Imagine scrolling Instagram posts and being grabbed by a Martha Stewart post referring to Eliot Coleman’s long time enterprise: organic gardening in Maine year round using unheated greenhouses. This beautiful book has many photos to support the reveal of his family’s passion: life and times growing vegetables for restaurants and markets within a 25 mile radius. Ingenuity emerges in every chapter. Crop rotation, green houses, tunnels, developing custom tools, historical research of Paris in the late 1800s, importance of facing south in the northern hemisphere, custom seeding applications and much MORE. The illustrations are outstanding.
Several years ago my curiosity was peaked by Instagram posts of a longtime friend on the launch of vegetable and flower business supporting the Jonesborough, TN farmers market. Planning involved minimal acreage and a three season planting rotation of most areas. Closed for winter months. Tilling the long time pasture area was challenging. I only briefly saw a map designating plan for plant location and seasonal rotation. Starting from scratch, I wondered how one planned compatible combinations and timing of planting/harvest…so, this Winter Harvest Handbook answered many or most of my questions and more (given the different growing zone). EF
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