Backyard Book Reviews

If you want to expand your understanding of your backyard world, and how you can make it a wonderful habitat for the winged creatures you love, we’ve got some books that will help you. From designing gardens that are welcoming to a variety of birds, to installing the right feeders and bird baths, these volumes offer a wealth of knowledge and practical information you can use to attract and enjoy all the birds found in your area.

1. Attracting Birds to Your Backyard: 536 Ways to Create a Haven for Your Favorite Birds (Rodale/Roth): If birds area going to make a regular visit to your backyard, they will have to find ample supplies of food, water, shelter and possible nesting sites. This comprehensive book covers all of these topics, and more, in great detail. In-depth information and step-by-step instructions make it easy to transform any backyard into a birding sanctuary.

2. Backyard Birds — Peterson Field Guides® for Young Naturalists: This is an outstanding book for bird lovers of any age, with special emphasis given to helping younger bird enthusiasts learn about birds, their likes and dislikes, and how they are best served in our backyard habitats. Very little prior knowledge is required to make good use of this very instructive book. It will help all budding bird watchers deepen their comprehension and enjoyment in discovering the birds in their areas.

3. The Backyard Bird Lover’s Field Guide: Secrets to Attracting, Identifying, and Enjoying Birds of Your Region: This is another book by Sally Roth, bird expert extraordinaire. She’ll walk you through the topics outlined in the title, with conversational descriptions that are easy to follow for the new bird lover and the veteran birding enthusiast alike. The wonderful, full-color pictures alone are worth the price of this stunning book! Give this book a read, keep it handy as a reference guide, and your pleasure in the hobby will be magnified abundantly.

4. The Backyard Bird Feeder’s Bible: The A-to-Z Guide To Feeders, Seed Mixes, Projects, And Treats (Rodale/Roth): Publisher and author team up again to offer the most comprehensive book on the market for novice and intermediate bird watchers. You’ll love the color photos, handy outlines of each species, and practical tips for watching them in nature. This is a great reference resource to keep by your window or to add to your backpack alongside your birding binoculars.

5. Backyard Bird Secrets for Every Season: Attract a Variety of Nesting, Feeding, and Singing Birds Year-Round (Sally Roth): The first lady of bird watching takes her readers through the basics here, teaching them the nuances of turning their backyards into a habitat their winged friends will gravitate to and decide to become a long-term part of. You’ll learn what to do in each season to have the best opportunity of attracting your favorites to the feeder, the nesting houses, or the bird bath. Learn about migration and ways to attract species that are just passing through, too.

Pick up one or two of these books today, and your love for all-things-birds will grow with the turn of each page. You’ll be educated, fascinated, and motivated to get out and discover for yourself why more than 1 in 5 people describe themselves as bird watching enthusiasts!

Gardening Books for Beginners

Gardening gains new enthusiasts each year, from children learning alongside a parent, to adults looking for a rewarding new hobby, to retirees who finally have the time to stop and smell the roses. There are a number of very helpful gardening books for beginners, and we bring you some wonderful choices to get you started:

1. Gardening for Beginners, by Wolfgang Hansel: It is what it purports to be! This luxuriously illustrated guide features 350 color photos and illustrations that teach and encourage with examples from every topic discussed. New gardening enthusiasts will have terms and concepts clearly explained, and will gain an understanding not only of what steps to take to produce a healthy, productive garden, but why each step is necessary. The novice will learn about the right tool, preparing the soil for optimal production, fertilizers and compost, planting, irrigation, and more. A detailed section profiles over 150 flowers, shrubs, and grasses. Great for beginners, but lots here the veteran gardener will benefit from.

 

2. Gardening Basics For Dummies, by Steven A. Frowine: While we would never suggest the title refers to you, we are confident the beginning gardener will enjoy this comprehensive overview of gardening fundamentals. This book assumes no previous knowledge, so concepts are thoroughly explained. Soil issues, bed design, choosing flowers, shrubs and trees, and proper plant care are given detailed exploration. The section on selecting the right annuals and perennials is excellent, as is the instruction on cultivating an organic, edible garden. Children will love the chapter on creating a little garden for them to learn in, and the discussion of plants that will attract butterflies to the garden. Novice gardeners will feel like geniuses when finished with this book, and will produce gardens to prove it.

