I don't think I had a biggest or most pressing. I guess the questions came to be as I had to learn how to battle the problems I encountered. A great thing to explain though would be when to start your seedlings. I'm in zone 6 and I have to start my lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant indoors. I can direct seed radish, squash, pumpkin, melons, and corn. That can be a huge topic because it changes with zones, but it would be something that beginners probably wouldn't know. Soil basics would be a great chapter too. Where you can get your soil tested, how to prepare your soil samples, understanding the results, and then amending your soil to correct any problems. Such as, if the pH came back as 5.5. How much lime to add, usually the back of the bag has a chart that will show the square footage across one axis and the pH across another. Then you just match the two and it will give you the pounds of lime to add to get a neutral pH. Most frustrating: VARMINTS! Pronounced "GROUND-HOGS"! Nothing is worse than working diligently in your garden only to come out the next morning and all of your cauliflower is gone! Common problems: bugs, bugs, bugs, bugs (repeat that a few hundred times), drought. Diseases are a common problem too. This could be a huge topic, probably a book of its own. Ortho has a really awesome book out that has most common garden plants listed, then for each plant it lists the most common diseases and pests. Along with pictures of what a disease looks like, what the pests look like, and your possible defenses. How much would I pay? Probably nothing for a course. Not that I'm cheap, I just can't afford the time. I usually Google around for my answers or post them on forums such as this one. For a book, I've paid $40.00 for a book or two on specific gardening topics such as how to prune and train trees. I think in this forum you're going to find a lot of do-it-yourself-ers. People here tend to try what the want and then learn from their mistakes. In fact, a lot of gardeners I know are like that. That's what is nice about gardening, you don't need a heap of book smarts to get great results. A few simple rules that need to be memorized and then a huge amount of work that needs to be done. Good luck on your book. Maybe check out that Ortho book, I can't remember the title, but it is was published by Ortho. A local nursery had one that I used to pair my apple trees for cross-pollination. That is another topic for fruits too! Cross-pollination vs self-pollination. Pollinators......I think that you're book is going to have to be 15 or so volumes to cover the amount of information that your survey is trying to gather.

How nice!

I too have at least 2 dozen cartons of books packed up, and probably that many more of shelves....needing to be packed. One of our kid's charities just had a collection for a sale and one of the art's groups is having one now. I am taking a bunch to them this weekend. I need to clear out some of this stuff! This is what finally convinced mt to get a kindle.

Now this is a subject dear to my heart. Many months when I don't post to the month's reading thread, it is because I am immersed in garden books and thought they were really too off topic to include. I am simply delighted to have an excuse to describe a few of my favorites. Currently I am reading Plant-Driven Design by Scott Ogden and Lauren Springer Ogden. This is a landscaping book that presents the novel concept that gardens are for the growing of plants, not for hardscape, the non-growing parts of a garden. This approach is long overdue in my opinion. On the other hand, I find Nan Fairbrother's The Nature of Landscape Design to be a very thought-provoking book about how shaping outdoor spaces influence people. It has long been a favorite with me. You can probably tell from my forum name that I am enthusiastic about growing roses. No doubt it comes as no surprise that I suggest two rose books. The first is Visions of Roses by Peter Beales, eye candy raised to an art form. The second, oddly enough, is a rose catalog, Vintage Gardens Book of Roses Not only is the catalog highly informative, it is also one of the most beautifully written rose books I know. I grow food, too, and like to read about that as well. Amy Goldman's book The Compleat Squash has inspired me to experiment with growing all sorts of heirloom squashes, and to cook with them too. I'll end with recommending Gene Logsdon's The Contrary Farmer, a book that eloquently advocates a return to the small mixed farm. His is not the only voice that speaks for this approach to food production, but his was the one that made the life actually appeal to me. Not that I'm going to take up farming, mind you. But I have gone from growing a strictly ornamental garden to growing one that is heavy in vegetable and fruit as well as flowers and shrubs. As for the question posed by PAM, it is downright dangerous to ask me what I grow in my garden! First off I grow roses along with all kinds of perennials, bulbs, and herbs in the front and roadside areas. In the back my husband grows tomatoes, peppers, beans, and eggplants. I have a couple of beds with garlic, shallots, peas, broccoli, Swiss chard, beets, and fennel. I'm digging a bed for 30 asparagus crowns that should arrive in the mail any day. And of course I'm getting ready to plant all those heirloom squashes. Besides that we have lots of fruit plants, all sorts of citrus as well as plums, a peach, a fig, an apricot, a loquat, apples, mulberries, pomegranates, persimmons, blueberries, grapes, and a young avocado tree. Some of these plants are established and producing food, but many are young and not yet mature enough to bear fruit. Rosefolly