The Ruth Stout No-Work Garden Book: Secrets of the Famous Year-Round Mulch Method

by Ruth Stout, Richard Clemence

Can you really have a productive garden without plowing, hoeing, weeding, cultivating, and all the other bothersome rituals that most gardeners suffer through every growing season? "Sure," says Ruth Stout, a prolific author and writer at 80 years young. The reason that Ruth can throw away her spade and hoe and do her gardening from a couch is a year-round mulch covering, 6 to 8 inches thick, that covers her garden like a blanket. Thousands of curious gardeners have visited her Redding, Connecticut garden, including university scientists and horticulture experts. The experts have been dazzled by the technique used by the queen of mulch! But the results of 41 years of gardening experience can't be denied. The Ruth Stout No-Work Gardening Book gives Ruth's unique advice on growing techniques and tells how she has escaped the bugaboos that haunt most gardeners. Her poison-free method of combating slugs and other insects, her scheme for growing tasty vegetables all year, her method of foiling both drought and frost -- these and many other growing secrets are revealed -- secrets that have brought this perky organic gardener season after season of growing pleasure. If you're tired of being a slave to your garden, yet still want to enjoy it without the bother of sprays, weeding, hoeing or other toilsome garden chores, The Ruth Stout No-Work Garden Books has the information you need. It's completely tested gardening method, perfected during more than 40 years experience and reported in the pages of Organic Gardening magazine, eliminates gardening strain and toil, and does it organically with no dangerous chemical fertilizers or toxic sprays. Take it easy. Put nature to work in your garden.

Genres: Gardening, Nonfiction, Agriculture, Reference

218 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 1971

About the author

Ruth Imogen Stout was the fifth child of Quaker parents John Wallace Stout and Lucetta Elizabeth Todhunter Stout. Her younger brother Rex Stout, an author, was famous for the Nero Wolfe detective stories.

Stout moved to New York when she was 18 and was employed at various times as a nurse, bookkeeper, secretary, business manager, and factory worker. She coordinated lectures and debates and she also owned a small tea shop in Greenwich Village. She worked for a fake mind-reading act.

In 1923, she accompanied fellow Quakers to Russia to assist in famine relief. She met and married Alfred Rossiter in June 1929. In March 1930, the couple moved to Poverty Hollow at Redding Ridge, on the outskirts of Redding, Connecticut.

Ruth continued to use her maiden name as her pen name and Rossiter as her official name. Fred, a Columbia-trained psychologist, followed his passion for wood turning and subsequently became known for his wooden bowls. Ruth decided to try her luck at gardening, and in the spring of 1930, she planted her first garden

Reviews

[Marybeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book at a garage sale and OF COURSE had to to buy it. She has the most amazing theories about using bales of straw to grow your plants through, or to mulch at least several inches on everything. She claims this is almost no work and even entitles one chapter "The Couch I Garden On." Stout is a fine writer, so the book is a reading pleasure in itself. Her annual fall garden clean-up consists of leaving everything exactly where it is and covering it with straw (Hay has seed in it.) To weed, she bends the weeds flat and pulls straw over them. That and many other tips prove her point that good gardening comes from bales of straw. An extraordinary woman.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quirky, amusing, down-to-earth writing. Stout's instructions for a no-work garden boils down to: Keep your garden covered in a deep layer of hay (or maybe leaves) all year round. Don't till or turn over the soil. The End.
I definitely want to try this mulching technique in order to conserve water and keep the soil from getting compacted.

[Kenneth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mulch Queen' Ruth Stout and her labor-saving, soil-improving, permanent garden mulching technique is what earned her lasting fame. Stout was born in 1884 and lived to be 96. Her no-work gardening method is simply to keep a thick mulch of any vegetable matter that rots on both my vegetable and flower garden all year round. As it decays and enriches the soil, she added more. The labor-saving part of her system is that she never plowed, spaded, sowed a cover crop, harrowed, hoed, cultivated, weeded, watered or sprayed. She was into organic gardening back in the 1950's and 1960's Mother Earth News reported about her years ago.
I read this and put her practices to use.
Remember now to put down a nice, thick layer of straw down in your garden/

[Jan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book, published in 1971, is the only one on my shelves (so far) to earn five stars. Reason? Ruth Stout was an original green farmer/gardener with a strong, clear voice that she was not afraid to use. Writing with Richard Clemence, she was practical, to the point, and funny! I recommend that all my gardening friends read this and send me your opinions. Non-gardeners - if you read this book you may be encouraged to start. I will refer back to this book every year.

[Claire Arbogast · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written in the 50s, Ruth's clear, no-nonsense voice and approach is refreshing and unexpected. Not only is it good gardening advice, it's good life advice. I can't believe I went this long before reading this woman!

