1/2 acre or more.

2. After a few years the organic gardener will begin to experience mysterious crop failures - seeds that fail to germinate. Mr. Solomon attributes this failure to symphylan infestation - I suspect that soil-borne seed pathogens (Pythium, Rhizoctonia, etc.) may also play a part - but in any case, this book does not offer any viable solution for the CITY gardener. We city gardeners can hardly afford to garden on only half of our too-small plot, leaving the other half fallow for 3 or 4 years, waiting for the soil to return to equilibrium. (The Seattle Tilth trial gardens have suffered this fate, with no solution in sight.)

The BEST gardening book for the Pacific Northwest gardener!
This book is a must for every Northwest gardener, but I found it especially helful for a beginner like myself. Its very easy to follow and the author doesn't talk over the reader's head. I especially liked the focus on organic gardening. My vegetable gardens have been awesome since reading this book and following the basic guidelines given. I have given this book as a gift to family and friends and they have all loved it and the results it has made in their gardens. I would recommend it to any serious gardener in the Pacific Northwest!

A "Must" for gardeners
I love this book. It is so helpful in giving you hints on growing all sorts of vegetables. Especially valuable to me is the author's "super fertilizer mix" (my words) in which he suggests combinations of natural ingredients to supplement the soil. It works! Now, I mix his formula up and put in old garbage cans so I can always have it on hand to give my little veggies. And do they ever appreciate their "treats"! I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in gardening successfully and doing it in a respectful manner.