Customer Reviews

The New Organic Grower: A Master's Manual of Tools and Techniques for the Home and Market Gardener

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I would like to start up a small garden market and was looking for a good book to get me started. This book provided more than I asked for! It was very thorough on every detail of what would be involved - making a good soil, rotating crops, green manure, composting, greenhouses, seed producers, materials and costs, the benefit of animals, hiring/firing workers, marketing your product, irrigation, finding a good land plot to begin with and so much more! His information about start up costs and materials is in a simplistic, not extravagant and expensive way. He stresses reusing and recycling just about everything to save time, money, effort, and most importantly, our valuable earth resources. Although he makes strong suggestions about what will work successfully, he is always open to new ideas and techniques that could better improve any small farm. I appreciate his open-mindedness to new ideas and the value of constant learning. Reading this book makes you want to go out and start a farm right away with confidence that you'll be successful!

Practical idealists, the Shakers demonstrated that it is possible for man to create the environment and way of life he wants, not by complaining about the system but by building their own domain arranged to their liking. Eliot Coleman, farm manager of the Mountain School Program of Milton Academy in Vershire, Vermont, has demonstrated that it is possible to undertake small-scale, commercial farming and gardening without the use of harmful pesticides by using cost-effective, environmentally sustainable methods to produce spectacular results with economy of effort and means. By offering a wealth of ideas; by identifying the most efficient and practical machinery and tools; by offering simple and efficient production techniques; and advising on the most remunerative marketing methods, this book is for the gardener and small farmer who has an unfulfilled dream to established an organic enterprise with minimal expense. When low cost production methods are allied with the right machinery and marketing practices, the viability of the 1-5 acre farm producing high quality food is not only possible but also enjoyable and profitable.

The advantage enjoyed by the small farmer is quality. If the product is first class and in demand and you are a dependable supplier at reasonable cost there is never a problem finding customers. But it needs hard work and intelligence. When starting in the era of 'get big or get out' there were almost no models of commercially successful organic small farmers to provide inspiration and ideas and where they existed it was exhausting and neither cost effective nor efficient. But by seeking out the best from different parts of the world Coleman found the optimum to be about 2.5 acres per grower - enough to produce quality vegetables for 100 people. Produce from the school farm now set the quality standards for the area. He learned much from Helen and Scott Nearing - they were the most practically organized country people he has met - especially their skills in observation and planning. Coleman sets out the year's work on paper during the winter and has a notebook with sections for each crop. He rotates crops until he finds the optimum - the single most important practice in a multi-cropping program. "The 8-year rotation presented below is a good one to conclude with because it is the one I have followed since 1982. It has been well tested. I have thought about modifying it countless times but never have. Its virtues always seem to outweigh its defects, although that isn't to say it can't be improved. I'm sure it can. But it has been a dependable producer and I offer it here as a tried-and-true example of a successful rotational sequence that incorporates many crop benefits. The goal of this particular rotation is to grow 32 vegetable crops in adequate quantities to feed for a year the community of 60-some people who eat daily in the Mountain School dining hall. Since we have found that we can feed 40 people per acre, the rotation below represents 1.5 acres of land. The salad crops not included here are grown in a separate small salad garden close to the kitchen." However, the author points out that tomatoes do better being grown in the same place each year fertilized by their own waste.

Factors that affect plant growth - light, moisture, temperature, soil fertility, mineral balance, biotic life, weeds, pests, seeds, labor, planning and skill - need to be arranged to the plant's liking with the grower coordinating and combining them into a harmonious whole much like the conductor of an orchestra. Successful farmers understand that their role is to help the seed do what it is already determined to do. Good farming practices such as crop rotation, animal manures, green manures, cover crops, mixed cropping, mixed stocking, legumes, crop residues, and season extension have been used for generations, but removing the limiting factors to plant growth and generating a balanced soil fertility are ultimately the secret of success.

There are 22 chapters, each one dealing with an important element of success such as green manures, tillage, direct seeding, transplanting, weeds, pests, harvest, marketing, season extension. In addition there are three appendices on tools, the major vegetable crops and a one-page schematic outline of biological agriculture. If you plan to buy just one book on organic growing, you will find it difficult to beat this book.

an excellent book for anyone just beginning organic gardening or even the experienced gardener looking for new ideas or better ways to do things. Many explanations of various procedures some old, some quite unorthodox has the reader asking "why didn't I think of that". Well worth the price this is the book you'll go to time after time.

This amounts to the 'bible' of organic growing. It is informative and inspirational in equal measure. While the approach Coleman takes is particularly suited to market gardening, it is also eminently suitable for smaller-scale gardeners who simply wish to feed their family.

Coleman writes, 'The premise of this book is that you can make a good living on 5 acres or less of intensive vegetable production. Thus it is those acres that concern us most.' (p16)

In a nutshell, Coleman's approach is to:

- plan and market effectively

- develop the healthiest soil

- grow the most valuable crops

- extend the growing season to the maximum

He show just how to do this in 334 pages with 28 chapters and four appendices. There isn't space here to offer a contents list, but here are some highlights:

Chapters addressing the question 'why do it?' - Agricultural craftsmanship', 'a final question'

Chapters on 'season extension', mobile greenhouses and 'the winter garden'.

'Plant-positive' solutions to pests.

Chapters on marketing strategy and marketing.

However, 'The New Organic Grower' covers far more than this - in fact everything you could need to start successful organic vegetable production! Readers living in cool/temperate climates may also want to check out Coleman's other popular book, 'Four Season Harvest'.

To feed yourself, feed the soil. Coleman has long been gardening under challenging conditions, has learned how to optimize soil fertility to produce health-giving harvests. Here he presents top-notch advice so you can do it too.

For over three thousand years there has been a written record of agricultural and horticultural curiosity and creativity. It is a domain of understanding where observation has always been the source of creativity. During that long history there have been many brilliantly creative observers of nature whose passions form the backbone of what we know about growing plants. Eliot Coleman is one of those true masters. He has spent his life applying his enormous, practical curiosity to HOW TO GROW FOOD PLANTS. If you grow vegetables and fruits, for pleasure or for market, you owe it to yourself to sit at the feet of one of the very best.

from Nicholas Lore, best selling author of "THE PATHFINDER: How To Choose or Change Your Career for a Lifetime of Satisfaction and Success"

I could not recomend another book more highly. The information in this book is useful to growers on any scale. The chapters on soil preparation and crop rotaion are worth the price alone. I am online right now ordering a copy for my dad as a gift. Enjoy!

Eliot Coleman has written a masterful treatment of a deeply important subject. Not only does he offer an array of practical, time tested methods to help the reader successfully garden organically, he also tells the reader WHY one would wish to do so.

Eliot has done so much research on soil management that can be used by anyone. He has helpful information on maintaining soil, crop rotations and helpful hints for starting seeds to harvesting. A book I return to often.

The New Organic Grower and Eliot Coleman's Four Season Harvest are two of the absolute best books ever written on the sunject of cold-climate market gardening. For the latest on Coleman's ingenious techniques, check out his newest publication: "The Winter Harvest Manual." The sub title is "Farming the back side of the calendar." He is doing commercial greenhouse production of fresh vegetables -- throughout the Maine winter -- without supplemental heat! This is MUST reading!