Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades: Steve Solomon's Complete Guide to Natural Gardening

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Summary: Most useful gardening book I've ever read
Review: If you are a gardener west of the Cascades you'll definitely find useful and readable information in this book. It includes an introduction to soil science, when to plant, what varieties grow well here, which seed companies are reliable and trustworthy, information on dealing with pests, and a section on the cultivation of each vegetable. Steve Solomon started the Territorial seed company, though he's no longer associated with it, and was growing most of his own food when he wrote this book. His approach is primarily organic, though not evangellically so. This is a good book for both the "corn and tomato" gardeners as well as somebody who is aspiring to grow a significant fraction of their own food. This is a regional book--probably one of its strongest points, since gardening is different in different bioregions. The regions include the Willamette Valley, SW Washington, Oregon coast and Southern Oregon, Puget Sound, Washington foothills, Yoncalla Valley, along the Umpqua, and northern California, with probably the most emphasis on the Willamette Valley and SW Washington. This is the book I begin every planting season (or seed purchasing season) with!

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Summary: Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades really works!
Review: In composing a review of a book we've used constantly & incessantly over the years, my husband murmured that I should describe our copy. Wherever we've found a portion that pertains to our patch of earth in a valley on the edges of a National Forest, I've stashed a marker. Sometimes it's an emery board, a letter from England, pages from scratchpads with recipes for slug bait or maps of our raised bed plantings for a year, postcards from friends warning us about their impending visit. This book is now double in thickness yet these markers allow me easy access to what I need most often. We have enjoyed every penny we invested in Steve Solomon's Complete Guide to Natural Gardening. When we've got a problem, there's usually an answer right in there. When we're wondering about our climate, or our soil or our expectations for a harvest, given our climate, Steve Solomon's got an answer. Really useful, just wish it had more illustrations!

Rating:
Summary: Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades really works!
Review: In composing a review of a book we've used constantly & incessantly over the years, my husband murmured that I should describe our copy. Wherever we've found a portion that pertains to our patch of earth in a valley on the edges of a National Forest, I've stashed a marker. Sometimes it's an emery board, a letter from England, pages from scratchpads with recipes for slug bait or maps of our raised bed plantings for a year, postcards from friends warning us about their impending visit. This book is now double in thickness yet these markers allow me easy access to what I need most often. We have enjoyed every penny we invested in Steve Solomon's Complete Guide to Natural Gardening. When we've got a problem, there's usually an answer right in there. When we're wondering about our climate, or our soil or our expectations for a harvest, given our climate, Steve Solomon's got an answer. Really useful, just wish it had more illustrations!

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Summary: Communist Nonsense
Review: While the horticultural information is minimally valuable, the communist anti-capitalist quackery contained herein is worthless and wrong. Much better books are available such as the Vegetable Gardeners Bible by Edward C. Smith expanding on the deep wide bed philosophy of the French Intensive Method and Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew which replaces commercial techniques with one based on providing food for a single family. Add a Rodale book on organic gardening and you will have all the information you need without the moralistic communist anti-profit preaching of Mr. Solomon.