Carol,

It is a wonderful book. I was worried that I might find it redundant, having already read the Four Season Harvest book about a decade ago, but it has a lot of advanced ideas and techniques in it. I want a hoophouse, and intend to have one someday, but in the meantime I am now feeling inspired to try low tunnels, which he also refers to as quick hoops. The crops he raises in them in zone 5 weather is just amazing, and low tunnels are so easy I could 'build' them all by myself.

I'd never even tried floating row covers/frost blankets until I read his first book and learned he used them inside his cold hoophouses to provide a secondary layer of protection for his plants there in zone 5 winters. When I used them here to give plants protection from late freezes in spring or from the first few freezing nights in fall, I was amazed at the protection plants received from such a lightweight material. Who knew such a small thing could make such a difference? Now I can hardly wait to try quick hoops to see what a difference they'll make. Maybe I can return to planting "early" knowing the tunnel will protect the plants from extreme cold.

He is so precise in the way he does things.....you know, he makes it seem so easy that I am sure even a non-gardening caveman (they were hunter-gatherers, you know, LOL) could do it after reading his book. He gives detailed info on about 30 or 40 crops and tells you all you need to know about growing something 'new' to you in virtually any season with the confidence that you'll succeed. (Of course, he can grow letuce greens in the summer that we can't because of our heat, but that's the price we pay for living in Oklahoma instead of Maine.

He distinguishes between a cold greenhouse or hoophouse (an unheated one) and a cool one (minimally heated) and while much of the book seems aimed at other commercial growers like himself, the techniques he uses are easily adopted by home gardeners. I am convinced that all of us could raise most of our food year-round just using low tunels. I don't think you "have to" have a 96' long x 32' wide greenhouse like his (I'm guessing at the size, don't have the book here in the room with me) to achieve great results, but I turn positively green with envy when I look at the beautiful photographs from his and Barbara's farm.

When I read one of Eliot's books, I don't feel like I'm reading the words of one of the world's premiere organic gardeners and market growers, although that is exactly what he is. I feel like I am reading good, hands-on practical advice and growing tips from a dear friend. He is just so normal and down-to-earth.....not lecturing or preaching or quoting research papers. Instead, he's talking about what he does, how he does and why it works for him....and how we can make it work for us.

I was surprised at the book's high quality and gorgeous photos. I don't know how they're making any money selling a book of this quality at its list price. Can you tell I love it?

Needless to say, everyone who's interested in growing as much of their own produce as they can year-round needs this book.

Dawn

Now I don't remember which one you have. Is it The New Organic Grower? My DH was going to order one for me for Christmas but didn't know which one to get. He has a winter harvest one that I haven't read but I was afraid that it would be a lot like the Four Season Harvest one that I already have.

Dawn, you can build a pvc hoop house your self. I did. I used it for maybe 3-4 years until a tornado messed it up too badly to repair. I found the plans online (where else?). I used greenhouse plastic to cover it. I did find it was just as cold inside as out at night. I am wondering how he grows things year round in Maine. I guess I need to read his book.

Then I made one from some used cattle panels and reused the plastic and used it for a couple of years. The frame is now my bean frame.

Carol,

The book I have is "The Winter Harvest Handbook", published last spring and already in its second printing in June 2010. It builds on the techniques he discussed in "The New Organic Grower" and "Four Season Harvest" but goes much deeper into how you can raise crops year-round using a variety of techniques, including low tunnels, which he refers to as Quick Hoops. Although some of the info from the older books is also included in the new book, it is not a repeat or just an updated version of Four Season Harvest. It is a new book with expanded techniques he and Barbara have developed and refined in the decade or so since "Four Season Harvest" was published.

Glenda,

I've made PVC low tunnels before to protect crops from a very late freeze but haven't used them for anything but that, and our fenced chicken run has a PVC hoophouse style top over it covered with bird netting to keep our chickens in the chicken run and to keep predators out.

I want to build a hoophouse on some flat land (we're in a creek hollow area with lots of creeks, springs and a swamp and flat land is rare on our property) north of our garage before next winter, but also want to try the Quick Hoops this spring.

I haven't done much with cattle panels in the past, but hope to use some of them this year for a bean tunnel like yours.

Now, I'll tell y'all a little more about the book.

Dawn

In his latest book, Eliot Coleman describes the techniques used at his commercial market farm to raise cold-season crops in unheated cold greenhouses and under protective structures like cold frames, freeze-blanket type row covers, and Quick Hoops covered with row cover and greenhouse plastic. He does this at his farm in Maine in zone 5 winters. Raising crops year-round provides him with a year-round farming income instead of just a seasonal one, and his techniques can be used by home gardeners to grow much of their winter produce.

