4 comments about Neal Kinsey's Hands-On Agronomy.

1. An in depth discussion of soil fertility issues and how to use specific fertilizers to achieve balanced crop nutrtion. Excellent statagies for soil testing. Answers to soil problems not easily found.



2. The author has a soil consultation service, and one does not have to read too many pages before one realizes that all that has been read so far is self-aggrandizment, and this continues throughout the book. The author makes the same claims that are heard or read in advertisments for quack products: State and/or university soil testing facilities produce inaccurate results because they cut corners in testing or return stock answers to stock analyses; but; the lab the author uses is 100% accurate. Growers who use the author's recommendations have increased crop yields by X%, with X depending upon the crop in question. All claimed increases are substantial.

   The author includes just enough factual material on soils to give the book an air of authority, but is very short on any explanation or reason for the importance of these soil factors (other than humus). The whole book seems to be a many-paged advertisement for people to use his service.

   Those interested in the subject might better spend their money on a good soils textbook.




3. Attending one of Mr. Kinsey's seminars and visiting with the farmers who have implemented his programs will convince the most staunch skeptic. His concept of "Feeding the soil and let the soil feed the plant" makes perfect sense. All elements in the soil must be within specific parameters for any plant to grow and produce to its full potential. Too much of the research results and recommendations that are available are tied to some corporate sponsorship that is ultimately tied to a product they wish to sell whether it is needed or not. Mr. Kinsey's success in 50 states and 50 countries speaks for itself. If you are a serious steward of the land and intend to stay in business in agriculture this book will help you get the not only more yield but higher quality products from your operation.



4. At a guess the reviewer "A reader from New York" has never had anything to do with soils and farming. He/she just eats the end products.
   I am a farmer in Australia dealing with some of the hardest yet some of the most potentially productive soils as any in the USA. This book was recommended to me by a fellow farmer. After reading it I was stunned as to how much sense it made. I can now relate soil test data to what I see in the field and understand why some areas always produce more than others. It's not "quackery" when you can understand how mother nature and basic chemistry allow some areas of a field to outperform others by sometimes 3-1.
   Readers of this book should be farmers who are willing to take a close look at their soils, work the numbers, think about it and then be prepared to accept what they WILL see in it all.
   I am by no means an organic farmer, I still use some commercial fertilizers and spray about as much as anyone. After reading this book I have started working on balancing the soil because I see from experience the most balanced soils producing the best crops.
   I don't really care if Neal Kinsey has a consulting practice on soils. And as far as the book being a bit "light on" for detail is concerned, well it's not. It is a great first step to understanding the soil we grow things in. Fertilizer brouchures are light on for detail.
   Happy reading and I hope the little light bulb gets turned on in your head like it did in mine.

2 comments about The SECRET GARDEN: TALKING BEETLES & SIGNALLING TREES: HIDDEN WAYS GDNS COMMUN.

1. This is one of the most fascinating garden books I've ever read. It's also one of the strangest. What's fascinating is that it's full of interesting information on things like the amazingly sneaky way some bushes defend themelves from caterpillars and how aphids enslave ants to do their bidding. What's strange is the dialogue between Mr. and Mrs Gardener that keeps popping up as a transition. Not everyone will like this dialogue (I didn't), but read the book anyway. It's really worth it.



2. This book shows us what a complex and exciting world exists in our own back yards. With great wit and a sense of high adventure and drama, Bodanis lays out the amazingly complex interplay of all living organisms within a tiny area. I'll never be able to transplant a geranium again without the awareness that I am drastically altering the lives of millions of beings! The Secret Garden tells us that all life really is connected (chemically, systematically) and that seemingly passive plants and bugs behave in ways that would make Olympic gods seem tame.

No comments about The Potential of U.S. Cropland to Sequester Carbon and Mitigate the Greenhouse Effect.

No comments about Agroforestry for Soil Management.

No comments about Organic Gardening Basics: Soil (Rodale Organic Gardening Basics, Vol 2).

