Overview of Sustainability and Gardening:
Small Is Beautiful: Economics As If People Mattered
,
Schumacher, E. F., ©1973 Blond & Briggs. This classic inspired much
of the current thinking in sustainability. Although it does not relate
directly to gardening, it explains the basis of the idea of natural
capital. E.F Schumacher Society website: http://www.smallisbeautiful.org. Their resource page is comprehensive.
The Natural Step Story, Robert, Karl-Henrik, © 2002 New SocietyPublishers. Not a gardening book, this book details how Robert obtained general agreement on ecological change in Sweden, as well as a statement of the four conditions of sustainability discussed in our first meeting.
Lazy-Bed Gardening: The Quick and Dirty Guide
,
Jeavons, John and Cox, Carol, ©1992 Ten Speed Press. A more accessible
book than Jeavons’ “How to Grow More Vegetables: etc.” Written by
pioneers in the U.S. of Biodynamic French-Intensive gardening, it tells
how to create fertility on a closed-system basis, that is without
inputs, by growing both calorie crops for humans and carbon crops for
compost.
The Gift of Good Land: Further Essays Cultural and Agricultural
,
Wendell Berry, ©1981, San Francisco North Point. This prolific writer
and farmer articulated the problems of the loss of small farms and the
tragedy of large ones while ag policy was changing to ‘get big or get
out.’
Eat More Dirt: Diverting and Instructive Tips for Growing and Tending an Organic Garden, Sandbeck,
Ellen, © 2003 Broadway Books. This small book tells how to actually
accomplish the act of gardening, including how to use tools, how to move
big rocks, and why herbicide doesn’t work on concrete.
Square Foot Gardening and All New Square Foot Gardening, Bartholomew, Mel, © 1981 Rodale and © 2013 Cool Springs. Not an overview book, but specific instructions for small-space gardening.
A Nation of Farmers: Defeating the Food Crisis on American Soil
,
Astyk, Sharon and Newton, Aaron, © 2009, New Society Publishers.
Explores the world food crisis and why
big conventional ag can't solve it.
Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer, Robin Wall, 2014 Milkweed Editions. Kimmerer, a Native American biologist, weaves together two ways of knowing the earth. Also, Kimmerer's article on Yes! Magazine,
Nature Needs a new Pronoun.
David's Background Bibliography for Sustainability
Deep Economy, The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future,
McKibben, Bill, ©2007 Times Books Want a dose of hope? Here.
McKibben has delved into a variety of alternative choices to find
examples of human civilizations that actually approach creating a viable
economy and lifestyle that considerably reduce man’s impact on the
world. Like most of the books following, this is not strictly a book on
sustainability, in the main, - however, this is one of the MOST hopeful
books that brings some of these issues to light. One thing rings
through out this book: community is key to many of the answers of the future.
Easy Green Living, Loux, Renée ©2008, Rodale Inc. Breeziness belying a
difficult resource book that will help you shop through the sustainable
hype. A compendium of little helpful hints (the Heloise of our time?)
and deciphering clues of labels and claims. She covers everything from
the bathroom to light bulbs and beyond, helping delineate what the
labels mean with all those fifteen syllable words on them. However,
this book like all the other books in this vein are limited by what we
know today - the solution we learn tomorrow may well contradict the
solution we applaud to day. Still, we have to start where we are now -
we really can't start anywhere else!
Kitchen Literacy, Vileisis, Ann, ©2008 Island Press, Along
the lines of the Pollan books, Vileisis brings us back to the knowledge
every cook had in days before we let the ‘experts’ and the government
tell us what to eat and why. Turns out it was better for us and for the
earth. This book is the history of eating dinner in America. It also
reflects on woman's role in society and the evolution of that role by
virtue of how our lives have changed as regards to eating and effort of
putting food on the table.
Out of the Earth: Civilization and the Life of the Soil, Hillel, Daniel,
© 1992,
University of California Press, There has been a recent spate of books
on soil in the past ten years. Preceding this glut by almost ten years,
Hillel wrote the best of the lot - all the others are second rate. Not
to say they don't have a story to tell, but Hillel's book is not only
science, but reads at times like poetry and his love of the subject is
steeped in a deep knowledge that encourages affection and respect.
There is no other book on soil that teaches so much about soil with a
deep spirituality and yet is science-based and science driven. I truly
love this book and it has been an inspiration for many years.
The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture, Berry
Wendell, ©1997, Sierra Club Books, Anything by Wendell Berry is worth
reading. Everything from Wendell Berry can be life-changing. Wendell
Berry, quirky and profound, looks at the world with a lens many of us
only aspire to. His writing is eloquent, his thinking eclectic. Of the
authors that have been instrumental in bringing me to where I am today,
Berry is the one whose ability to see a much larger picture is the most
constant and his range of vision deeper than anyone I can name at this
moment.