 

3. Joy of Gardening, by Dick Raymond: This popular television gardener has thousands of fans grateful that he decided to put his vast knowledge into print. The book expertly covers all the basics of gardening, from soils, to seed and plant selection, to composting and irrigation, to pruning and harvesting. But Raymond’s real love, vegetable gardening, is the subject of the book’s most helpful and inspiring sections. Many photos and drawings deliver illustrations that bring his teaching and methods to full-color life. Beginners to master gardeners will find the help they need to produce fantastic gardens from the first scratch of the soil.

 

4. You Grow Girl: The Groundbreaking Guide to Gardening, by Gayla Trail: This quirky, chatty book is aimed at young ladies who would never consider gardening to be “cool,” but just may find plenty of joy and fulfillment when they give it a try. It’s a great book for moms and daughters to read together, and then put to good use in a hobby that will develop wonderful generational bonds – the kind that used to exist before industrialization and mobility took over. It’s a good primer on basic gardening topics. If the hobby takes, next season you may want something a bit more advanced. Still, following the guidelines in the book will get any gal off to a great start.

Flower Gardening Books

Flowers add inspiring beauty to each day. Growing flowers in your own garden, flowers you selected, planted and nurtured, then watching the plants come into bloom, multiplies the joy received from them many times over. Developing your skills as a flower gardener takes learning and practice, but the effort is rewarded each time you behold the loveliness and enjoy the fragrance of what you have cultivated. These books will make you a better flower gardener:

1. Complete Guide to Flower Gardening (Better Homes & Gardens) by Better Homes and Gardens Books and Michael McKinley: A comprehensive guide to planning, selecting, planting, and caring for flowers. A discussion of garden styles includes traditional, country, naturalist, eclectic, and more. The book contains more than 700 photos and illustrations, and an encyclopedia covering 450 different species.

 

 

 

2. The Big Book of Flower Gardening: A Guide to Growing Beautiful Annuals, Perennials, Bulbs, and Roses, from Time-Life Books: This big, beautiful book offers complete directions for growing healthy flower gardens, with fact-filled and practical sections on each type of flower covered. From preparing the soil, to cutting fresh flowers, to readying the beds for winter, no important topic is overlooked. It’s great for the coffee table when not in use!

 

 

 

3. The Well-Tended Perennial Garden: Planting and Pruning Techniques, by Tracy DiSabato-Aust: This is another large volume packed with stunning photos and illustrations that will instruct and inspire each gardener. It covers in detail the steps the gardener must take to cultivate the healthiest, most productive flowering plants possible. The beginner will not be overwhelmed with this book, and the master gardener will discover new information and techniques, as well. Practical, yet inspiring, this book is a perennial best seller!

 

 

4. Gardening for All Seasons, by the Editors of Creative Homeowner: This book covers all of the basics required for beginner and seasoned green-thumbs alike. The focus is on cultivating a garden that will bloom heartily, spring, summer, and fall, along with the best way to prepare flower gardens for wintering. It is very practical, nicely illustrated, and more affordable than some of our other selections, though not as in-depth. The book covers not only the growing of wonderful flowers in your outdoor garden, but includes a helpful section on maintaining potted house plants.

 

 

5. The Flower Gardener’s Bible: Time-Tested Techniques, Creative Designs, and Perfect Plants for Colorful Gardens, by Lewis Hill, Nancy Hill, and Joseph Desciose: Reading this book is like being mentored by wonderful master gardeners with a passion for what they do, and great ability to explain concepts so that they are easy to understand and apply. This very thorough book is easy to read, featuring a style that makes it feel like a magazine. Step-by-step instructions, abundantly illustrated with photos and drawings, makes for can’t-miss success. The Gallery of Gardens provides pictures of dozens of gardens that will motivate and inspire your own creativity in designing your garden and choosing the plants you want to incorporate into it. Some 260 species are given detailed profiles that will help you select plants you’ll love, and those that will flourish in your part of the world.

Simple Gardening Design Books For Everybody

Garden design is an ancient art. By adding human creativity to natural beauty in the planting of perennials, annuals, flowering bushes, and bulbs, the gardener can create serene and majestic space that renews the soul. Knowing how to design a garden so that it combines a sense of order while still allowing nature its organic impulse to spread and prosper takes some planning. These books will help you to design a simple garden that you’ll enjoy, and find very rewarding.

1. Garden Designs, by Robin Williams: This book by the British gardening expert will help you lay out your garden so that it blends naturally with your existing landscape. Many design examples, as well as 500 photos and illustrations, make this a very visual guide to creating the garden of your dreams. Topics include developing your priorities for the garden, using your space most effectively, and adding vertical elements like trellises and walls to add dimension to your garden. From planning to planting this comprehensive guide manages to be highly inspirational while providing the technical know-how to bring your garden visions to reality.

