- Hardcover: 216 pages
- Publisher: Reader's Digest Association (April 1996)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0895778483
- ISBN-13: 978-0895778482
- Product Dimensions: 28.7 x 22.4 x 2.5 cm
- Shipping Weight: 1.2 Kg
- Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #787,956 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon.com
Equal parts gorgeous and practical, Reader's Digest's The Complete Container Garden provides clear and straightforward advice accompanied by brightly colored close-up photography. From spring bulbs to winter berries, the range of plants and containers is tremendous, and the how-to tips are invaluable. You'll find techniques for training vines and topiary or planting strawberry jars, and generous coverage of basics like pruning, feeding, wintering, and deadheading.
The author pays great attention to choosing plants. The ideas for unusual foliage plants are exceptional, ranging from lovely purple-leaved cabbages to aromatic pelargonium. Only two brief pages are devoted to discussing pests and diseases, but the photos are a big help in identifying various creatures--for greater detail in getting rid of them, novice gardeners will need to look for other information sources.
Over 70 pages are devoted to descriptions of plants that are container-appropriate, and you'll have plenty to choose from in all categories--common bulbs and annuals as well as more unusual vegetables and small fruit trees are all represented with growing tips and optimal conditions, so you'll be sure to choose plants appropriate to your environment. Enjoyable inspiration for the novice or expert, you'll find this a worthy addition to both your coffee table and your reference shelf. --Jill Lightner
From Publishers Weekly
Container gardening offers myriad possibilities for growing things in restricted spaces, for adding color to problem planting areas and for providing dramatic focal points to landscaping. British garden writer Joyce concentrates primarily on floral gardening here, demonstrating how to combine color schemes for shady or sunny exposures and how to use foliage plants as a primary focus. More than 400 color photos illustrate the steps involved in selecting and transforming an assortment of containers, from large and costly pottery tubs to recycled coffee cans, into contained gardens. Soil selection and planting methods, the use of liners, hanging baskets, window boxes, pruning and propagation are considered; there are sections on container rock and water gardens. An extensive chapter on individual plants is organized by color of bloom and/or foliage and includes reference to U.S. hardiness zones. "Model Plantings," with lists of ingredients and positioning diagrams, depicts arrangements that seem most likely to thrive in areas of the U.S. that enjoy maritime climates comparable to those in Great Britain. Lackluster, jerky prose and the failure to address organic means of pest and disease control further narrow the overall value for U.S. gardeners.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not enough for Part/Shade Gardening,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Complete Container Garden: More Than 1000 Plants for Containers, Step-By-Step Instruction (Hardcover)
I enjoyed this book but found it's primary focus was on "sunny" container gardening. Since I need to focus on part-shade and shade plants the book was not as helpful as I would have liked.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Essential for your garden book collection!,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Complete Container Garden: More Than 1000 Plants for Containers, Step-By-Step Instruction (Hardcover)
This book has it all! It has practical tips for container planting, maintainence, topiary, and inspiration. It does emphasize ornemental plantings, but it really does offer a well-rounded approach to container gardening. It has lots of eye-candy to boot! Who can beat that? The best of both worlds, informational, and artistic. My only complaint is that it does not always say what the light requirements for the plants presented, but the container blue-print section makes up for that in some degree. A good staple for container gardening.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Color Groupings Distinguishes This Work,
By
This review is from: The Complete Container Garden: More Than 1000 Plants for Containers, Step-By-Step Instruction (Hardcover)
Beautifully presented, this book provides two different functions. The first part of the book is a standard introduction to container gardening, with information about how to plant pots, the order, and how best to arrange them. The author has some very nice instructional graphics to illustrate the steps, disembodied hands working in the dirt. The second and more interesting part of the book involved his breakdown of container plant types by color. Each main area of the color wheel is given a section, and plants for that color are described for spring, summer, and fall/winter. If you like to work and create your arrangements by combining color schemes, this will be very helpful. I'm still at the stage where a book like Hillier's 'Container Gardening Through the Year' was more appropriate providing concrete examples that you can go out and put together. Joyce does do that for a variety of pots, indicating through pot-maps where things should be planted etc., but that's not the main thrust of the book it appeared. I did like the presentation and can understand the high rankings this work receives.
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