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,
Kingsolver, Barbara et al © 2007 Harper Collins, When less is really
more. Kingsolver and her family agree to eat only foods produced within
100 miles of their West Virginia home (everyone was allowed one
exception and her husband chose coffee marking him as a sensible man)
for one year. The story of how they did it and the results they
achieved makes delightful reading and food for thought. One of the
easiest books to read on this list, not only is it inspirational and a
harbinger of hope, there are some passages that I recall as being some
of the funniest stuff I've read in a while. I still can be doubled over
by someone with a thick Italian accent saying, "the seeds, senora, are in the squash!"
The Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook,
De Rothschild, David, ©2007, Rodale Inc. A lot of statistics that
just overwhelm a person, but a viable list of Things To Do Today and
beyond. Probably one of the more easily digested books of this
contemporary genre. The most sustainable thing to do, however, is to get
it from the library. (That holds true for all these books.)
The Lost Language of Plants,
Buhner, Stephen Harrod, ©2002 Chelsea Green Publishing, Humans
getting well should not get the earth sick. This is the ecological
‘why’ of alternative medicine, but be warned, you will never look as a
fashionable layer of mascara the same way again either! Buhner's message
is critical and crucial. This work shows that how we think about the
earth and our relationship to it absolutely needs a comprehensive
overhaul in ways most of us have yet to imagine. I think Buhner's
writing is a little obtuse, but he is the only one out there with THIS
message and it must be heard.
Reading List Week Two: Books About Sustainable Design Principles
Principles of Ecological Design
, Ludwig, Art, ©1989 Oasis Design, oasisdesign.net.
This short manual gives rules for ecological design that are both
simple and profound. An excellent companion to his other books which
deal with greywater and water storage.
Gaia’s Garden
,
Hemenway, Tony, © 2000 Chelsea Green. This is the most accessible book
about Permaculture for gardeners, especially for the West Coast. Directly applicable.
Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability
, Holmgren, David, © 2002, Holmgren Design Services. A more theoretical approach to sustainable design concepts.
Permaculture: A Designers' Manual,
Mollison, Bill, © 1988 Tagari Publications. This comprehensive book is
the textbook for the Permaculture Design class. A reference for those
who have already been introduced to the principles, as well as a dual
duty doorstop and blunt instrument :-). It is on this list for the sake
of comprehensiveness, not because we expect you to read it. Mollison's out of print Permaculture One is much more accessible.
Design with Nature
,
McHarg, Ian, © 1982 John Wiley and Sons, Inc. This book is more a
lanscape-level and regional-planning book, but has beautiful graphics
and exposition about where to site projects. This book addresses the
too-rarely asked question, “where is this project?” when designing.
The Power of Limits: Proportional Harmonies in Nature, Art and Architecture
,
Gyorgy Doczi, © 1981 Shambhala Publications, Inc. How the Fibonacci
sequence and other aspects of the golden mean underlie proportions in
nature, and how this has been used historically in good design.
Fukuoka Farming Bibliography
One Straw Revolution, An Introduction to Natural Farming, Fukuoka, Masanobu ©2009, a reissue of his 1978 classic, Fukuoka's first book on his extensive work in Japan.
Decidedly with a Japanese bent (his main crop is rice and barley), he
still presents a lovely description of his farming efforts that began as
a reaction to the Western idea of agriculture and more that began to
infiltrate Japanese society in the 1930's. His work continued until his
death in 2008 (at 95). His grain raising techniques became THE grain
raising techniques in permaculture.
The Natural Way of Farming: The Theory and Practice of Green Philosophy, Fukuoka, Masanobu © 1985 Also out of print. And expensive. ($61, used on Amazon)
Can be downloaded as a PDF, I had success at this site, but I do not warranty it to be 100% safe from commercial interests.
The Road Back to Nature,
Fukuoka, Masanobu © 1988 Out of print, but you can find copies
reasonably priced on eBay, used copies are almost $70 from Amazon. From
the back cover: Fukuoka's reflections on his trips to Europe and to
America, his sense of shock at seeing the destruction wreaked in the
name of agriculture. A collection of his lectures, articles and essays
which outline his thinking on nature, God and man and his underlying
optimism that good sense can still prevail and we can still turn it all
around. This is a collection of articles, lectures and essays recording
his impressions as he travels the world talking about his revolutionary
'do-nothing' agricultural methods. There is a spiritual side to a lot of
his thoughts and an optimism that a change in lifestyles and farming
methods could yet heal the Earth's wounds.
Fundamental Realities,
an article by Hazelip, Emilia was found at the Fukuoka Farming Website –
but as of this writing that website is no longer in existence.
However, You Tube has several videos with Hazelip describing how she has
adapted Fukuoka's principles to a Western market garden.
,
ibid. How to garden (and farm) with the least effort and inputs
possible, by someone who has been farming all his life, and fighting big
ag at the same time. All of his books are excellent. Gene has a blog at 
,
Nabhan, Gary Paul, © 2002, W.W. Norton. One of the original books on
eating local which inspired many others, including Barbara Kingsolver's Animal Vegetable Miracle.
All of his books are worth reading.
, Dell, Owen, © 2009 For Dummies. Dell has been telling the truth about the impacts and inputs of gardening for a long time. 
