Grocery Shopping from the Back Porch
That’s my plan. At least, for vegetables. Last weekend a friend left
some seeds on the porch that I planted in tiny seedling containers
on my kitchen counter. Following a brief ant invasion, my son-in-law
put them on the back porch, and I decided I needed help with this
gardening business.
I haven’t planted anything since the tomatoes in my
New Jersey backyard over 40 years ago, so I count
myself as a novice.
Since the Richmond Public Library is my go-to source of information for
things of which I am totally ignorant, I decided to see if they had any e-
books on the subject. To my pleasant surprise, hoopla yielded 52 results to
my vegetable gardening e-books search.
Being in a big hurry–it is around dinner time, and my stomach is growling–
I was instantly attracted to some of the first titles that appeared on my
screen. I got a little uneasy when I discovered that the Southern volume of
the Fruit and Vegetable Gardening Guides series did not include Virginia.
Instead I needed Mid-Atlantic Fruit and Vegetable Gardening by Katie
Elzer-Peters. But I felt better when I saw the Timber Press Regional
Vegetable Gardening Series covering 7 regions and 4 states by various
authors. Mine was the Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening In The
Southeast by Ira Wallace. The Speedy Vegetable Garden, a 2012 Timber
Press offering by Mark Diacono and Lia Leendertz, sounded even more
interesting. I borrowed Starter Vegetable Gardens: 24 No-Fail Plans for
Small Organic Gardens by Barbara Pleasant with high hopes of success,
only to discover a very long Table of Contents. “Who has time for
comprehensive planning?” I thought, stomach growling again. Then I
looked at Container Vegetable Gardening: Growing Crops in Pots in
Every Space by Liz Dobbs with Anne Halpin. Not only were the photos very
nice, but the table of contents contained names of some of my favorite plant
foods–how enticing! I’ll start reading right after dinner. I can’t wait to find
out what to do next! To be continued . . . .
