Amidst the bumper crop of new food-gardening titles, Backyard Bounty : The Complete Guide to Year-Round Organic Gardening in the Pacific Northwest by Salt Spring Island, B.C. resident Linda Gilkeson stands apart. I put three recent edible plant titles by Northwest authors to the test by trying to find answers to commonly asked questions in them. Whether you are a beginning gardener or an experienced (or jaded!) old hand, this book will neither insult your intelligence nor blind you in a blizzard of technicalities. If you want to know about soil in raised beds, what to grow over the winter, or how to protect your grapes from predacious raccoons, this is the place. Though it lacks photos of primped and prinked up fruit and veggie glamour, the information is well-organized and clearly presented. I learned enough from reading it that I may just have to own a copy.
Keyword: Reviews
The Gossler Guide to the Best Hardy Shrubs
![[The Gossler Guide to the Best Hardy Shrubs] cover](https://depts.washington.edu/hortlib/graphix/gosslerguide.jpg)
I have long enjoyed the folksy but information packed annual catalogs from Gossler Farms Nursery in Springfield, Oregon. It is a great pleasure to now have the first book by the family (mom Marjory and sons Roger and Eric Gossler), The Gossler Guide to the Best Hardy Shrubs. Here the very practical, learned-by-experience descriptions of the catalog are expanded to 350 of their favorites, and all would make a good choice for local gardens.
The highlight of the introductory chapters is “How Not to Kill Your Plants” with lots of advice on how to select, buy, plant, and nurture your new shrubby children. “Consider it an open adoption: you want to know about the birth parents, what neighborhood the plant came from, whether drugs were involved, and so on.” This same professional insiders advice continues in the A-Z listings, where I learned that a favorite of mine, Enkianthus perulatus, is rarely found in nurseries “…because it grows too slowly to be profitable.”
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
In My Nature: A Birder’s Year at the Montlake Fill
![[In My Nature] cover](https://depts.washington.edu/hortlib/graphix/inmynature.jpg)
“In My Nature: A Birder’s Year at the Montlake Fill” describes the wonderful bird life of the area also known as the Union Bay Natural Area at the Center for Urban Horticulture.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
Living With Bugs
![[Living with Bugs] cover](https://depts.washington.edu/hortlib/graphix/livingwithbugs.jpg)
“Living With Bugs” concentrates on the critters that find their way into your house, but there are valuable tips on co-existing for gardeners, too.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
Pacific Northwest Native Plant Habitat Garden Manual
“Pacific Northwest Native Plant Habitat Garden Manual” is a short, loose-leaf bound notebook intended to give the basics for teachers and students establishing school gardens using natives.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
The Collector
For a total change of pace, pick up Jack Nisbet’s “The Collector.” Although written in the third person, the story-telling is so good that it reads like a memoir by one of the most influential of the early plant explorers to our region. David Douglas was a keen observer of all things in the natural world, but especially the plant kingdom, and had a natural talent for the recording, collecting, and preserving what he found. And what energy! From 1823 until his tragic death in 1834, Scotsman Douglas was almost constantly exploring the new world, risking many hazards of travels and meeting many interesting people in both academic and frontier life.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
Mushrooms of the Pacific Northwest
“Mushrooms of the Pacific Northwest” is another in the fine series of Timber Press Field Guide. Like earlier works on wildflowers and insects, it’s well designed to be a good field companion with a coated cover, a ruler on the back, and frequently needed facts easily found on the inside covers.
Particularly good is the long introduction which addresses subjects from the ecology of mushroom-fungi, the hazards of hunting in the Pacific Northwest, to “How to avoid becoming a poisoning statistic.” Unlike many field guides, the text in the descriptive encyclopedia is in narrative form, rather than having set descriptive elements for each species. Not being a mushroom hunter, I can’t vouch for the effectiveness at identification by this approach, but I found it enjoyable reading.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
Greening Cities, Growing Communities
“Greening Cities, Growing Communities” is a case study of community gardens in Seattle. Written by landscape architects, this book is an excellent tool for supporters of community gardens in making their case in language understandable to urban planners and policy makers. For those of us already convinced, the breadth of activities at the profiled gardens will be surprising, and you could use this book as a unique travel guide to the Emerald City.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
The Climate Conscious Gardener
“The Climate Conscious Gardener” is the latest in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden Guides for a Greener Planet. While most of the contributing authors live in the Northeast, one of the five chapters, “Turning Your Landscape into a Carbon Sink,” was written by Arboretum Foundation staff member Niall Dunne. To give an objective perspective, I’ll quote from a review in HortIdeas (published by Greg and Pat Williams in Gravel Switch, Kentucky — so no regional bias here): “Dunne’s chapter alone is worth getting the book…with valuable information on numerous techniques for sequestering carbon in backyard gardens. Wouldn’t it be great if amateurs throughout the U.S. could keep a really huge amount of carbon out of the atmosphere?”
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.
The Informed Gardener Blooms Again
Linda Chalker-Scott debunks many gardening practices that don’t work in “The Informed Gardener Blooms Again,” a sequel to her excellent “The Informed Gardener” from 2008. The format is very similar to the first book, built around a series of short chapters with Sherlock Holmesian titles (“The Myth of the Magic Bullet”, “The Myth of Nitrogen-nabbing Wood Chips”) that analyze horticultural fads and home remedies from an applied, scientific perspective. After a thorough discussion of the research, a helpful summary (“The Bottom Line”) follows, along with references to support her conclusions.
Chalker-Scott clearly has a passion for bringing science based, best practices to both home gardens and professional landscapes, as she has also edited and published “Sustainable Landscapes & Gardens: Good Science-Practical Application.” Divided into five, separately bound units–all housed in a three-ring binder–this work has contributors from major universities throughout the Pacific Northwest.
The audience here could be either the home gardener or the professional who designs, installs, or maintains landscape plantings. The writing, while technical, is well-edited for readability for the non-academic reader and teaches not only better horticulture, but also about the research process that generates this advice. The format is designed for easily added updates and additions, so this is likely to be an important reference for our region for a long time.
Excerpted from the Fall 2010 Arboretum Bulletin.