California Fruit Vegetable Gardening

This easy-to-follow guide features planting, care, and harvesting information for more than 60 edibles; popular vegetable selections from artichokes to turnips; a variety of common and unusual fruits, nuts, and herbs; and advice on garden planning, creating the perfect soil, watering, and more.

In this updated 2nd edition of California Fruit & Vegetable Gardening, the critical elements of climate, soil, sun, and water are addressed to ensure your success, no matter which part of The Golden State you call home. California's diverse and unique growing conditions offer special challenges to food gardeners. Whether you garden in the southern, central, or northern part of the state, you'll find the answers you're looking for. From soil preparation and starting seeds to safely managing California's most troublesome vegetable garden pests, author Claire Splan guides you to your most productive garden ever. Inside, you'll find detailed profiles of over 60 edible plants that thrive in California's distinctive growing conditions, including favorites like avocados, tomatoes, passion fruits, eggplants, beets and pomegranates. In addition to vegetables and fruits, also featured are popular herbs. Helpful charts and planting graphs keep you on track, while the garden maintenance tips found throughout ensure a lush, productive, and high-yielding garden. Whether you grow in containers, raised beds, an extensive kitchen garden, a community garden, or a backyard veggie patch, California Fruit & Vegetable Gardening serves as an invaluable resource to West Coast gardeners, regardless of whether you're a first-time grower or an experienced Master Gardener. California Fruit & Vegetable Gardening is part of the regional Fruit & Vegetable Gardening series from Cool Springs Press. Other books in the series include Texas Fruit & Vegetable Gardening, Mid-Atlantic Fruit & Vegetable Gardening, Carolinas Fruit & Vegetable Gardening, and many others.

California abounds with edible selections to grow in the diverse conditions of the state. California Fruit & Vegetable Gardening addresses the critical elements of climate, soil, sun, and water that affects growing success. More than sixty fruits, vegetables, herbs, and edible flowers are highlighted, and helpful charts and graphs for planning and planting the garden are included.

California Vegetables is handsomely printed, contains many cuts, has over 300 pages, and is bound in cloth. The contents cover every phase of vegetable growing, including farmers' gardens, California climate, vegetable soils, irrigation, drainage, cultivation, fertilization, protection, weeds, seed, growing, location and arrangement, planting season, propagation, also description and methods of handling all varieties of vegetables grown here.

"The purpose of the work is to give the newcomer, or old-resident beginner, an understanding of the peculiar conditions which he encounters in California and descriptions of gardening practices which attain most satisfactory results under those conditions. Experienced gardeners from other states and countries soon find that their accustomed procedure fails of its wonted results; that the old times and ways of doing things are unsuitable, and that new rules of practice must be learned. Often those who have had no earlier gardening experience seek a rural home in California and burn with a desire to possess the delights of a home garden. They soon find that following the advice to beginners given in books written for other climates, yields little but disappointment. Conditions of soil and climate in California are varied to the last degree, and practice must vary with them."--

If you’re interested in growing your own fruits and vegetables, you’ve joined the ranks of a blossoming group of DIY gardeners who place a premium on the idea of self-reliance. But like any other kind of gardening, growing edibles is not a one-size-fits-all pursuit: in order to be successful, you’ll need to know not only which plants grow well in your state or region, but also how to grow them with careful methods and a schedule that caters specifically to your local microclimate. Fortunately for you, Northwest Fruit & Vegetable Gardening is written exclusively for gardeners who want to grow edibles in British Columbia (Canada), Northern California, Oregon, or Washington. Author Katie Elzer-Peters, the master gardener responsible for our bestselling Beginner’s Illustrated Guide to Gardening (2012), equips you with all the information you need to design your edible garden, tend the soil, maintain your plants throughout their life cycles, and—most importantly—harvest the delicious foods they produce. So whether you live on the Olympic Peninsula, in the Willamette Valley, in the Walla Walla Valley, or anywhere else in the Northwest, you’ll discover the best fruit and vegetable plants for your garden in this beautiful step-by-step how-to guide . . . and they’ll be on your table before you know it.