ORGANIC GARDENER'S COMPOSTING TEXT

Through numerous editions and still the standard soils text for American agricultural colleges. Every serious gardener should attempt a reading of this encyclopedia of soil knowledge every few years. See also Foth, Henry D. _Fundamentals of Soil Science._ Bromfield, Louis. _Malibar Farm._ New York: Harper & Brothers, 1947. Here is another agricultural reformer who did not exactly toe the Organic Party line as promulgated by J.l. Rodale. Consequently his books are relatively unknown to today's gardening public. If you like Wendell Berry you'll find Bromfield's emotive and Iyrical prose even finer and less academically contrived. His experiments with ecological farming are inspiring. See also Bromfield's other farming books: _Pleasant Valley, In My Experience,_ and _Out of the Earth._ Carter, Vernon Gill and Dale, Tom. _Topsoil and Civilization. _Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1974. (first edition, 1954) This book surveys seven thousand years of world history to show how each place where civilization developed was turned into an impoverished, scantily-inhabited semi-desert by neglecting soil conservation. Will ours' survive any better? Readers who wish to pursue this area further might start with Wes Jackson's _New Roots for Agriculture._ Ernle, (Prothero) Lord. _English Farming Past and Present,_ 6th edition. First published London: Longmans, Green & Co., Ltd., 1912, and many subsequent editions. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1962. Some history is dry as dust. Ernle's writing lives like that of Francis Parkman or Gibbon. Anyone serious about vegetable gardening will want to know all they can about the development of modern agricultural methods. Foth, Henry D. _Fundamentals of Soil Science, _Eighth Edition. New York: John Wylie & Sons, 1990. Like Brady's text, this one has also been through numerous editions for the past several decades. Unlike Brady's work however, this book is a little less technical, an easier read as though designed for non-science majors. Probably the best starter text for someone who wants to really understand soil. Hall, Bolton. _Three Acres and Liberty. _New York: Macmillan, 1918. Bolton Hall marks the start of our modern back-to-the-land movement. He was Ralph Borsodi's mentor and inspiration. Where Ralph was smooth and intellectual, Hall was crusty and Twainesque. Hamaker, John. D. _The Survival of Civilization. _Annotated by Donald A. Weaver. Michigan/ California: Hamaker-Weaver Publishers, 1982. Forget global warming, Hamaker believably predicts the next ice age is coming. Glaciers will be upon us sooner than we know unless we reverse intensification of atmospheric carbon dioxide by remineralization of the soil. Very useful for its exploration of the agricultural use of rock flours. Helps one stand back from the current global warming panic and ask if we really know what is coming. Or are we merely feeling guilty for abusing Earth? Hopkins, Cyril G. _Soil Fertility and Permanent Agriculture. _Boston: Ginn and Company, 1910. Though of venerable lineage, this book is still one of the finest of soil manuals in existence. Hopkins' interesting objections to chemical fertilizers are more economic than moral. _The Story of the Soil: From the Basis of Absolute Science and Real Life. _Boston: Richard G. Badger, 1911. A romance of soil science similar to Ecotopia or Looking Backward. No better introduction exists to understanding farming as a process of management of overall soil mineralization. People who attempt this book should be ready to forgive that Hopkins occasionally expresses opinions on race and other social issues that were acceptable in his era but today are considered objectionable by most Americans. Jenny, Hans. _Factors of Soil Formation: a System of Quantitative Pedology._ New York: McGraw Hill, 1941. Don't let the title scare you. Jenny's masterpiece is not hard to read and still stands in the present as the best analysis of how soil forms from rock. Anyone who is serious about growing plants will want to know this data. McCarrison, Sir Robert. _The Work of Sir Robert McCarrison. _ed. H. M. Sinclair. London Faber and Faber, 1953. One of the forgotten discoverers of the relationship between soil fertility and human health. McCarrison, a physician and medical researcher, worked in India contemporaneously with Albert Howard. He spent years "trekking around the Hunza and conducted the first bioassays of food nutrition by feeding rat populations on the various national diets of India. And