Customer Reviews

Gardening Success with Difficult Soils: Limestone, Alkaline Clay, and Caliche Soils

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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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.

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.

Living in central OK, I have a wealth of problem areas on the property, from loose, silty soil to hard, compacted red clay, with an underlying belt of hard caliche under it all. I bought the book to help me select the proper plants for the worst of these conditions, and I've been pleased with it. It's not a be-all and end-all solution, but few things are when faced with the challenges of growing in the Oklahoma climate and soil conditions. I'm a very experienced gardener (a certified CA Master Gardener) and all I can say is that it can be . . . challenging, at best.

All in all, I'm finding the book helpful and I'm glad I bought it. It's well written and easy to understand, and the sections are clearly defined. It does not take a Master Gardener to use it, but is suitable for all levels of experience.

This is a great book for the south west type soils. Unfortunately I live in the north east so it isn't as pertinent but I have been able to gleen info to use in my area for growing. It is easy to read, nice photos and plants suggestions.

I live in New Mexico. All the information I have found on the web about caliche soils has advised me to "get rid of it". This is stuff from master gardener websites, including some local websites! I simply dont have the funds or the muscle to dig out my entire yard and replace it with purchased bagged soil. I stumbled on this book by accident and i'm very happy with my purchase. The pages are filled with text and pictures. There are many examples of gorgeous plants n in this book, in color. I'm confident that I will find something to grow in my yard.