After 35 years in the garden, I've read hundreds of gardening books and donatd most of them to garden societies or the public library. The "how to" books and coffee table picture books are gone. I keep only the garden literature....Henry Mitchell, Alan Lacy, Maribel Osler, Vita Sackville-West, Elizabeth Lawrence etc. Rereading these is a delight.

I looked up some of the authors that you mentioned. I can see why you treasure these books. There are not a lot of people today that can produce the quality of writing that these authors did. The photos of Alan Lacy's books were beautiful! Most of the gardening books these days are produced by big corporations, not true gardeners.

Big time YES to garden book reading, *especially* older ones!!!

I have about 300, some general, some roses, a few on garden essays (love), most on vegetable gardening- my longest love. I always love requesting a recommended title from library loan, like getting ready to meet a new friend!

Tanya, I agree...those I like best are the experiences of individuals, and just soaked with narrow and specialist, sometimes, viewpoints that I may not entirely agree with, since gardening is so site defendant, but just absolutely love being privy to!

Yes, I love the older books written by true gardeners. It's interesting that you mentioned libraries as a source of gardening information. I think people forget that you can request almost any book you want (from just about any library) by request, through your local library. Worldcat is a great site because you can search library card catalogs all over the world.

I also enjoy watching gardening shows on TV. I grew up watching the "Victory Garden" on PBS every weekend with my grandmother. But my favorite PBS show is This Old House.

I, too, loved the victory garden. His three books, Crockett's Victory Garden , Crockett's Indoor Garden and Crockett's Flower Garden will tell any beginning gardener all he/she needs to know. He was a gentle soul.