like the various nations of India, some of the rats became healthy, large, long-lived, and good natured while others were small, sickly, irritable, and short-lived. Nearing, Helen & Scott. _Living the Good Life: How to Live Sanely and Simply in a Troubled World._ First published in 1950. New York: Schocken Books, 1970. Continuing in Borsodi's footsteps, the Nearings homesteaded in the thirties and began proselytizing for the self-sufficient life-style shortly thereafter. Scott was a very dignified old political radical when he addressed my high school in Massachusetts in 1961 and inspired me to dream of country living. He remained active until nearly his hundredth birthday. See also: _Continuing the Good Life_ and _The Maple Sugar Book._ Parnes, Robert. _Organic and Inorganic Fertilizers. _Mt. Vernon, Maine: Woods End Agricultural Institute, 1986. Price, Weston A. _Nutrition and Physical Degeneration. _La Mesa, California: Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation, reprinted 1970. (1939) Sits on the "family bible" shelf in my home along with Albrecht, McCarrison, and Howard. Price, a dentist with strong interests in prevention, wondered why his clientele, 1920s midwest bourgeoisie, had terrible teeth when prehistoric skulls of aged unlettered savages retained all their teeth in perfect condition. So he traveled to isolated parts of the Earth in the early 1930s seeking healthy humans. And he found them--belonging to every race and on every continent. And found out why they lived long, had virtually no degeneration of any kind including dental degeneration. Full of interesting photographs, anthropological data, and travel details. A trail-blazing work that shows the way to greatly improved human health. Rodale, J.I. _The Organic Front._ Emmaus: Rodale Press, 1948. An intensely ideological statement of the basic tenets of the Organic faith. Rodale established the organic gardening and farming movement in the United States by starting up _Organic Gardening and Farming_ magazine in 1942. His views, limitations and preferences have defined "organic" ever since. See also: _Pay Dirt._ Schuphan, Werner. _Nutritional Values in Crops and Plants. _London: Faber and Faber, 1965. A top-rate scientist asks the question: "Is organically grown food really more nutritious?" The answer is: "yes, and no." Smith, J. Russell. _Tree Crops: A Permanent Agriculture._ New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1929. No bibliography of agricultural alternatives should overlook this classic critique of farming with the plow. Delightfully original! Solomon, Steve. _Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades._ Seattle, Washington: Sasquatch Books, 1989. My strictly regional focus combined with the reality that the climate west of the Cascades is radically different than the rest of the United States has made this vegetable gardening text virtually unknown to American gardeners east of the Cascades. It has been praised as the best regional garden book ever written. Its analysis of soil management, and critique of Rodale's version of the organic gardening and farming philosophy are also unique. I founded and ran Territorial Seed Company, a major, mail-order vegetable garden seed business; no other garden book has ever encompassed my experience with seeds and the seed world. _Waterwise Gardening. _Seattle, Sasquatch Books, 1992. How to grow vegetables without dependence on irrigation. Make your vegetables able to survive long periods of drought and still be very productive. My approach is extensive, old fashioned and contrarian, the opposite of today's intensive, modern, trendy postage-stamp living. Turner, Frank Newman. _Fertility, Pastures and Cover Crops Based on Nature's Own Balanced Organic Pasture Feeds._ reprinted from: Faber and Faber, 1955. ed., San Diego: Rateaver, 1975. An encouragement to farm using long rotations and green manuring systems from a follower of Albert Howard. Turner offered a remarkably sensible definition for soil fertility, in essence, "if my livestock stay healthy, live long, breed well, and continue doing so for at least four generations, then my soil was fertile." Voisin, Andre. _Better Grassland Sward. _London: Crosby Lockwood and Sons, Ltd., 1960. The first half is an amazing survey of the role of the earthworm in soil fertility. The rest is just Voisin continuing on at his amazing best. No one interested in soil and health should remain unfamiliar with Voisin's intelligence. See also: _Grass Tetany, Grass Productivity,_ and _Soil, Grass and Cancer._