Gardening Books

[burnie]

I've stickied this and moved it so that it can include all gardening books, not just veggies for reference.

[veggiechicken]

I have too many gardening books - almost as many as packets of seeds.
Many of your recommendations are familiar from my book shelves!
I like Joy Larkcom's books (straight to the point, minimal waffle)
Charles Dowding's No dig diaries are good to follow through the year (if you want to be organised).
Gertrud Franck is "different" and I dip into her book quite often.
Most of my recent purchases have been permaculture, forest gardening, perennial veggies and edible ornamentals.
I've yet to find a gardener/writer who gardens "my way". I've no idea why.

[nickdub]

Seems you and I are the ones with the most books so far VC - I'm none too sure how many I have, but if you include horticulture related ones its probably around 300 I think.

As I said at the start of these posts, a better reader than a gardener in my case.

[veggiechicken]

I've just had a quick count - there were over 100 gardening-y books upstairs I thought there were about 20!!
As for downstairs
I found Shewell-Cooper's "Compost Gardening" amongst them. Don't remember reading that one! That's tonight's bedtime reading!

[Guest]

I have around 50ish books, but many are still to be read (wartime reprints, hotbed growing techniques etc). I agree with most of the books already listed. I tend to go towards specialist books and one not mentioned is Joy Larkcoms Oriental Veg.

Penny Woodward - Garlic and Friends. I had a big thing for alliums and this was the only book that made sense of things. Will never leave my bookshelf.
Hugh F-W - RCH No2, Preserves - I struggle what to do with things once I have grown them and have gone back to this book over and over. I have the set but this is the only tatty looking book
Amy Goldman - The Compleat Squash, also melons. Gorgeous pictures and wonderful information on varieties that can get anyone hooked. Not on my shelf but I would happily accept as a gift. (not one for growing techniques)

My sentimentals are my FiLs Percy Throwers Gardening Year I also have my Fils GYO magazines somewhere (not this GYO type) and my Dads The Big Book of Gardening Illustrated by Charles Boff

Edit: Another sentimental one - Dr Hessayon - the houseplant expert (signed), my Nanny won it on one of the many comps she used to enter along with pots of cutting gel. Anyone remember them? They were like pots of ready made jelly and you stuck your cuttings through the foil lid and got to see the roots grow. Strange what you remember.

[Penellype]

I have plenty of none-veg gardening books, although nowhere near 100. Some I have found useful are:
50 Ways to Kill a Slug - Sarah Ford (Some practical, some more for entertainment)
RHS Gardeners Encyclopedia of Plants and Flowers
Hot Beds - Jack Firth
Garden Design (smaller gardens) - Brian Leverett
The Good Plant Guide - Peter Seabrook (slim pocket sized book useful for identifying those eyecatching plants that you know very little about and somehow make their way into the garden centre trolley)

[Cadalot]

I've yet to find a gardener/writer who gardens "my way". I've no idea why.

Trust me VC you will never find one unless you write it and by the time the first edition is published it will already be superseded and in need of an update. I can see the title now "Growing Frank Sinatra Style - I Did It My Way!"

[casejones]

lets see books, magazines and newspaper articles.
books i say Amy Goldman:
the Compleat squash; melons for passionate grower and heirloom tomatoes

best garden system book :square foot gardening Mel Bartholomew.

best book for garden plans: ground breaking food gardens Niki Jabbour

best vegetable garden planning book : none so far

[veggiechicken]

"My" Book would be an Annual - "I did it My Way 2018" or better ""I'm intending to do it this way in 2018".
I'd publish it just before Chr****** and it would become as popular as the Beano Annual (showing my age) and be found in every thinking gardener's stockings.

[SelkirkAlex]

absolutely essential reading up here is Fruit and Vegetables for Scotland by Kenneth Cox and Caroline Beaton, simple down to earth book with lots or experience of real conditions here

[mat]

Twenty-odd years ago I bought a 2nd hand copy of "Rare Vegetables" by John Organ (while I was manning a stall at Chelsea for Organic Gardening magazine). It was first published in 1960. It was then, and for quite a time afterwards, the only book I knew of to deal with unusual vegetables, a subject I was already slightly obsessed with! It's a subject I've ended up writing a book about myself, and you could argue it all began with Mr Organ, a man ahead of his time.

Another second-hander I refer to a lot is "Vegetable Gardening Made Easy" by an excellent writer, Violet Stevenson. I'd buy anything I saw by her.

[nickdub]

"My" Book would be an Annual - "I did it My Way 2018" or better ""I'm intending to do it this way in 2018".
I'd publish it just before Chr****** and it would become as popular as the Beano Annual (showing my age) and be found in every thinking gardener's stockings.

I'm imaging this publication might be called "The VC Hardy Annual".

[mysteryduck]

Currently out of print, but due to be “relaunched” in May-June of this year — according to Ken Cox of the Glendoick Garden Centre.

absolutely essential reading up here is Fruit and Vegetables for Scotland by Kenneth Cox and Caroline Beaton, simple down to earth book with lots or experience of real conditions here

[burnie]

Is that the Glendoick near Perth on the A90?

[nickdub]

Currently out of print, but due to be “relaunched” in May-June of this year — according to Ken Cox of the Glendoick Garden Centre.

Amazon is listing it at £20 for pre-order, coming out in April I believe :-

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-li...2505087&sr=1-1