2 comments about Gardening Success with Difficult Soils: Limestone, Alkaline Clay, and Caliche Soils.

1. This is the most practical, useful, and enjoyable book on gardening that someone in the Texas Hill Country could ever want! It's not as big or comprehensive as the Wasowskis' "Native Texas Plants: Landscaping Region by Region", but that's because it focuses on the challenges of gardening in these "difficult" (nice word!) soils that we live with. Ogden's observations and advice about dealing with our limestone and caliche, and his reality-based recommendations of plants to use and the ones to avoid, gave me hope, encouragement, and new ideas for making this corner of the world a more beautiful place! It's got some great color photos, too.



2. Dry limestone based soils such as the Edwards Plateau area of Texas and other places in the southwest, provide a major challenge to gardening which is addessed in this book. In such areas many plants simply will not grow well. Trying to get them to do so is an exercise in frustration and general garden books can lead you far astray. This book is not about how to try to change your soil, high pH soils cannot be effectively acidified. The book is about plants, trees, shrubs and varieties that do well in dry calcarious soil conditions. It will save you a lot of time, money and frustration if you face these conditions. A great book, a gold mine of information.

No comments about Healthy Soil (Best of Fine Gardening).

1 comments about Plant Nutrition Manual.

1. This is a nice compact book that can be used to teach plant nutrition. The directions on making DIY kits for tissue analysis are interesting. I wish the author had icluded a guiding range of values corresponding to the five elemental requirement categories in Appendix D.

1 comments about The Secret Garden: Dawn to Dusk in the Astonishing Hidden World of the Garden.

1. This is a great Chrstimas present for any of you who have gardening friends. I loved it! It's also a great coffee table book.

5 comments about The Humanure Handbook: A Guide to Composting Human Manure.

1. Due to a plumbing fault in the house, my family have been composting in the back garden on a daily basis for over a year. What a bonus to stumble upon this book and find out that our actions have been helping to preserve the future of our planet! A number of residents in our street have complainined that the local environment has been suffering from some kind of unpleasant air pollution of late, so we feel proud to be putting something back.



2. Everyone should read this book, even if they have no intention or ability to use a humanure composting system. It provides a wealth of information on a subject that has been ignored for too long...human waste - how to dispose of it in a sensible, sustainable, practical, useful manner. We haven't flushed a toilet in this house in eight months, since we got this book and built our own sawdust toilet and composting box out back. We had a serious drought here this summer and our well was REAL low, but we had no problems because we weren't FLUSHING FOUR GALLONS OF CLEAN DRINKING WATER UNDERGROUND each time we went in the bathroom. I always wondered why we eliminate in water, anyway. And it doesn't stink, the compost box doesn't stink, it's simple and straightforward and clean and the humanure toilet's time has come! Everybody who comes in our house gets dragged into the bathroom by my husband to meet our new humanure toilet! Then I drag them outside to meet my wonderful compost box! So far we've had one convert, a couple with a camp who were using a stinking old outhouse, and they are just thrilled with the idea of using a humanure toilet next summer when they move back to camp. As a bonus, our electric bill dropped substantially, just because the water pump doesn't have to kick on every time a toilet is flushed. Buy this book, read it, start using a humanure toilet, tell all your friends, lend the book to your friends, do it now! Then read Joe Jenkins' other book, "Balance Point."



3. Fascinating and intelligent book that holds the key to sustainable practices that will help protect our drinking water supply. Why use 1.5 -5 gallons of precious drinking water to wash our poop away? It's a shameful and wasteful practice and this book provides the best solution to managing our excrement in a way that is healthy for us and for the planet.



4. the true revolution is in our poop! its a great read and is a vital piece to the new sustainable culture we are growing. thanks joe!



5. I wish my parents had known about this so they could have taught me instead of me having to teach them. Shame on anyone that has discouraged this sort of creative thinking. Let the rigor with which Joseph Jenkins has researched this topic be a lesson to anyone who wants to make a claim about the validity of any of our social norms.