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CLEARANCE ITEM. PREVIOUS RETAIL PRICE WAS $34.95 AVAILABLE ONLY WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!

In this comprehensive and inspirational compendium, Jo Ann Gardner and Karen Bussolini have selected and vividly illustrated the best candidates for a broad range of growing and design needs. Whether you decide to add a dash of quicksilver or the soothing perfume of an ancient herb, this in-depth guide to plants of uncommon beauty is certain to change the way you see and plant your garden.

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This 344-page book combines practical wisdom on ecological design and community-building with a fresh, green perspective. Activist and urban gardener Heather Flores shares her nine-step permaculture design to help you build fertile soil, promote biodiversity and increase natural habitat in your own garden.

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Indulge your passion for gardening. Imagine extended growing seasons, homegrown tropical fruits, abundant vegetables ready to pick year-round, exotic orchids and colorful flowers galore. They're all possible with this comprehensive guide to turning the dream of year-round gardening into a reality.

From the simplest cold frame to the most elaborate freestanding tropical paradise, there is a greenhouse plan in this collection to fit every gardener's needs. Author Roger Marshall guides you through all the style options, the practical considerations of choosing materials and a site, plus every step of the building process, from foundation to glazing.

Whether your interest is in rare orchids or in healthful organic vegetables for your family, a greenhouse provides the environment to protect and nurture the plants you love. And when it's cold and gray outside, the greenhouse is a welcoming place to feed your gardening hobby.

Today, more than ever before, our society is seeking ways to live more conscientiously. To help bring you the very best inspiration and information about greener, more sustainable lifestyles, MOTHER EARTH NEWS is recommending books to its readers. For more than 30 years, MOTHER EARTH NEWS has been North America’s “Original Guide to Living Wisely,” creating books and magazines for people with a passion for self-reliance and a desire to live in harmony with nature.

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By combining the tireless observation of a scientist with the imaginative skills of an artist and writer, Peterson created a field guide that Robert Bateman, in his foreword to the fifth edition, says was the doorway for millions of people into the wonderland of natural history.

The Peterson Identification System has been used in the more than fifty books that make up the Peterson Field Guide series. Peterson's magnum opus, now in its fifth edition, created the trail for countless field guides to follow. They are still following year by year, but his is the standard by which all other field guides are judged.

On the morning of July 28, 1996, Roger Peterson was painting his final bird plate. He died peacefully in his sleep later that day. It is fitting that his final work—a culmination of more than sixty years of observing, painting, and writing—should be this one, a revision of the guide that started his legacy.

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The reader will find much in this third book in a trilogy of information on growing giant pumpkins. How-to-Grow World Class Giant Pumpkins, III presents the newest information on cultural methods, who’s who, and records. New ideas about plant size and pruning strategies throw a whole new light on the grower with only a small area to devote to giant pumpkins. New discoveries involving the use of considerably more calcium in feeding programs, a steadily growing consensus on the use of nitrogen, the beginnings of a real effort at applying genetic theory in pollination strategies, how-to select the best seed, and the controversial subject of genetic manipulation, all required an airing-out here.

The explosion in the number of growers gathering information via the internet, either through website information, or through open forums with other growers via message boards, has become a major accelerator in the learning curve of all growers. Seed auctions, message boards, and a site devoted entirely to maintaining a database of pumpkin genetic backgrounds, all contribute to a shortening of the time it takes to succeed in this sport. I would be remiss if I did not spend the time to write about these valuable resources, and convey any new discoveries to you.

If you want to grow a world record giant pumpkin, you will find much in this book to to help you.

If your goal is 1500 pounds, then you’ve come to the right place.

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Fruit trees, shrubs, and vines are true two-for-one plants. Many varieties are strikingly beautiful — well suited to doing double duty as delicious sources of sweet, organic fruit and as ornamental additions to the home landscape. Backyard fruit plants also tie in perfectly with the growing locavore movement. It's difficult to find food that's more local than one's own backyard!

