This is an important book that focuses on growing more food crops by improving the soil through composting and other natural ways to amend the soil. Agricultural monoculture practices that rely on fertilizers and pesticides can deplete the soil resulting in less productivity. The GROW Biointensive methods incorporate crops to enrich compost that in turn enrich the soil.

The information in this book is backed up by great research. Perhaps because of the research foundation, the book is not as organized and easy to follow as I would have liked. And I need to do additional research to fill in some gaps left in the information. Despite these shortcomings, How to Grow More Vegetables...has earned a permanent spot on my resource book shelf.

A reference book I had been coming across often in newer gardening books. Did not gain much more than what other authors had already cited.
Good info all the same.

The book has confidence in its vision and belief, and sticks to it staunchly through its broad claims and pseudoscience spiels. While the gardening method it employs seems to be viable and well-backed, the title is misleading and the book itself is by no means comprehensive, citing other publications, dead links, and its own website (quite often) for the "further reading" crucial to the method itself.

Wow what a lot of interesting information. My only concern is that the writers claim their findings are applicable to ANY climate/soil type, and I'm not certain that's truly the case. That said, I was fascinated by their planting techniques, the information about companion planting and natural ways of getting rid of pests. Not to mention the raised bed style of gardening, which I want to go out and try right now.

If you are interested in maximizing the yield from your vegetable garden in the smallest possible space, then this is the book for you. The author outlines the tools and procedures that his team of scientists has developed at California's Santa Cruz University to help farmers in third world countries grow high yield sustainable organic gardens to feed their families. The method involves careful soil preparation, production and use of organic compost, planting of the vegetables in close proximity to one another, and gentle watering that reduces erosion. All of these are outlined extensively in the book. This is not the usual colorful photograph filled eye candy that constitutes most gardening books. This is large on science and illustrated with only a few sketches. However, there is a great deal to be learned from these scientists who promise that the average person will be able to support themselves in a sustainable way on the produce from just 1/8 acre of land. Astounding.

Terrific book with practical advice for working towards a sustainable garden. If you liked Square Foot Gardening, check this book out...you'll understand more of the "whys" and "hows" for using intensive gardening techniques.

This should have been right up my street: sustainable, organic gardening being something I'm pretty passionate about. But it was a disappointing read: simultaneously didactic and uninformative. I found it repetitive in places and with the exception of the section on plants to repel certain bugs, was left feeling that I had learnt very little. There were numerous mentions of other booklets published by the Ecology Action group which were rather irritating: if it's important enough to keep referring to, why not just put the booklet's text into the book? The fact that they'd turned the GROW BIOINTENSIVE process into a capitalised brandname was annoying, too. It's not what organic gardening should about, in my opinion.

Mr. Jeavons knows what the hell is up.

A classic!

If your only going to buy one gardening book, get this one. Although their are many organic gardening books on the market, and many of them, especially those from Rodale Press are good, this is the best. Building on the Biodynamic and French Intensive methods, the ideas outlined in this book can be implemented by any individuals with basic hand gardening tools. One important point is that for a suburban or urban gardener the earlier editions (1-4) like this one are superior to later versions in one respect. Early additions were focused more on urban and suburban gardeners with their unlimited supply of potential compost (especially leaves) while later editions focus on rural, self sustaining farming (where organic matter from outside you own land) is limited.

Amazing gardening book. It was out of print for ever - and is now back in print. We use this double dug method to literally grow 5x what our neighbors grow. We eat the veggies all winter only to run out just before they are ripe again.

I bought the sixth edition when I bought my house in 2007 and my first garden flourished despite the thick clay soil. This edition clarifies the vast amounts of information in it by providing concise step-by-step procedures for many common intensive gardening tasks.

The Grow Biointensive method is a bit of a form of gardening for wonky people who like numbers, but I like the idea of creating a closed system, even if it means sacrificing good "vegetable" space to grow your own "browns" to be composted. I think this method is a good self-sufficient method and I like the focus on sustainability (grow your own compost, save your own seed, use your own muscles for the work) and the emphasis on continually building up the soil.