Enjoy and benefit from the garden all year long. Whether it's onions in the summer, lettuce in the winter, or orchids any time, 'The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Year-Round Gardening', covers every step of the process of both outdoor and indoor gardening. From seeds, soil, compost, equipment, and fertilizers to all types of covers and greenhouses, and even gardening and harvesting in root-cellars during winter, this guide is a must-have for any dedicated gardener. Over 7 million households nationwide plan to grow their own fruits, vegetables, herbs and berries. The trend has recieved a boost from Michelle Obama's White House garden - aswell as from the desire to save money on food. The only book that covers both outdoor covered gardening and greenhouse gardening, as well as root-cellar gardening and harvesting, written by an expert in the field of greenhouse gardens.

Even in winter’s coldest months you can harvest fresh, delicious produce. Drawing on insights gained from years of growing vegetables in Nova Scotia, Niki Jabbour shares her simple techniques for gardening throughout the year. Learn how to select the best varieties for each season, the art of succession planting, and how to build inexpensive structures to protect your crops from the elements. No matter where you live, you’ll soon enjoy a thriving vegetable garden year-round.

No butts about it! Because of increased interest in self-sufficient and sustainable living practices, people interested in having their own milk supply are turning to goats, which are easier to keep than cows. Whether for pets, milk, fiber, or even meat, The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Raising Goats provides everything a beginner needs to know about raising goats. ?According to the June 2007 issue of Better Nutrition magazine, goat's milk is gaining popularity in the United States because it is less allergenic and more easily digestible than cow's milk, and contains higher percentages of key nutrients ?Like raising chickens, raising goats ties directly into the sustainability and thrift movements

Perhaps it's because of the uncertainty that surrounds the safety of produce purchased in the grocery store these days. Perhaps it's because people are looking for fun, inexpensive hobbies to dive into. Or perhaps it's because there's nothing like the taste of fresh fruits and veggies grown in the backyard. But whatever the reason, readers need advice on gardening now more than ever before. And The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Vegetable Gardening is just the place to turn. In this book, expert authors Daria Price Bowman and Carl A. Price provide information on: Expert techniques for planning and plotting a gardenUnderstanding what's necessary for soil nourishmentPlanting seeds and seedlingsGrowing fruits, vegetables, berries, and moreCultivating medicinal and healing herbsRecognizing and preventing the most common plant diseasesIdentifying and eliminating weedsPruning and trimming plantsKnowing when to harvestDeciding whether to can, dry, or freeze A comprehensive, easy-to-read book, The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Vegetable Gardening is an excellent resource for anyone interested in growing fresh fruits, vegetables, and herbs.

Creative strategies for gardens on balconies, ledges, fireescapes, planting beautiful borders and walkways, kids gardens, and much more!

Fruits and vegetables are some of the most expensive parts of any regular menu in your home. With rising transportation costs, a food increase in the summer of 2008 of almost 2 percent, and continually shrinking supplies, the cost of maintaining a healthy supply of these necessary staples is becoming harder and harder for many families. However, with the right resources and planning, you can take advantage of an age old method of storage that will allow you to buy fruits and vegetables when they are least expensive or to grow your own and store them for future use. This book will walk anyone through the process of building and using a root cellar to store their fruits and vegetables for later use, through the cold winter months when even the most basic items can cost an arm and a leg. Before even starting your root cellar, you will learn the basics of choosing the right crops and planting them at the right time or buying them in advance for your root cellar. You will learn how to know which crops and which specific vegetables and fruits are good to keep and which ones should be left alone. You will learn how and when to bring in the harvest and how to prepare for storage effectively. You will learn the basics of spoilage and what to expect from your foods. You will learn what to expect each winter for multiple month storage and which vegetables and fruits to start expecting in your cellar. You will also benefit from interviews with the top experts in the field of storage and root cellaring and farmers who have been storing vegetables for years. You will learn how to start your own underground garden and what various types of cellars exist trenches, closets, and hideaways. You will learn how to start planning your root cellar, how to utilise your basement if you so desire and how to start excavating and preparing it for the first harvest. No matter your situation or your crops, you can benefit from this book and its take on the world of root cellaring and long term fruit and vegetable storage.

Vertical vegetable gardening isn't intuitive. Although some vegetables, such as tomatoes and pole beans, have been grown vertically for a very long time, it is only recently that gardeners who are short on space have looked to vertical methods and structures for growing vegetables that traditionally have been thought to require a lot of horizontal space. Vertical Vegetable Gardening provides information on growing all types of leafy, root, and other vegetables vertically, saving space, protecting from insects, and making harvesting easier. Now people living in urban areas can grow produce that used to require sizable plots of land. Also included are ideas and plans for vertical structures.

Blessings from the Darkness complied by Kelly J Koch and published by Nicholas Grabowsky with Black Bed Sheet Books and a dedication by G.L. Lentz. For those of you who have never experienced a family illness that completely wipes the family out emotionally and mentally as well as monetarily then you have no idea what it can do to a family. Blessings from the Darkness the brain child of G.L. Lentz for a family that is going through that very thing is so worth every penny spent on it. The thirty plus authors who have given up their stake in the book have written stories, poems and flash fiction that will wrench your very heart out of your chest, put tears in your eyes and make you look at life in ways you never have before. While the book is titled Blessings from the Darkness- it is not all horror stories. There are stories of everyday experiences, thoughts, wishes (some that do not turn out so well) and emotions. "When Angels Fall" will have you weeping as you turn each page and read each line, "The Third Wish" will make one think twice before wanting to deal with a Genie, "Death of a Parent" will cause you to weep. These are just a few of the wonderful writings by up and coming authors and writers who have never been published before- but you need to keep on your radar. This is a book that you will want to add to your library and to read over and over again.

The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Aquaponic Gardening is a comprehensive guide to aquaponic gardening, from choosing a setup to selecting fish and vegetables. In addition to everything one needs to know to run a healthy aquaponic garden and care for both the vegetables and fish, there are step-by step plans with photos for building different size systems. The expert author fully explains how to garden indoors and how to resize and move a garden inside or outside, depending on the season, to produce an abundant supply of edible, organically-raised vegetables and fish.

Shed those pounds the healthy way. This brand-new edition of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Healthy Weight Loss not only gives readers critical information on nutrition and health-it also delivers everything they need to know about the mental and exercise pieces of the weight- loss puzzle. In addition, it presents a comprehensive overview of today's most popular diets, chapters on such major diet types as low-fat, low-sodium, low-carb, and low-cal, as well as chapters on dieting for kids, dieting for diabetics, dieting for heart health, and more. Best of all, readers will find five unique diet plans to help them lost weight- and keep it off-starting today! -Features new research on how nutrition and certain foods affect body weight -Expanded information on surgical and pharmaceutical options for weight loss, plus the skinny on supplements and over-the-counter remedies -Upload exercise chapters with more fat-burning exercises and updated charts for calorie burning (including suggestions for meeting the U.S. Government's new exercise recommendations)