Learn about fruitscaping from author Lee Rich and his book Landscaping With Fruit. It will help you to grow pretty and tasty fruits in your suburban or rural home. Spring blossoms, summer and fall fruit, and the year-round presence of the plants themselves bring a special magic to the home landscape. Pillowy pink blossoms on peach branches or the bright orange fruit of persimmon trees perk up their surroundings with color and drama.

Landscaping with Fruit is a complete, no-nonsense guide to growing temperate-zone fruit, with information on everything from planting and pruning to pest control and harvesting. Readers will find all the basics of landscaping with fruit — site analysis, climate assessment, understanding soil and sun, plant selection, and optimizing growing conditions. An encyclopedia of 38 plants includes information for each entry on hardiness, size, potential pests, special care and pruning, harvesting, and visual appeal.

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The Winter Harvest Handbook
Year-Round Vegetable Production Using Deep Organic Techniques and Unheated Greenhouses
by Eliot Coleman

From the bestselling author of The New Organic Grower and Four-Season Harvest, a revolutionary guide to year-round harvests of fresh, organic produce—with little or no energy inputs.

Choosing locally grown organic food is a sustainable living trend that’s taken hold throughout North America. Celebrated farming expert Eliot Coleman helped start this movement with The New Organic Grower published 20 years ago. He continues to lead the way, pushing the limits of the harvest season while working his world-renowned organic farm in Harborside, Maine.

Now, with his long-awaited new book, The Winter Harvest Handbook, anyone can have access to his hard-won experience. Gardeners and farmers can use the innovative, highly successful methods Coleman describes in this comprehensive handbook to raise crops throughout the coldest of winters.

Building on the techniques that hundreds of thousands of farmers and gardeners adopted from The New Organic Grower and Four-Season Harvest, this new book focuses on growing produce of unparalleled freshness and quality in customized unheated or, in some cases, minimally heated, movable plastic greenhouses.

Coleman offers clear, concise details on greenhouse construction and maintenance, planting schedules, crop management, harvesting practices, and even marketing methods in this complete, meticulous, and illustrated guide. Readers have access to all the techniques that have proven to produce higher-quality crops on Coleman’s own farm.

His painstaking research and experimentation with more than 30 different crops will be valuable to small farmers, homesteaders, and experienced home gardeners who seek to expand their production seasons.

A passionate advocate for the revival of small-scale sustainable farming, Coleman provides a practical model for supplying fresh, locally grown produce during the winter season, even in climates where conventional wisdom says it “just can’t be done.”

Praise for The Winter Harvest Handbook:

"How do you produce first-rate food all year-round in northern places? This is the question facing the local food movement, and Eliot Coleman, one of America's most innovative farmers, has come up with excellent answers...The Winter Harvest Handbook is an indispensable contrinution." Michael Pollan, auhtor of The Omnivoire's Dilemma and In Defense of Food

"If we are going to create a good, clea, fair food system, we've got to learn how to grow affordable, local food year-round and make a living at it. Eliot Coleman knows more about this than anyone I've met. Here he gives the detailed information needed to make it work." Josh Viertel, Presiden, Slow Food USA.

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This is the single best book to buy if you want to grow vegetables in the winter inside cold frames or hoop houses. Author Eliot Coleman is a master organic grower who gives you all the details you need to succeed. Highly recommended.

Today, more than ever before, our society is seeking ways to live more conscientiously. To help bring you the very best inspiration and information about greener, more sustainable lifestyles, MOTHER EARTH NEWS is recommending books to its readers. For more than 30 years, MOTHER EARTH NEWS has been North America’s “Original Guide to Living Wisely,” creating books and magazines for people with a passion for self-reliance and a desire to live in harmony with nature.

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Over 300 step-by-step illustrations show you when to harvest the seeds of more than 100 vegetables, herbs and flowers, as well as how to dry, store and test them for viability for the next growing season.

About the author:
Freelance writer and horticultural consultant author Carole B. Turner specializes in gardening techniques and native planting. Besides her Storey book, Seed Sowing and Saving, Carole has authored many articles in American Nursery and was an editor at Fine Gardening magazine.

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Armed with nothing but this book, novice gardeners can quickly learn to extend their growing season and increase their yields without increasing the size of their plot. Solar Gardening also names the crops that will thrive in the coldest and hottest seasons.