[Cindy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Ruth Stout. She is so funny and I learned a lot about gardening from her books. Every time I see a copy for sale, I grab it and gift it to someone else interested in gardening.

[Ellen Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book became my bible for easy gardening - mulching was my thing. Good for Ruth, the sister of Rex Stout.

[Donna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just wonderful for experienced or novice gardeners. Loved it

[Laurla2]

-if this man had what it takes to put prejudice aside and really give mulching a try, he would find that on cold nights all he would need to do would be to toss the hay, lying there handy, onto his plants. then the professor could calmly go to bed, and happily dream that he was a reasonable human being who tried out a thing before he damned it.
-twice a season, or possibly three times, i go down my cabbage-family row and sprinkle a little salt from a shaker on each plant. i do it right after a rain or when there's dew on the plants, and it should be done, the first time, when the plants are young, then once or twice more if there's any indication of their being eaten.
-i think i'll go lie down now. i'm exhausted just from writing about all the unnecessary work that some people do.
-use hay; if you must, you can buy salt hay. it is rather expensive but rots slowly and will last for a few years. if, however, you know a farmer who has 'spoiled' hay (hay that has been wet and is unfit for food) the very best thing to do is to get a few loads of that. it rots more rapidly than salt hay, which is fine, for when it rots it enriches your soil. dont be afraid of seeds; in a heavy mulch they dont have a chance.
-this watering would not be necessary if you had mulch on your garden all winter and spring. mulch not only conserves moisture but prevents weeds, which, during time of drought, are particularly harmful for they use up the moisture which vegetables need so badly.
-cardboard is an emergency measure if you run out of mulch.
-mulch 6-8 inches deep in drought.
-mulching keeps the ground cooler than it would be otherwise, conserves the moisture, prevents the soil from baking, thus providing better aeration, and keeps the weeds from growing and robbing the vegetables and flowers from the nourishment and water which they need.
-leaves, hay, straw, etc that are not decayed or that are only partially decayed will rob the soil of nitrogen if they are mixed into the soil. but when used on top the way you use them, i have never seen a nitrogen shortage as a result of the mulch. of course, if there was not enough nitrogen in the soil in the first place the mulch materials do not add any for at least a long time, so they would not help a shortage, nor add to it.
-fresh manure mixed in the soil would not cause a nitrogen shortage. if there were a large amount of straw mixed in with it, the shortage would be very temporary. the bacteria first have to break down the rather complicated organic compounds to make them available to the plant in the nitrate form. in doing that the bacterial use the readily available nitrogen for their own growth. in a few days to a few weeks they die and release that nitrogen to the crop.
-they pulled back the mulch and there were my allies, the earthworms, right on the job.
-if good yields can be maintained for ten or fifteen years without plowing, they probably can be maintained forever on similar soils.
-i have a booklet which is called 'science vs witchcraft'. the word science is in large but dignified white letters, the vs is small and black and inconspicuous, the witchcraft is big, black, menacing, and sort of erratic. they label organic gardeners 'faddists' 7 times in one page, self styled experts, rather than the 'sane and sensible'. a scientist seems always to know, and anyone who disagrees with him is a faddist, not to mention a witch. 'organic matter is neither essential nor necessary for plant growth'. the whole point of this rather expensive propaganda was to boost chemicals, not organic matter. '(chemical) fertilization will continue because its the only practical way of satisfying the nutrition requirements of these crops where a soil deficiency occurs. for this reason the fertilizer industry will have a larger and more important role than it has ever had in supplying the increased demand for its products.' for the past 19 years i have used no fertilizer (and incidentally, no poison sprays) except some cottonseed meal; for the past 7 years i have used no lime, for the past 3 years not even cottonseed meal. i keep hay and leaves on my garden all year round; these rot and nourish the soil. when i saw 'experts' taking the trouble to convince growers that they must use chemical fertilizers, and are stooping to name calling, i think "so enough people are going in for organics to get the 'experts' nervous! thats fine! three cheers for the faddists and opportunists, and hats off to the witches!"
-the writer went on at great length on the need to aerate the soil. he didnt seem to know (or just didnt want to admit) that in a plot which is well supplied with humus, the earthworms do an efficient aerating job."
-using the mulch method, one learns that neither a chemical nor organic fertilizer is needed. only rotting vegetable matter is required.
-i have put cigarette ashes in the hill where i plant squash and have never had a borer. if you do have trouble with vine borers, let your vines run over the surface and root them at the joints as they grow by covering these joints with soil.
