I want to really like this book because I like the idea of gardening it´s built on, and it´s got lots of rigorous info based on an experimental gardening, and it gives me hope that one day I will be able to harvest some vegetables, but then it starts talking about planting by the phases of the moon because tides, or using crystal patterns to decide what to plant where, and I go ???? and start to wonder if any of it is good science.

This book was far too technical and far more detailed than I needed. One of the very few books I couldn't finish. Even as a reference book it's too comprehensive for me. I never really wanted to know that much about it! However I did pick up the odd interesting bit of information.

I have no question that "How to Grow More Vegetables" is a great resource for an experienced gardener. For a beginner like me, it was a little overwhelming... and a little too technical for my taste. I did like the spacing charts and the simple mini-garden plans. Don't get me wrong, I learned a lot from reading the book, but I think a good portion of it was just over my head.

Incredible book, even for the avowed "black thumb." This book will show you how to grow food anywhere, from the desert to the steppes, and how to maximize the productivity of any patch of earth, all while adding richness to the soil.

i ended up not liking this book all that much. it's too sciency and the author gets bogged down in perfectionist details, when a first-time gardener wants simple, or at least that's what i wanted. on the other hand, after reading this book, i started my first garden and it was a wild, very high-density, high-yielding success!

Decades before the terms “eco-friendly” and “sustainable growing” entered the vernacular, How to Grow More Vegetables demonstrated that small-scale, high-yield, all-organic gardening methods could yield bountiful crops over multiple growing cycles using minimal resources in a suburban environment. The concept that John Jeavons and the team at Ecology Action launched more than 40 years ago has been embraced by the mainstream and continues to gather momentum. Today, How to Grow More Vegetables, now in its fully revised and updated 8th edition, is the go-to reference for food growers at every level: from home gardeners dedicated to nurturing their backyard edibles in maximum harmony with nature’s cycles, to small-scale commercial producers interested in optimizing soil fertility and increasing plant productivity. Whether you hope to harvest your first tomatoes next summer or are planning to grow enough to feed your whole family in years to come, How to Grow More Vegetables is your indispensable sustainable garden guide.

If you ever needed a tried and successful vegetable gardening blueprint to copy - this would be it.

There's plenty of information on growing rich soil, crop rotations, companion planting and many other techniques that have stood the test of decades in the field. Instructions are clear and there's very little room for error, but plenty of room for customization.

Beginner's might seem overwhelmed by the amount of information, but it's possible to implement as much as you feel comfortable at the time. I would say the book is more geared towards Intermediate gardeners, while Advanced gardeners will still find a thing or two to learn from it.

If I was on the lookout for shortcomings, then the (and Fruits, Nuts, Berries, Grains, and Other Crops) part can easily be dropped from the title. The book discusses vegetable growing deeply, and while it is true that most of these techniques can be applied in theory to other crops, there is no practical guidance on how to do it.

This is one of those revolutionary gardening books that would change the way I garden if I was willing to dig two-foot deep beds, which I am not. If you aren't, either, I would recommend Eliot Coleman as a satisfying alternative if you're looking to feel both inspired and inept as a gardener (I say this with humor and all affection, as a Coleman devotee).

I am a big, big fan of this book. In my varied career as a gardener, I have tilled soil everywhere from rooftop boxes in Canada, to an herb garden at a historic house in Georgia, to a market garden in West Virginia. I have found this book to be absolutely indispensible. It describes growing using the bio-intensive method, first championed by British gardening genius Alan Chadwick, and further developed in California by John Jeavons and the folks at Ecology Action.

One distinguishing aspect of bio-intensive gardening is soil preparation. The beds are deeply dug, using the "double dug" method. While this method is very labor intensive, preparing garden beds so that the soil is loosened two feet down gives the plant roots room to expand, and the plants to thrive. Another characteristic of bio-intensive gardening is that the plantings are not laid out in straight lines. Instead, the seeds or seedlings are laid out in a pattern where each plant has an amount of space between it and the surrounding plants in a grid pattern. Since the double dug beds are higher than the surrounding land, it is possible to even plant on the sides of the mounded earth. This results in a much more efficient use of the land.

Also included are very comprehensive charts for vegetables and garden crops; grain, protein and vegetable oil crops. and cover, organic matter, and fodder crops. Using the information in this book, anyone can grow a flourishing garden organically. For more information on growing bio-intensively, go to http://www.growbiointensive.org/

An interesting read, with some intriguing, non-standard ideas about gardening. It is kind of weird how cultish the book is. For example, whenever the words GROW BIOINTENSIVE are used, which is all the time, they are always in all caps. And you can tell that the guy who invented this method is revered as a living god by his followers. But if you can get over that, the book is obviously the result of years and years of research, and really useful.

Some really great tips in here and some parts to skim past. Isn’t that the way with most gardening books tho? Most notably is the idea that soil needs to be tilled. Definitely not a popular opinion anymore.

I found the sections on the science of compost to be one of the best explanations I’ve seen.

To be honest, I more or less skimmed this book as I was getting ready to plant my garden. I found, however, the principles taught in the book to be logical, they made perfect sense to me. The book talked about the history of Biodynamic/French intensive methods of gardening, and how to grow more vegetables in a small area. The thing I found to be most helpful in this book was the list given of veggies and herbs that grow well together, and what plants and herbs are antagonistic to one another. Really the whole book was most helpful to me and one I think would be interesting to any Gardner.