In this book, he gives us the history of intensive gardening dating back to France in the 1670s/1680s. He discusses intensive techniques that originated in France and then were adapted in Britain in the very early 1900s. He discusses his trips to Europe to study these techniques and bring them back to the US where they could be used by cold-climate farmers/market growers/home gardeners to raise cold-season crops under winter weather protection.

In the book, he discusses how to use cool greenhouses (minimally heated and not economically feasible for many small farmers or home gardeners), cold greenhouses, coldframes, mobile greenhouses on skids, floating row covers like Agribon both alone and inside other structures. hoophouses and low tunnels, which he calls Quick Hoops.

He discusses how they have refined their techniques over the years and goes into great detail on planting schedules, succession planting, crop rotation, winter sunlight, latitude, and more. He discusses both heavyweight and lightweight row covers and their use, the need for venting if daytime highs/sunlight combine to bring the heat 'inside' to a certain level, and he tells us how he specifically raises over 30 crops in his protective but unheated structures.

He does discuss raising crops inside his greenhouses in the summer, but for that to work here in our climate, we'd have to vent and use shadecloth to avoid the greenhouse effect and severe overheating. He discusses his early mobile greenhouses on skids, as discussed in the Four Season Gardens book and the changes they've made to those (they're only 22' x 48' now compared to the 30' x 96' ones he used years ago). He does go into a lot of detail about how to build and use mobile greenhouses as season extenders.

He discusses their use of Quick Hoops to enable them to raise cold-season crops in the ground in zone 5 Maine, and explains how they can be utilized in much of the country to get the same results. He says Quick Hoops can be used to cover individual rows or beds at about 5% of the cost of errecting a large hoophouse/greenhouse.

He discusses soil-building, soil preparation, maintaining good soil tilth, composting--including how they keep their compost 'working' in their very low winter temps by using A-frame tunnels over their piles to keep them warm enough for active composting to occur. He also discusses sowing (with a special emphasis for cost-effective techniques for market growers), weed control, soil cultivation, harvesting, washing, packing and selling, and marketing.

Near the end of the book, he discusses methods used for pest control, insect control and creating the right growing conditions to minimize insect and disease issues. He also discusses tools that can be used to make small market growers more efficient and the use of deep organic techniques.

At the end of the book there are several appendices including several climate maps, lists of some specific tools and their supplies, lists of specific vegetable varieties and seed sources, his sowing dates for fall and winter harvests (and he specifies we have to adapt ours to our locations), and an annotated bibliography.

Dawn

Thanks for the effort & time you put into that review, Dawn. You've sold me and it's gone into my Amazon wishlist. I've been curious about low tunnels for quite a while and this sounds like it might have the answers for me.

Would you think I need to get one of his earlier books to read first as a foundation for this one? Or is it a perfectly stand-alone book? (I do want a couple of his earlier ones as well but there are so many books I want and so little money. LOL)

Diane

Good Morning Diane,

You're welcome. I love this book, so the review was a 'labor of love'.

As much as you know about gardening, I think that you already have such a strong base of gardening know-how that you could pick up the Winter Harvest Handbook and plunge right into using his techniques.

For someone less experienced in organic techniques or who wants to expand their home garden into a market garden, I'd recommend his other book 'The New Organic Grower', and if you ever run across a copy of it at a good price, I'd recommend it but you know enough about organic growing to do just fine without it.

For someone who is pretty new to gardening in general (so, not you, but some of the brand new gardeners here), I'd recommend his wife's book "The Garden Primer". I also read Barbara Damrosch's other book on theme gardens many years ago and really enjoyed it as well.

Dawn

Thanks, Dawn, I appreciate it.

By the way, a lady I know from elsewhere on the non-gardening internet is cleaning out her attic/storage and sending me some old (from the 80s so not OLD old) gardening books. Can't wait to see what treasures are in there!

Diane

You're welcome.

How exciting is that? What fun it will be to receive those old books. You'll have to let us know what you get.

Dawn

Either I am senile or the site is having a problem again. I have posted two messages this morning that didn't show up. I am sure I hit the submit button.....I think. LOL

Anyway, I ordered the book. Thanks for the review. Carol

My new book, "The Winter Harvest Handbook" just came in the mail today. I can't wait to get started on it. Thanks again for the review Dawn.

Carol,

I doubt it was you. This website is acting like it is senile here lately. Apparently the garden gremlins and gnomes have gone wild again. I have had trouble posting all week.

I'm glad the book arrived (that was fast!) and hope you enjoy it. You'll have to let us know what you think of it. It has been a long time since I read Four-Season Harvest so reading this one got me all wound up imagining how much I could grow under quick hoops or in a hoophouse or greenhouse if I had one.

Look at the photos from their farm! Carol, I don't like cold weather at all, but after looking at their photos, I was ready to pack up and move to Maine. Of course, I wouldn't last a week there in the winter, but I bet their summers are darn-near perfect.

Dawn