Customer Reviews

The Montana Gardener's Companion: An Insider's Guide to Gardening under the Big Sky (Gardening Series)

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This is an extremely useful guide designed to introduce the special conditions, challenges, and constraints the gardener faces in Montana. The twelve chapters are organized in three sections: Firm Foundations (the basic needs of plants and Montana conditions), Green Things (Plants) and Garden Solutions.

=Firm Foundations
1. Soil: Soil is usually a problem in Montana, as it tends to be alkaline; chapter topics include: physical properties of soil, how to increase soil organic matter, cover crops to avoid in Montana, chemical properties of Montana soils, soil fertility, soil sampling and tests, and fertilizers
2. Climate: hardiness zones, growing season, precipitation, site microclimates, and a nice outline of a Montana Timeline- a month by month to-do list; for more detailed list, get Month by Month Gardening in Montana (Month-By-Month Gardening (David & Charles))
3. Water Relations: when and how to water, ways to conserve moisture...also some suggestions for plants that need less water

=Green Things
4. Lawns: Montana is not generally an easy place to keep lawns looking good...suggested grass blends, lawn establishment and maintenance, disease and weed control, insects, etc.
5. Vegetables: planning and planting, preserving produce, soil amendments, seed selection including both hybrids and heirloom seeds, transplants, direct sowing, perennial vegetables, urban and intensive gardening, watering vegetables, weeds (although many are edible themselves!), season extension, and special instructions for certain vegetables
6. Fruit: again Montana is not prime fruit country, but topics include the right fruit for your zone, purchasing, planting, tree fruits, etc. Only a few of the hardiest fruits make it in Montana: apples, occasionally pears; there are problems with any stone fruit like peaches. Sour cherries are easier to grow than sweet cherries; some plums do well and of course, native plants like chokecherries; nut trees don't make it in Montana, except, in the warmest areas, sometimes black walnut or butternut; small fruit like strawberries, raspberries, currants, gooseberries do well but grapes and blackberries are marginal. Native berries like buffaloberry and serviceberries do well. It was surprising and disappointing that blueberries, including the famous Montana huckleberry, were not covered in this section since other native berries were covered!
7. Annual Flowers: basics of planting and care, and some recommended varieties which are very popular in Montana, especially pansies and marigolds
8. Herbaceous Perennials, Bulbs, and Roses: some cultivars are not adapted to Montana even though they are sold here by chain stores, and also some species are designated as noxious weeds, depending on the county (see #11 below)! Roses can be tough to grow in Montana as well; shrub roses are the best bet -- tea roses not so much.
9. Trees and Shrubs: none are really fast growing, and those that grow relatively fast are short lived, such as most poplars. As with other plants, chain stores often stock plants that are not adapted to Montana, so they often die; your best bet is to go to local nurseries. Water, pruning etc. are other topics covered. Some trees they call "troublesome" can be good choices, in some situations, such as the use of Russian olive as windbreaks! Some trees they do recommend like Colorado blue spruce are often planted in spots too small for the mature tree; here in Helena I see way too many gigantic blue spruces on tiny residential lots, with the carpet of needles, twigs and cones that kill off everything that grows at it base...and sometimes most of the yard.
10. Native Plants: actually quite variable in what they prefer in sites, these won't grow everywhere, and fit within a different aesthetic as well. Digging in the wild is often illegal and the plant may die anyways. Some nonnative plants actually do very well in Montana such as the common lilac and the ash tree. The authors seem less than enthusiastic about the use of native plants overall, an area in which Montana seems to be behind in the national trends.

=Garden Solutions
11. Pests and Problems- insects, disease pathogens (Montana often has a lot of cedar-apple rust because of all the crabapples planted here (p. 172)-- oddly enough the authors also recommend planting crabapples on residential lots rather than native trees (p. 159)! Animal pests-- deer are the main problem in Montana for their destruction of gardens, for more solutions, see Deerproofing Your Yard & Garden ; noxious weeds defines the difference between "invasive plants" and "noxious weeds"-- noxious weeds (27 species listed for Montana) actually fall under a landowner's legal responsibility to control under the Montana County Noxious Weed Control Act. Abiotic (environmental) problems like too much wind, poor soil, etc.
12. Resources for the Montana Gardener, including the Montana Master Gardener Program (unfortunately not available in many locations), web resources, print publications, soil survey maps/info, soil testing labs in Montana, and the Montana Extension Service,

These very knowledgeable authors are horticulturalists from Montana State University in Bozeman; thus they recommend landscape/garden treatments from a conventional point of view, such as planting lawns (which are terrible wastes of water in a dry state), using fertilizers, herbicides, and insecticides (which are not sustainable practices and will be an issue when oil prices increase again). With those caveats, this is an essential work for the average gardener in Montana. What is needed to complement this well-written work is another book more focused on cutting-edge developments in biointensive methods (How to Grow More Vegetables and Fruits (and Fruits, Nuts, Berries, Grains, and Other Crops) Than You Ever Thought Possible on Less Land Than You Can Imagine), permaculture, alternative strategies, community-supported agriculture (Sharing the Harvest: A Citizen's Guide to Community Supported Agriculture, Revised and Expanded), etc. and some of the other newer trends which are beginning to be applied in Montana.

This was a great book to help get started in Montana gardening, having come from an area with a different climate and fertile soil.

I will be better able to review it once spring arrives. Right now my lawn and landscaping looks pristine and white and has since the week before Thanksgiving. With the short growing season, an area that has "gumbo" soil, city water that is so high in salt and minerals that it kills everything except Japanese Elms, Russian Olives, and Cottonwoods this book may or may not help. Really I need plants that grow well near the ocean, in rocky, clay soil with the ability to survive long harsh winters. I think they call them silk or artificial plants.