Backyard Bounty

Linda Gilkeson

Description

Are you itching to start your own garden or grow more in the one you have, but feel that gardening is too challenging or time-consuming for your busy schedule? Would you like to enjoy fresh, home-grown produce every month of the year?

Backyard Bounty is like having your own Master Gardener to consult every step of the way. This encyclopedic reference demystifies gardening, bringing it back to the down-to-earth, environmentally practical activity that anyone can enjoy. Learn about:

• Planning your garden and preparing the soil
• Organic fertilizers and simplified composting
• Sowing, growing healthy seedlings, transplanting, watering, easy weeding, and mulching
• Planting for winter harvests, intensive planting schedules
• Growing fruit, simple pruning methods
• Greenhouses, tunnels and containers
• Organic pest management, and more.

Packed with a wealth of information specific to the Pacific Northwest, this complete guide emphasizes low-maintenance methods, exposes common gardening myths, includes a monthly garden schedule for year-round planting andharvesting and features plant profiles for everything from apples to zucchini. Perfect for novice and experienced gardeners alike, Backyard Bounty shows how even the smallest garden can produce a surprising amount of food twelve months of the year.

Sujets

• Sustainable Living
• Vegetables
• Vegetable
• Organic horticulture
• Greenhouse
• Pacific Northwest
• Organic
• Region
• Gardening
• Compost
• Regional

Informations

• Publié par: New Society Publishers
• Date de parution: 01 avril 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781550924749
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 19 Mo

