Four-Season Harvest: Organic Vegetables from Your Home Garden All Year Long [Paperback]

Eliot Coleman (Author), Barbara Damrosch (Author), Kathy Bray (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 1999

If you love the joys of eating home-garden vegetables but always thought those joys had to stop at the end of summer, this book is for you. Eliot Coleman introduces the surprising fact that most of the United States has more winter sunshine than the south of France. He shows how North American gardeners can successfully use that sun to raise a wide variety of traditional winter vegetables in backyard cold frames and plastic covered tunnel greenhouses without supplementary heat. Coleman expands upon his own experiences with new ideas learned on a winter-vegetable pilgrimage across the ocean to the acknowledged kingdom of vegetable cuisine, the southern part of France, which lies on the 44th parallel, the same latitude as his farm in Maine.
This story of sunshine, weather patterns, old limitations and expectations, and new realities is delightfully innovative in the best gardening tradition. Four-Season Harvest will have you feasting on fresh produce from your garden all through the winter.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

From first sentence to last, Coleman's ( The New Organic Gardener ) book is a delight--an earnest guide written with an impish sense of humor. It will refresh anyone who wants to get the most from a vegetable garden yet doesn't want to devote too much time and energy to the process. Apparently Coleman thoroughly enjoys every phase of gardening--from planting crops to weeding. Who else has ever suggested, only half in jest, dancing with a hoe? Or keeping a pair of ducks for pest patrol? This is that kind of book. It's also a book full of valuable information on how to harvest fresh vegetables and salad ingredients literally year-round--yet without an expensive greenhouse or indoor light garden set-up. Coleman combines succession planting (small sowings three or more times, rather than one big endeavor) with cold-frame growing in the winter months. He includes how-tos for building simple cold-frames. Given the fact that he lives in Maine, his advice seems all the more reliable. He believes in simplicity ("If what I am doing in the garden seems complicated, it is probably wrong"), seasonality (tomatoes in summer, broccoli in fall, mache in February) and diplomacy in the garden (which "has more to teach us than just how to grow food"). Here, his philosophy of organic growing is shared easily. The book concludes with an extensive chapter on the vegetables that comprise his "cast of characters." Illustrated.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Four-Season Harvest is a magnificent work. It's enticing, inspiring, sensible, and it opens a whole new world for the home grower."--Peter Fossel, Country Journal

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Product Details

• Paperback: 236 pages
• Publisher: Chelsea Green (October 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1890132276
• ISBN-13: 978-1890132279
• Product Dimensions: 9.9 x 7.9 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (81 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,232 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #17 in Books > Crafts, Hobbies & Home > Gardening & Horticulture
  • #17 in Books > Crafts, Hobbies & Home > Sustainable Living

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

300 of 304 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Essential guide for organic gourmands, October 27, 1999

By 

GENE GERUE "Author, Find Your Ideal Country Home" (Zanoni, MO USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Four-Season Harvest: Organic Vegetables from Your Home Garden All Year Long (Paperback)

Eat fresh, home-grown vegetables year round? Eliminate canning and freezing? Do this all at low cost? Eliot Coleman does, you can, too, and here is the how. Coleman is a market gardener in Maine who may eat better than Bill Gates. He shows that sunlight and wind protection are more important that temperature--and, by the way, most of the U.S. gets more winter sunlight than Coleman's place. Inexpensive, unheated greenhouses that he calls tall tunnel houses--some say hoop houses--and cold frames protect from wind and keep snow off the veggies. Greenhouse comfort is more to benefit the gardener. The key is what and when to plant. Full info given for planting dates, construction details, sources of seeds, tools, greenhouses. Well illustrated. An essential guide for organic gourmands.

168 of 171 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I recommend this for anyone who hates to see the season end!, December 28, 1999

By 

Terry (Boston, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Four-Season Harvest: How to Harvest Fresh Organic Vegetables from Your Home Garden All Year Long (Paperback)

Eliot Coleman's love and deep knowledge of gardening comes through in this easy to read, and easy to use book. I love the idea of a four season harvest, and if he can do it in Maine, then anyone can do it! The book opens the readers mind to the wide spread possibilities that await gardener's with imagination, an open mind, and the willingness to work at it. He offers ideas for cold frames, row covers and tunnels to extend the season. Good explanations as to how they protect crops. The book also gives a great amount of detail for a wide range of vegetables. Charts provide information on when vegetables can be harvested throughout the year, and offers the reader many vegetables to choose from for a three season harvest, and a fair number for the four season harvest. I would recommend this book to anyone, beginner or experienced gardener!

67 of 67 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Grow vegetables year 'round!, February 26, 2006

By 

Robert A. Williams "libertarian" (Oberlin, OH United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Four-Season Harvest: Organic Vegetables from Your Home Garden All Year Long (Paperback)

Coleman is an experienced organic gardener and has written previous books on organic gardening. Whether you are looking for new organic gardening techniques or ways to improve a self-sustaining lifestyle, Coleman's book will be a valuable resource. He explains how to grow delicious, organically-grown vegetables from your home garden year 'round. Organically-grown vegetables can be harvested throughout the coldest months in all climate zones in the Lower 48 without much extra effort or time. He shows how to design inexpensive, simple cold frames and unheated mobile greenhouses. He explains how to use them along with a root cellar to grow a variety of organic vegetables each suited to their season. Success depends on growing a large variety of vegetables each suited to their season, and in cold frames, mobile greenhouses, and root cellars. Coleman's book will surely guide the grower to extend the growing season!