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Smith & Hawken: The Book of Outdoor Gardening

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From Smith & Hawken, and now with a striking new cover, here is a book that offers a distinctly American approach to the art, craft, and pastime of gardening. Embracing British perennial beds, French intensive techniques, antique roses, heirloom vegetables, alternative lawns, and a bedrock philosophy of working with-not against-the ecosystem, this illustrated organic gardener's bible includes a 350-entry color plant guide and is written for all North American regions and hardiness zones.

Readers will learn how to feed the dirt, achieve good tilth, create and use compost. How to plant in contours, manage water, plant outdoors. How to work with plants that not only come back every year, but bloom early and long, smell great, and even provide a pleasing silhouette in winter. There are sections on tools and gear, grooming and deadheading, winterizing and ornamenting the garden; digging and planting; propagating garden plants from seed; the secrets of maintenance. Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club's Country Homes & Gardens Club, the Newbridge Garden Book Club, and the Rodale Book Club. Over 140,000 copies in print.

544 pages, Hardcover

First published January 12, 1996

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About the author

Jim Anderson

316 books4 followers

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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
Profile Image for Bernie4444.
2,464 reviews12 followers
December 29, 2022
You can never have too many gardening books

It is past time for my raised garden, small as it is. Each year it gains a new personality. In the winterer, it gets replaced with black river rocks. Then each year the rocks get removed and the planting begins. One year it was just cat thyme for my outdoor friends to travel. One year just different lavenders. I am a little late this year and it looks like a few natives have taken possession.

I found this book or should I say it found me. They say you cannot tell a book by its cover. But it was the cover that attracted me. Then I glanced at the pictures before reading. Wow. I can do some marvelous things and garden wisely. However, I do not think I can get my 2,000 sq' house to look quite like the homes in the pictures. I would have bought the book alone for the pictures.

When this book gets down to the technicalities of gardening from soils to plants to tools and how to use them there is something to learn no matter how much you know. You can get more out of this book if you have any gardening background.

Look up Smith & Hawken on the internet.

"The more you garden the more you grow"
2,103 reviews61 followers
August 21, 2017
About average in terms of gardening books. Not too focused on veggies, lots of ornamentals
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