These books about gardening and food are interesting, informative and absolutely gorgeous!
1-Minute Gardener, Fabian Capomolla and Mat Pember
My hubbie and I were tired of spending weekends cutting the lawn, weeding and trying to keep our veggie patch free of predators so living in an apartment was our go-to solution. Two years on I found I was missing my little veggie patch to take care of so we purchased a Vegepod and, fortuitously, the 1-Minute Gardener landed on my desk.
Fabian Capomolla and Mat Pember are the brains behind The Little Veggie Patch Co., a Melbourne-based business that specialises in helping people grow their own food no matter how much space they have.
This great book covers bite-sized tips that will help all novice gardeners up their skills. There’s advice on so many aspects of veggie gardening including how to plant seeds, space plants, drying herbs, dehydrating vegetables, how to make compost, fending off pests, and what your worms like to eat. Tasks on more complex gardening jobs, such as hand-pollination and pruning trees are also included but I doubt I will progress to those skills.
For those with short attention spans and looking for instant gratification (i.e. me!), the authors have also included the Top 5 veggies to grow. There’s also a section on how children can get involved in some gardening activities… seed bombing, decorating the patch and competitive snail hunting!
The 1-Minute Gardener is beautifully illustrated, humorous, super-informative, and the steps are easy to follow… even for me.
Green Thumb, Craig Miller-Randle
Evidently, even though you think you are an indoor plant killer, Craig Miller-Randle, a ‘plantspert’ and self-confessed house-plant addict, believes through his guidance and techniques, you’ll be growing lush, healthy and envy-worthy specimens in next to no time at all.
“No one is born with a green thumb… but anyone can grow one!”
Craig Miller-Randle
Whether you’re just starting out or already have a large collection of plants, Green Thumb will help you select, care for and propagate plants with ease. Topics include choosing the right soil, watering, eliminating pests, repotting, light and location, fertilising, and propagating.
There are also great photographic step-by-step projects, an A-Z guide on caring for the myriad types of indoor plants as well as a few inspirational tips on styling.
Once I have my container veggie garden under control and producing an abundance of edible food I think I will give Green Thumb some attention and see how I do with growing indoor plants… successfully!
Food Freedom Community, Isa Pearl Ritchie
The author of this book set out to write her PHD on the topic of food sovereignty in Aotearoa. Food sovereignty is essentially people’s rights to have healthy and culturally appropriate food, produced sustainably and control of their own agricultural systems. Priority is given to local economies (as opposed to big multi-national corporations), with local control and the sharing of information.
Isa focuses on alternative food networks, food sovereignty and social economics through inspiring and helpful case studies of real people and communities, in both urban and rural New Zealand.
The Kiwi author reminds us that people and environments are being exploited and devastated – mostly driven by profit motives – and that ethical, free-range food is often expensive and not available to all.
There’s no doubt that we are living in challenging times so these local food initiatives by small farmers, community workers and activists are well-timed. Food sovereignty means access to locally produced good food that’s affordable and communities are encouraged to support local growers through farmers markets, seed saving, sharing, community gardens and distributing excess food to those less fortunate.
Although the author interviewed people and researched areas mostly in Whaingaroa (Raglan), the book will have a wide appeal to those community groups looking at permaculture systems within their own communities.