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As a Wanna-Greenie blogger I get a lot of emails extolling the latest and greatest in supplements and such, but every once and a while I get an offer to review a book! It is just torture for me to accept these offers, I dread when the mailman leaves that heavy envelope on my doorstep, and it just breaks my heart that once I'm done reading a donation I either have to keep it or give it away on my blog. Torture, I tell ya!
So, you can imagine my chagrin when the Reader's Digest Illustrated Guide to Gardening landed with a heavy thud on my front stoop. It certainly was larger than I had expected, but no matter, and it sports a medallion on the cover that reads, "Now All Organic!".
The end pages have a lovely color map of the plant hardiness zones, which you know is near and dear to my heart. Chapters cover everything from ferns to hedges to heathers and heaths. The chapter that I decided to peruse first was on vegetables, and I kept an eye out for any organic tips of the trade. I found the section on homemade organic controls to be interesting - who know you could make a garlic oil spray to combat squash bugs and and cabbageworms?! And although I knew the ladybug was useful in fighting garden pests, the small section on other "little helpers" revealed the helpfulness of, among other bugs, the hover fly.
I will say that the typeface is extremely small, which I suppose is a necessity for a book that covers so much, but for those who have some sight limitations, this might dissuade them from turning to this guide as a regular resource. This book will certainly be a comprehensive addition to a gardener's reference collection; I'm sure it will get a workout this summer as the Wanna-Greenies refer to it again and again.
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