Sustainable Landscaping For Dummies

by Owen E. Dell

Create a beautiful, sustainable landscape that's easy on your pocketbook. Want to go green outside your home? This practical, hands-on guide shows you how to design, create, and live with sustainable lawn and garden spaces. You'll see how to eliminate the use of chemicals, reduce energy use, and conserve natural resources, all while you craft an attractive and functional outdoor environment that increases the value and improves the appearance of your home. Understand sustainability: what it means, why it matters, and what materials and resources to use.

Work with water: evaluate and maintain irrigation systems, explore water harvesting, and manage watering for maximum conservation. Make the most of hardscaping: from patios and walls to fences, steps, and lighting systems, construct and maintain sustainable elements. Select, establish, and care for gorgeous climate-appropriate plants that need few resources.

Open the book and find: The essentials of sustainable garden care; Ways to minimize your lawn's impact and keep it healthy; A step-by-step tutorial on designing a great landscape plan; How to grade, plant, and irrigate the sustainable way; Tips for fitting food into your landscape; Cheap (or free) planet-friendly projects; Nonsustainable gardening mistakes to avoid; When and why to call in the pros.

Genres: Gardening, Nonfiction

364 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2009

Reviews

[Carolyn Page · Rating 3 out of 5]

Man the bar for sustainable landscaping is really low. Turns out it's what my family has pretty much done that all along! We had a big yard, but put cows and chicken on it haha. I liked this book and will use it for a reference.

[JP · Rating 3 out of 5]

The information is readily digestible and Dell is funny, I just wished there were more photographs and detailed illustrations though, especially for the complicated landscape components like irrigation systems... Ended up switching to Google Images quite a number of times.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really informative book. I was planning on just skimming it, as I do for most gardening books, but I found myself stopping to read and digest the information that I had been planning on skimming. I learned a lot of good stuff.

The author is also funny, but doesn't hit you over the head with it. I appreciated that the humor was sprinkled instead of flooded.

[David Roberts · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book I read to research this post was Sustainable Landscaping For Dummies by Owen E Dell which is an excellent book which I bought from kindle. Sustainable landscaping is using native plants and materials in your garden and recycling where possible. It's often cheaper than convential landscaping and requires less maintenance. Native plants are more disease resistant and native vegetables and fruits that are grown in season are very healthy. Scientists are likely to discover different nutrients that make up our diet that aren't known at present but following this rule will definitely ensure you have a healthy diet. Recycled materials can often be obtained for nothing and you should befriend local businesses so they can give you things like old building materials for recycling especially if you intend doing this as a business. Bear in mind if you have to dispose of a lot of waste you will probably have to pay a fee which can be quite substantial for commercial waste. If you build a wall in a garden up to 2 feet tall it's quite straightforward but beyond that you might need to reinforce it especially if it will support a load. Also some things like adobe bricks while cheap aren't intended to bear weight. Also the most important step in having a landscaped garden is the design and planning and deciding how you are going to achieve it and you can't skimp on these steps. I enjoyed reading this book and it's very interesting but aimed at the American market which might be a slight problem if like me you live in Britain.

[jess · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is surprisingly good for a "for dummies" book. Since it's meant for the masses, the political agenda is pretty weak. This, in turn, weakens the premise that there is much motivation for sustainable landscaping. I'm not sure many people will put in sustainable landscaping only to save money - without other incentives like the health of your family, natural community, and planet, it's a bit of a stretch. Regardless, there is plenty of info in here to send you off in a million directions, but just enough to help you figure out where you want to start. Some attention is paid to design, but not really enough. All in all, it's a decent book with good ideas and a solid basis, and probably a smidge better than you can reasonable expect from a "for dummies" book. There are no lovely pictures to illustrate - it's all black & white line drawings - but you didn't expect glossy color photos from a "for dummies" book, right?

[Jan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Plan to use some of these tips in redoing both our front and back yard. I hope it will not involve heavy equipment but I can see where using stakes to lay out a plan would be useful. Also plan to work on using plants which will not be high maintenance.

[A · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of this information is invaluable to those who want to have gardens and not use a lot of water. I am a do-it-yourself kind of person and much of this information was superfluous to me. Still, it gave a lot of good suggestions and ideas o how to lay out a garden, and what to consider.

[Jill · Rating 3 out of 5]

I will probably buy a copy of this book - it's been great in figuring out what to do with my backyard. Not so helpful with the food-gardening aspects, but with everything else.

[Courtney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of great information. No pictures though

[Nate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Helpful, practical handbook for landscaping with minimal impact. The author's from California, so some of his examples include California native plants.