-earworms in corn, if you find one squirt a little mineral oil onto the tips of your growing ears of corn.
-i've got what it takes to say 'i dont know' 5000 times.
-people arrive with doubts in their minds about no plowing, but when they see a garden which hasnt been plowed for 25 years producing many fine crops in soft rich earth, they believe. let the earthworms earn their board and keep.
-always expect the dismay; then the delight, when it comes, will be a glorious surprise. my system (or temperament) is just the opposite; for goodness' sake, expect delight. if dismay is what you get, it will be a jolt, yes, but think of all the wonderful expectant hours you spent! and the dismay neednt last long; in no time at all you find yourself anticipating fresh delights.
-there are two kinds of gardeners - those who insist on trying to master the demand and temperaments of the more difficult flora, and those who refuse to bother with the prima donnas. the latter gardeners, of whom i am one, fill their beds with friendly types which will stand for a lot of give and take.
-theres nothing wrong with mulch, but if you pile it thick on virginia bluebells, you wont get any spread. organic gardening is ok, but if theres too much organic matter in your nasturtium soil, you'll only get leaves, no flowers. - so skip the bluebells, and plant nasturtiums in poor soil with mulch on top.
-yes here i go, sounding off again about the so-called authorities.
-in spite of the experts my row of tulips has thrived in the same spot for over 10 years, never dug up, mulch never removed. and no fertilizer is needed except the constantly rotting hay and leaves.
-perhaps the practical thing for me to do is to have a psychiatrist try to relieve me of my grim determination to grow them (about her failures with sweetpeas).
-what is the spray for? did it get rid of it? no? then why do you spray? if the spraying didnt do what it was supposed to do, what was the purpose of spraying.
-it seems like our attitude to hybrid tea roses is too much like our attitude to our friends: we are likely to expect too much of them. if we like half a dozen things about a person, why do we feel that he should have a dozen things for us to like? if he is a pleasant addition to a dinner party why must he also be the kind of person who arrives on time? just so with roses. just because the people who sell them like to say they are ever blooming, do we have to expect it of them? is it the fault of the roses that we want more from them than they have to give?
-i planted three rows of berries, the rows about 8 inches apart. i let the first plant in each row make only one runner, straight down the row, and let the other plants in each row make two runners, one up, one down, the row. when finished, i had three rows of plants, the rows 8 inches apart, the plants in each row 1 foot apart. a year from the following spring, after i had picked the first crop, i pulled up the first plant in each of the three rows, left plants number two and three, pulled up four, left five and six, and so on. i got rid of the mother plants and left the runners they had made. then during that summer, the plants i kept were allowed to make just enough runners to replace the ones i had pulled up. year after year, the older plants are removed and the newer ones are left.
-no one seems to approve of the way the other fellow spends his money. so when anyone says to me (obviously in criticism):'did you really spend hundreds of dollars for THAT?' i in turn ask him a questions. 'would you spend a few hundred dollars on a trip to europe? well i woudnt. but that cage is worth that much to me, for i can now grow corn the rest of my life without having to fight the raccoons anymore.'
-having laid the seed potatoes, i cover the rows with six or eight inches of hay, and do nothing more until several weeks later. after the blossoms fall, i begin removing the hay carefully to see how things are progressing. small potatoes can be separated from their stems without disturbing the parent plants, and the hay easily replaced.
-dried manure, commercial dried and shredded manure has an advantage over the real thing. being virtually a powder, it readily penetrates down thru the hay, and provides the best nourishment for the plants as their roots develop.
-concentrate on feeding your soil instead of trying to feed your plants. work with nature instead of against it.
-the problem is to keep your seeds in place and moist until they germinate. peat moss and a sprinkler.
-narrow rows with wide aisles between them merely waste space in the home garden without fulfilling any useful purpose. == i disagree with this. i need wide aisles for me to comfortably access all my plants. to be able to squat, kneel, or sit and pick beans or plant seedlings. to accommodate my garden kneeler so i can get back up after getting down. to me, its not a waste of space at all, its a necessity.
-the old saying that the right time to start a garden is last year applies to the stout system more than others, and the best results cannot be expected before the third year.
-the principal advantage for the stout system relates to labor input. the permanent mulch, consisting largely of hay, is maintained with little more labor than is required for ordinary summer mulching. but in addition to the weed control, moisture preservation, and other merits of summer mulch, the stout system, once established, transfers the work of tilling, hoeing, cultivating, and fertilizing from the gardener to natural processes.
-no economist can determine the real cost of labor inputs to anyone but himself.

