| View Larger Image | Teaming with Microbes: A Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web | Hardcoverby Jeff Lowenfels (Author), Wayne Lewis (Author)
| List Price: | $24.95 | | Price: | $16.47 | | You Save: | $8.48 (34%) | | | Available: | Usually ships in 24 hours |
| | Binding: | Hardcover | | Publisher: | Timber Press, Incorporated | | Page Count: | 196 Pages | | Publication Date: | July 15, 2006 | | Sales Rank: | 16,335th |
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EDITORIAL REVIEWS |
Product Description
Teaming With Microbes enlightens readers in two important ways. First, in clear, straightforward language, it describes the activities of the organisms that make up the soil food web, from the simplest of single-cell organisms to more familiar multicellular animals such as insects, worms, and mammals. Second, the book explains how to foster and cultivate the life of the soil through the use of compost, mulches, and compost teas. By eschewing jargon, the authors make the text accessible to a wide audience, from devotees of organic gardening techniques to weekend gardeners who simply want to grow healthy, vigorous plants without resorting to chemicals. |
CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 5.0 based on 51 reviews)
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excellent beginner's overview to soil by J. Lipstate (Prescott, AZ)  5 Stars
November 25, 2009
this book provided a good start to what is really going on in soil, and opened my eyes to additional downsides of traditional petrol based NPK fertilizers along with the various pesticides that must accompany them. I do wish that it had gone into depth slightly more on the interactions in soil, however I realize that that would be beyond the scope of the book.
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Detailed and Understandable by kaukaty (Hawaii) 5 Stars
November 09, 2009
I live in Hawaii and have been struggling with my garden for two years now. Some of the gardeners in the area have turned to the method in this book. They are very successful. I am changing over and will be ready by next spring to go with this guide. I can't say that it works for me as it will be a year or so for me to really know, however, I am more than anxious to begin. I feel positive about the method from what I have seen with the successful gardeners nearby.
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Teaming with Microbes: A Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web by OldRoses (NJ) 5 Stars
October 15, 2009
I was disheartened to read in the Preface to "Teaming with Microbes: A Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web" that the first part of the book would be difficult to get through. I pressed on. Very science-y. An excellent sleep inducer. No joke. I did fall asleep while reading it one warm afternoon. But it was definitely worth it. Like the authors, I urge you to read the entire book and not just the second part which is the heart of the book.
Their argument boils down to one sentence: "No one ever fertilized an old-growth forest". Think about all the wild places you have ever seen, lush with growth. How did they get that way without the help of Scott's or Miracle-Gro? And if Scott's and Miracle-Gro are so superior, why don't our yards and gardens look better than those wild places?
The authors' thesis is that we should garden like Nature gardens, working with the flora and fauna in the soils rather than against it through the use of compost, organic mulches and actively aerated compost tea. Best of all, they provide precise instructions and call for materials that most of us have on hand anyways. No need for expensive ingredients or equipment!
I was thrilled to discover that I am not a "lazy composter" as I have always thought. Instead, I practice cold composting (not turning the compost), a method that produces the most "nutritious" compost! And what I jokingly refer to as "composting in situ", using the mower to shred up leaves and dumping them with the grass clippings onto my beds in the fall is actually a recommended mulch. As are the leaves I leave in my gardens over the winter. The only thing I am doing wrong is removing the leaves in the spring. And my deepest, darkest secret is nothing to be ashamed of. Instead of carefully working my compost into the soil, I just spread it on top. Again, a recommended method for amending the soil!
Of course, there are things that I have to do differently. Such as leaving the leaves on my beds. And even though I don't roto-till, I should still stop "loosening" the soil in the spring when I plant my seeds. The soil should be disturbed as little as possible. Planting in individual holes or narrow furrows is fine. I should learn to make and use actively aerated compost teas. Perhaps most importantly instead of throwing anything and everything into my composter, I should pay closer attention to the individual ingredients and their proportions, maybe go so far as to have different composters to make compost tailored to the needs of the various plants in my gardens.
This is a wonderful book that I will be referring to again and again.
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Outstanding book! by Otis H. Johnson (Corralitos, CA) 5 Stars
September 08, 2009
This book helped to fill in lots of blanks for me regarding the soil food web. I am a Master Composter and worm farmer and while I was aware these principals work I was not aware how they work. I will recommend this book to many others and use it to help teach schoolchildren in my volunteer work. Thanks for a great job.
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This reading is a MUST by T. Spain 5 Stars
September 03, 2009
This book is a must for the gardener, organic or not. I spent most of my gardening life not really understanding the nature of how things grow. This book explains it very good, especially for the non scientist/novice lke me. If you read it you will learn and if you follow it's principles you will have a better and more beautiful garden/lawn etc with less disease and insect problems without the use of chemicals or poisons of any kind...A MUST READ FOR THE GARDEN HOBBIEST!!! ********** ( I give it ten stars!)
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