 

2. The Essential Garden Design Workbook: Second Edition, by Rosemary Alexander: The author presents what can be a complex subject in simple steps that make is seem well within the reach of the average gardener. You’ll learn the basics of garden design, with many examples illustrating Alexander’s information. This book will help you tap into your creative instincts for a gorgeous garden while staying with the parameters of practical necessity. Those who use this book will appreciate the level of detail and the full-color photos that illustrate the concepts under discussion. It’s like a college course on garden design, enjoyed right in your own yard.

 

3. Big Book of Garden Designs, by Tim Wilhite: If designing your first garden, or overhauling an existing garden, Wilhite offers insightful, thought-provoking advice on how to make the most of the space you have. More than 120 garden plans are included to get you thinking, imagining, planning, planting, and enjoying what you’ve planted. No matter what type of natural landscape you have, from flat, to hilly, wet to dry, rocky to grassy, small to unlimited, his expertise will guide you in creating a garden that will bring you more fulfillment than you thought possible. A section on herb gardening is an added bonus. Photos and complementary sketches give you the picture, no matter what your climate. You design the garden, then fill in the blanks with plants that work well where you live.

 

4. Small Spaces, Beautiful Gardens, by Keith Davitt: This book fills an important niche, since so many gardeners must work with limited space. A small plot outside your urban home or work place, or narrow strip between apartment buildings, can take on a sense of spaciousness and glory with forethought and good plant selection. The author uses 16 of his own projects to illustrate “before” and “after” views of his work, giving the reader wonderful inspiration that they can turn a little overlooked spot into a sensuous feast for eyes and noses, and if you enjoy the buzz of bees, the ears as well. In ground gardens as well as gardens made up completely of containers, are explored.

Herb Gardening Books Review

Gardening and cooking are related in many ways. Both start with basic ingredients and produce something fragrant, aesthetically appealing, and very fulfilling. Growing an herb garden is the perfect way to combine a love for gardening and cooking. Cultivating herbs and spices yourself, and then incorporating them into your cuisine forms a delightful duo. The books we review here will provide you will all the instruction you need for growing a first-rate, useful herb garden.

1. Your Backyard Herb Garden: A Gardener’s Guide to Growing Over 50 Herbs Plus How to Use Them in Cooking, Crafts, Companion Planting and More, by Miranda Smith: That title is a mouthful, and you’ll love the mouthfuls of delicious food you prepare with herbs from your own garden. Smith writes with an enthusiastic, engaging style that will have you excited about the possibilities. Her detailed explanations make growing healthy, productive herbs easy and fun. Helpful sections on soil preparation, fertilizing, irrigating, and preparing harvested herbs for use are worth the price of the book. Bonus material covers employing herbs outside the kitchen, in potpourri, cosmetics, crafts and more.

 

2. The Herb Gardener: A Guide for All Seasons, by Susan McClure: Practical and inspiring, this guide offers clear instructions illustrated with generously provided color photographs and drawings. Solid basics about herb cultivation are covered before McClure turns to a discussion of maintaining outdoor and indoor herb gardens that will keep you in fresh herbs all the year round. Herb garden designs that feature beauty and accessibility are included. The section on dividing your plants offers you the opportunity to share your hobby with family and friends, giving them a memorable gift they’ll appreciate with each herb-enhanced meal!

 

3. The Complete Book of Herbs: A Practical Guide to Growing and Using Herbs, by Lesley Bremness: This full-color best seller is a gold mine of practical advice, beginning with clear explanation of how to plan a design a productive herb garden. All the details of planting, nurturing, and harvesting your lovely little crops are at your fingertips. Helpful extras include a guide to herb identification, gift ideas to spread the bounty of your efforts, medicinal uses, and fantastic recipes that deliver fresh flavor in each meal.

 

4. Little Herb Gardens: Simple Secrets for Glorious Gardens–Indoors and Out by Georgeanne Brennan: Herb gardens are as easy to grow as they are delightful to use, and this enjoyable book will detail how to cultivate and fully enjoy your herb garden. This book is unique in that Brennan offers an extensive guide to container gardening, in addition to sound instruction on creating luscious outdoor herb gardens. This best selling guide offers detailed profiles on 30 different herbs, offering instruction on how to grow them, and tips for using them to create culinary masterpieces.