Garden Library

Here are my two favorite books to use when working in the garden:

1) Good Bug, Bad Bug: Who's Who, What They Do, and How to Manage Them Organically (All You Need to Know about the Insects in Your Garden)

by Jessica Walliser

This book has full-color photos of 36 bugs that one might find in the garden. There are easy to understand instructions and advice about how to attract "good" bugs to the garden and ward off the "bad" bugs without using pesticides.

My favorite example of a time when this book was useful to me was when we found a bad bug with good bugs on it. The bad bug was a horned caterpillar with aphidius wasp eggs on top of him. Although the caterpillar was harmful to the garden, the aphidius wasps were much more helpful, so we let him stay!

2) The Vegetable Gardener's Bible

By Edward C. Smith

This book has how to information from seed to compost for all of the vegetables in our garden. He includes helpful tips about companion planting, composting, etc. When I need to plant a vegetable I have never planted before, I open this book and read his simple instructions.

When planting potatoes last year, this was particularly helpful. Potatoes need to be cut into 2 0z pieces so that you get as many seeds as possible. Each 2 oz piece needs at least 2 "eyes" in order for it to grow. During times of famine, people would save the potatoes that were seeds instead of eating them, because they knew that they could receive about 20 pounds of potatoes for every 2 oz seed.