Product Description

The author of Bugs, Slugs, & Other Thugs shares her years of practical experience and imaginative, time-tested ideas for saving money and cutting costs in the garden, and explains why some plants make better investments than others.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1367967 in Books
• Published on: 1995-01-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 176 pages

From Booklist
Hart offers readers advice on buying the most cost-effective garden tools and less-expensive seeds and plants, on collecting and storing seeds, and on taking cuttings from your plants (rather than buying new ones in the spring). The author lists plants best suited to various climatic conditions; disease-resistant varieties ; and drought-tolerant, cold-tolerant, and heat-tolerant plants. She also presents readers with a list of money-saving vegetables, herbs, shrubs, and flowers. A chapter on plant wellness ("healthy plants are productive plants" ) deals with fertilizers, composts, pest and disease prevention, crop rotation, and beneficial insects. There are also tips on making garden benches, birdbaths, ponds, and cold frames and on low-cost watering strategies. George Cohen

From the Back Cover
Create the landscape of your dreams -- from just a dirt-cheap investment! Producing a beautiful yard and a bountiful garden doesn't have to cost a fortune. Gardners really can "have it all," says Master Gardener Rhonda Massingham Hart, and they really can get something for nothing. In Dirt-Cheap Gardening, Hart shares years of practical experience and imaginative, time-tested ideas for saving money and cutting costs.

Dirt-Cheap Gardening offers a wealth of tips, tricks, and hints on how to:
-- Reuse and recycle to save in the yard and garden
-- Identify and acquire useful tools
-- Avoid tools that are useless "toys"
-- Institute low-cost ways of assuring healthy plants
-- Buy, save, and start seeds
-- Obtain plants for free -- or at least as best buys
-- Find money-saving plant varieties
-- Create inexpensive garden accents and accessories
-- Evaluate which plants make a better investment than others

About the Author
A former Master Gardener, Rhonda Massingham Hart is the author of such books as Bugs, Slugs & Other Thugs, Deer Proofing Your Yard & Garden, Squirrel Proofing Your Home & Garden and Dirt-Cheap Gardening, as well as Easter Eggs--By the Dozens!, You Can Carve Fantastic Jack-O-Lanterns, North Coast Roses, and Trellising. She has also written many bulletins. Rhonda has been published in a variety of magazines, including Flower & Garden, Woman's Day Better Living Series and Fine Gardening magazines. Her desire to deer- and squirrel-proof comes from her mutual respect for people and animals and from a desire to incorporate wildlife into our yards and lives. She has lectured extensively on pest proofing and organic gardening techniques and taught continuing adult education classes at her local community college. Bugs and dirt are in her blood!

Rhonda is also Co-Publisher and Editor of "The Gaited Horse", a national magazine covering all breeds of gaited horses. She lives in Washington with her children, Lance and Kailah, and her new husband Daymond and his daughter, Sarah.

Customer Reviews

Excellent read!!! very informative and helpful and creative.
this book gives all kinds of helpful advice and can definetly save you all kinds of money. It cuts to the chase and does not waste any of your time. I would recommend it highly.

This is an informative guide to tight-wad gardening.
What? Another gardening book? This book, "Dirt Cheap Gardening, Hundreds of Ways to Save Money in Your Garden," is a guide that every gardener needs, whether or not he already owns other gardening books. It has some very practical advice, from starting seeds inexpensively, to drying your own produce. Rhonda Massingham Hart, the author, packs a lot of info into this paperback of only 166 pages. You can skim-read it in an evening, and the information you read will help you with your gardening all year. This book mostly covers vegetable gardening, harvesting, and storage. If you are an avid gardener who enjoys saving money, too, this book is for you.