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Growing Your Own Fruit & Veg For Dummies

by Geoff Stebbings

Growing Your Own Fruit & Veg For Dummies

Published by
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd
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Chichester
West Sussex
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Copyright 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, Chichester, West Sussex, England

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, Chichester, West Sussex

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data: A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-0-470-69960-7

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Bell & Bain Ltd, Glasgow

10 9 8 7 6 5 4

About the Author

Geoff Stebbings got hooked on gardening at the age of eight and soon knew that he wanted to make it his career. He had weekend gardening jobs while at school, as well as working for a greengrocer. He trained at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and has worked in garden centres and in a specialist nursery before becoming a Head Gardener, restoring a historic garden. It was while working here that Geoff became closely involved with the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens and he had responsibility for the National Collection of Award-Winning Iris.

In 1989, to try and get others interested in gardening, Geoff became a gardening writer and worked for Garden News, Garden Answers, Practical Gardening and The Garden the journal of the Royal Horticultural Society. He then worked as a freelance writer for ten years and has written several books, including The Gardeners Guide to Growing Irises, The Year-Round Garden and Spring Bulbs.

Geoff also lectures widely and is a member of the Garden Roadshow, which travels around the country visiting major flower shows and answering peoples problems. He is a keen gardener and grows a wide range of plants in his garden, greenhouses and on his allotments. His passions are iris and growing tasty food especially tomatoes but he says that he could never be a specialist because he loves growing anything and everything except pampas grass!

Geoff is currently Editor of Garden Answers magazine.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to everyone who wants to discover the satisfaction of growing some of their own food. Its a voyage of discovery that never ends.

Publishers Acknowledgments

Were proud of this book; please send us your comments through our Dummies online registration form located at www.dummies.com/register/.

Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:

Acquisitions, Editorial, and Media Development

Development Editor: Steve Edwards

Content Editor: Jo Theedom

Commissioning Editor: Nicole Hermitage

Publishing Assistant: Jennifer Prytherch

Copy Editor: Andy Finch

Proofreader: David Price

Technical Editor: Sue Fisher

Executive Editor: Samantha Spickernell

Executive Project Editor: Daniel Mersey

Cover Photos: blickwinkel/Alamy (front); Chuck Place/Alamy, Organics Image Library/Alamy (back)

Cartoons: Ed McLachlan

Composition Services

Project Coordinator: Lynsey Stanford

Layout and Graphics: Christin Swinford

Proofreader: Melissa Cossell

Indexer: Ty Koontz

Brand Reviewers: Jennifer Bingham, Zo Wykes

Introduction

G ardening is an exciting journey. Every year is different: growing something new, experimenting with new varieties, and experiencing all that the British weather can throw at you (perfect weather one year and rotten weather the next!). No matter how many years you spend in the garden, you never get to know everything and you can always improve. But with every year you gain more experience, and the successes you have make your yearning for knowledge get even stronger.

Growing your own crops gets you outside in the open air and gives you plenty of exercise. More importantly, growing crops gets you back in touch with the seasons and with nature something that modern living has moved us away from. You experience the near miracle of seeds germinating. You nurture your seedlings and young plants, do your best for them, battle against their enemies, enjoy the abundance of your plants, and finally feed your body with food thats fresh and richer in nutrients than anything you can buy.