[Karen GoatKeeper · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gardening when you're over eighty takes ingenuity. Tilling, spading, weeding are labor intensive. It's time to put all the work aside and have a really good garden with only a little work.
Mulching as been around for a long time. Ruth Stout takes it to a new level with a year round, eight inch deep mulching system that makes tilling and spading unnecessary, manure and compost optional, protects plants during both floods and droughts and minimizes weeding.
These concepts are for a Connecticut garden and must be adjusted for other areas. Still, heavy mulching works well in the Ozarks too.
The ideas in this book are great. They are worth a serious try.
This book is based on a series of articles the author wrote for Organic Gardening magazine which makes the chapters somewhat episodic. It is easy and fast to read, although serious thought by both amateur and serious gardeners may slow the reader down.

[Suzie Q · Rating 5 out of 5]

This books was very good and can be summed up in a few key words or phrased...
1 USE TONS OF MULCH OR decayable matter to cover you garden and emerging plants so that it saves moisture smothers weeds and protects plants.
2.No need for compost bins or sections. Just put all decayable matter on to the soil and cover woth straw or grass clippings or leaves or wet newspaper or cardboard or veggie scraps
3. Your soil will improve with the mulch. More is better.
4 no need to till each row to plant or waste space in large walking rows of void space
5 if the ground is covered in mulch it's never enough mulch
6 plant seeds by poking through the mulch or moving some mulch away to plant

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know if Ruth invented this method herself, but this book is the earliest I could find to read about mulching and feeding your garden from the top down. Through trial and error she found ways to tend her garden by herself well into her later years. Of special interest to me was her experiment of throwing asparagus roots on top of the soil and covering with hay. It worked. I'm not that brave but I do like the idea that I don't have to dig to china to plant my asparagus roots. Practical and useful ideas in this book. An enjoyable read. A good reference I'll return to again.

[Douglas Toth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wish I heard of this a few years ago

She explained how well her system worked for her. I made 2new raised gardens using left over lumber and wood ties. Picked up top soil and compost in my truck and shoveled it out, tilled the soil myself... Oh and as its 2022 and there are still shortages of peat moss, I had to call around For that too! So much work! Then I saw a YouTube video, Back to Reality and learned about Ruth s Method.. I was hooked and tried it on potatoes and asparagus and beans a few weeks ago. Hope it works!

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

While it is an older book, it is incredible. I have spent years doing the typical method of gardening that seems to be more about buying products to put in your plants than about improving soil. I had some hay so tried a test plot in the garden when I started this book. She was spot on about the moisture level staying under the straw. In a month I saw worms under the straw and had better growth than my unmulched plants. I will be taking my leaves into the garden beds this Fall and getting more straw.

[Dalia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the original "lasagna" or layered compost book. I read it early in my time as a UC Master Gardener and am grateful I was able to get a copy from my local library as it was out of print. I have used her methods twice to transform weed filled gardens to flower and veggie patches with no digging and NO chemicals. She wrote from experience she is funny to boot. Anybody with a garden should read this book.

[Jerry Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Been gardening for many years, and if something promises "no work" I'm in. Although "no work" is a stretch, if this system works, it will definitely cut down on my gardening chores. Mulch, mulch and more mulch is the secret. Told in a "folksy" style, this can be read in small parts, or just the sections that apply to your current situation.I may amend this review at the end of the current gardening season.

[John Carlson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ruth is an amazing, courageous spirit that I instantly connected with! Her matter-of-fact real-to-life storytelling is packed with gardening wisdom I can put to use in my own life. If we weren't born in separate times, I'd be in love. In the raised-bed, no-till, heavy-mulch garden, rich and loose soil grows beautiful, healthy food! If weeds come up, put more mulch on it!

[Joy C · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ruth Stout became my favorite garden author when I read this book. Mother of 7 and continuing to garden, long after this book into her 80s with this method. Later she wrote “Lasagna Gardening”. Which basically taught, deep mulch gardening before it was cool.

[Paula · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though it may be old, and look old-fashioned, this book is wonderful. Its homey, conversational style is easy to read, and feels like an old friend is giving good garden advice and ideas for flower and vegetable gardens.

Lots of good things here to try in the garden.

[Charlie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid enough book. Quirky old humor. Didn't care much for Chapter 3 on flowers, though I appreciated the edging information. Chapter 4 was at times take it or leave it. Chapter 6 by Clemence had a lot of valuable information I've not come across, including particularly good information on growing sweet corn. I'm looking forward to our quasi-Stout garden this year.

[Jennifer Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the delightful story of her mother reading by the fire and teaching her 9 children not to interrupt by keeping a basin of cold water nearby. Any child who came close got their face cleaned with the cold water.

[Mandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent gardening advice dispensed with wit.

[Carolyn Semple faucher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ruth stout’s books are wonderful. She has a great voice and sense of humour. I wish that they would republish her books because they are getting pricey and hard to find.

[Patricia Bishop]

Interesting method of gardening meant to lessen traditional garden work.

[JoAnna McGarvie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always loved Ruth Stouts gardening technic's this book does not disappoint and I find it a lovely freind out in my gardens .

[Elizabeth H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my prized possessions. I was lucky to find it in a box of books bought at auction.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorites

[Jon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an entertaining read.

[Lisa Rosenow · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book easy read!

[Sage · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book but a bit dated in that to mulch with hay is no longer recommended. Hay is heavily sprayed with toxic chemicals and will destroy a garden now days, UNLESS you can find in organic.