Extrait

Advance Praise for Backyard Bounty
As usual, Linda Gilkeson is spot on with her trademark down-to-earth advice
to Pacifc Northwest Gardeners.  If, like me, you sometimes fnd y - our vegeta
bles bolting before their time and falling short of your expectations, if you’re
wondering how climate change is afecting what you should plant and when,
if you’re perplexed about pollination and the impact it is havin -g on your gar
den’s productivity, struggling with organic pest management, or wondering
how to achieve year-round bounty in your outdoor space, you’ll fnd these
pages brimming with seasoned wisdom and practical common sense.
—Carol Pope,
Editor G, ardenWise
Once again, Linda Gilkeson has enriched the gardening literature of British
Columbia with a book that is generously thorough and thoughtfully writen.
Backyard Bounty is ideal for beginner gardeners, and essential reading for
serious enthusiasts!
—Mark Macdonald,
West Coast Seeds
Backyard Bounty delivers a straighforward, practical guide to gr - owing an or
ganic food garden in greenhouses and containers as well as in -the open gar
den. In detailed directories to individual vegetables and fruit Linda covers
all essential information from choosing varieties to harvest and storage as
she anticipates common problems and equips the reader to prevent and deal
with them. No guesswork here.
—Helen Chestnut,
garden columnist, Times Colonist Linda Gilkeson has paid some tuition in the garden. Backyard Bo -unty is re
markably thorough, from roots to pests to pruning to crowns, and it inspires
even the experienced grower. Just like homemade soil for a bedding plant,
this book is loaded with the richness we need in order to feed ourselves.
—Lyle Estill, author of
Small is Possible: Life in a Local Economy and
Industrial Evolution: Tales fom a Low Carbon Future
Whether you have a small or large lot, litle or plenty of time, this book shows
you how to grow your own toxic-free fruit and vegetables the whole year
round. From preparing the ground to harvesting and storing the r- ipened pro
duce, all is clearly explained. An invaluable book for novices and experienced
gardeners.
—Barry Roberts, Past-Presiden t,
Master Gardeners Association of BC.
With Backyard Bounty, Linda Gilkeson has writen the ultimate book flled
with practical, interesting and sound advice. She takes the reader from the
soil to harvest and everything along the way — growing your own bounty
has never been easier.
—Jeff de Jong , C-FAX 1070 Host  
‘Gardening 101’a
c
a
n
Brdky Bouty
The Complete Guide to Year-Round
Organic Gardening in the Pacifc Northwest
Linda A. Gilkeson, Ph.D.Copyright © 2011 by Linda Gilkeson. All rights reserved.
Cover design by Diane McIntosh. Photos © Linda A. Gilkeson
Printed in Canada. First printing February 2011.
New Society Publishers acknowledges the support of the Government of Canada through
the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP pub) for our lishing a ctivities.
Inquiries regarding requests to reprint all or part of Bac kyard Bounty
should be addressed to New Society Publishers at the address below.
To order directly from the publishers, please call toll-free (North America)
1-800-567-6772, or order online at www.newsociety.com
Any other inquiries can be directed by mail to:
New Society Publishers
P.O. Box 189, Gabriola Island, BC V0R 1X0, Canada
[phone]
New Society Publishers’ mission is to publish books that contribute in fundamental ways
to building an ecologically sustainable and just society, and to do so with the least possible
impact on the environment, in a manner that models this vision. We are commited to doing
this not just through education, but through action. Our printed, bound books are printed on
Forest Stewardship Council-certifed acid-free paper that is 100% post-consumer recycled
(100% old growth forest-free), processed chlorine free, and printed with vegetable-based,
low-VOC inks, with covers produced using FSC-certifed stock. New Society also works to
reduce its carbon footprint, and purchases carbon ofsets based on an annual audit to ensure
a carbon neutral footprint. For further information, or to browse our full list of books and
purchase securely, visit our website at: www.newsociety.com
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Gilkeson, Linda A.
Backyard bounty: the complete guide to year-round organic gardening
in the Pacifc northwest / Linda Gilkeson.
Includes index.
ISBN 978-0-86571-684-1 eISBN: 978-1-55092-474-9
1. Organic gardenin — Ngorthwest Coast of North Ame 2. Bricaack. yard
garden —s Northwest Coast of North Ame I. Durrica. ret, Charles, 1955– II. T itle.
SB453.5.G538 2011 635'.048409795 C2011-900049-0
www.newsociety.comContents
Acknowledgmen.............................ts vii
Introduction ................................ ix
1. Our Gardening Climate and How Plants Gr............ow 1
2. Planning a Productive Ga......................rden 15
3. Preparing the Soil ............................. 43
4. Basic Methods for Growing Vegetables ................ 71
5. Starting Seedlings and Saving Seeds .................. 99
6. Basic Methods for Growing F ....................ruit 119
7. Food Crops in Greenhouses and Containers ............. 141
8. Year-Round Gardening Calendar .................... 155
9. Managing Pests and Proble......................ms 175
10. A to Z Vegetable..............................s 221
11. A to Z Fruit ................................. 257
Glossary ................................... 275
Resources .................................. 279
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
About the Author ............................. 293
vAcknowledgments
Te information in this book is the sum of far more than jus-t my own ex
perience. It is thanks to many people over the years that have shared their
gardening enthusiasm, knowledge and most importantly, their questions,
that I have learned so much about growing food in this climate.
I am grateful to Elizabeth Cronin who took many of the photographs in
Chapter 9 and has always been generous with permission to use her images.
Further thanks are due my gardening companions: Charlote (a fairly
good guard dog), Quirk and Quark (the two recycling he m nults), a itude nd a
of (nameless) benefcial insects.
viiIntroduction
With so many gardening books published every year, why write another one?
One reason is to provide a guide to organic gardening in ouPacr cifc oastal
Northwest climate, which is like no other on the con t tomine antt. Foes wor e
are limited to about the same growing schedule as other northerly regions,
but go out to my garden in January and
you will fnd it full of carrots, beets, leeks,
celeriac, letuce, spinach and other leafy
greens, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, kale and
much else besides. With a planting season
that lasts for six months and a ha-rvest sea
son all year round, our plants and planting
schedules (and even our pest problems)
are unique.
Another reason is the popularity of my
talks and classes on the theme “Grow the
most food in the smallest space (with the
least work).” Tis book expands the topic Gardening the easy way leaves me time to sit in my favorite
into a detailed guide to high-yield, low-lawn chair and enjoy the view.
maintenance food gardening. I wrote this
for busy people with litle time to garden and for anyone who wants to learn
how to grow a lot more food in whatever space they have.
When I was a child, vegetable gardens and a fruit tree or two were
common features in yards, and how to garden was common knowledge. Tat’s
not true today. So another aim in writing this book was to provide basic
information that would help new gardeners successfully tran-sform their col
lection of seed packages into a delicious harvest. Growing an organic food
garden is a practical skill anyone can learn: it doesn’t have to involve a lot of
ixx Backyard Bounty
work and certainly doesn’t require a big investment in special products or
equipment.
I have to confess that, for me, food gardening is really about pleasure. I
want everyone to enjoy the delights of fresh food harvested straight from
the garden and to reap the health benefts of a bountiful su -pply of organi
cally grown fresh vegetables and fruit. Tat’s the biggest reason why I wrote
this book!l
r
w
a
l
t
i
n
n
d
r
a
u
e
CHAPTER 1
Or G G Cimte
and HO w Pans G O
Tis chapter covers basic information to help
take the guesswork out of growing vegetables
and fruit in the Pacifc Northwest c-oastal cli
mate. It starts with an overview of the climate
and weather along the coast, followed by a
review of how plants grow, fower and fruit.
Gardening in the Coastal Climate
What’s diferent about gardening on the
P acifc Northwest coast? Te climate here is
characterized by mild winters and warm
s