Customer Reviews

Plants and Landscapes for Summer-Dry Climates of the San Francisco Bay Region

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's about time somebody published an inspiring photo driven book about western gardens. The Sunset Western Garden Book may be the bible for western gardeners for its wealth of information but it does not serve to inspire the way a book full of real gardens can. With more than 500 photos of western gardens this book should be destined to be a classic.

The great thing is that it is not just a beautifully designed, coffee table type book. The text is authoritative with dozens of full page charts and it seems to have been reviewed by a who's who of garden experts. The author suggests plants from all over the world that are adapted to a summer-dry, Mediterranean climate and the photographer shows them in gardens not just close-up details.

Hooray for this book. We western gardeners are too often frustrated by books and gardening advice originating from other regions. This book is so beautiful it will frustrate gardeners in those other regions who will want what we now have.

A book especially for the SF Bay Area(and similar Mediterranean climates). How incredibly sensible to plan your landscaping to fit the climate and water availability. It works wonderfully. Loads of great information and ideas for smart, labor saving landscaping. A must for your gardening collection

as a nurseryman, this offering gets right to the point when trying to explain the idea of future growth, the maturation, of the landscape to potential clients better than other books. the book is laid out simply in a straight-forward manner that is easily understood by novice or esoteric. the plant catalog is serviceable, not all-encompassing, which is a positive so as not to get bogged down solely by materials. the first and fourth chapters are of particular importance---paying attention to the basics for a good, solid start and future AND to gardening where you are. too many of us wish to duplicate something that we've seen somewhere else--EXACTLY! so often, the results are disappointing due to inflexibility on all sides. even though this book deals with the Bay Area specifically, it is adaptable and should prod some enterprising individual to produce a similar release for the Central Coast and the various environs of Southern California inclusive! after a lengthy absence, it is nice to have East Bay MUD's classic available once again. now, if we could only get Bob and Peg Perry to update THE BIBLE, we'd really be in the chips!

This is a very informative, well written, well organized guide to many of the plants that thrive in the various micro-climates of the greater Bay Area. The wealth of information is thorough and well researched. Nicely photographed as well. For anyone about to landscape, this book provides all the necessary information.

One would not normally read a book like this but would use it for reference. I read it through and learned an immense amount about workable plants to be used locally, especially nice plantings that do not need any or much summer watering. It is sumptuously illustrated with color photographs of many plants and discusses a number of varieties of many species, giving the origin of each. The price for such a book was not at all high. It's a good buy if you are landscaping or thinking of changing or adding plants to your property.

If I had the option I would be giving this book 4 1/2 stars instead of just 4- but there are a few minor problems that kept me from giving it a 5. The good points of the book other people have covered well- it has beautiful photographs and it has very good explanations of the bay area climate and why it presents unique gardening challenges and offers aesthetically pleasing and environmentally responsible ways of responding to those natural conditions and creating gardens that integrate well into the ecosystems around them.

Another interesting thing about the book is that incorporates ideas from many different places- it was put out not by one author but by a municipal district- a fascinating idea I hope is emulated elsewhere. However while there is a positive that it has so much input from many different sources and gardening philosophies, it suffers a little bit from the too many cooks syndrome. It doesn't feature native plants exclusively, but it does feature some of them, trying to kind of incorporate the native approach with more conventional gardening. The problem is that for anyone who is interested in knowing which plants are native to California the information is presented in a very confusing fashion. A little icon of the state appears next to the general group of plants (like carex) if ONE of them listed below is native. Or more. You have to read about each entry to try and figure out which belong to which. In some cases you will figure out which one is not native by a note saying 'Native to New Zealand' in one subentry, like C. buchananii. In others, like manzanita, no information on where each comes from is given, which may be confusing to someone who is not familiar with native plants, and will know that all are native.

There were also two errors I caught in the first reading- yarrow is not marked with a California symbol showing that there are native species in the state. Then there are sub-entries for Island Pink and common yarrow which don't state where they are from, so someone without prior knowledge of native plants wouldn't be able to figure that out from the rest of the text. In fact, the book is very inconsistent in stating where a plant is from. I think the final version of the book was not edited by someone familiar with native plants or they would have caught that and possibly found a clearer way of showing if a plant was native, such as putting a symbol next to the for entry Berkley sedge instead of up top with general heading of carex.

So in short I would fully recommend this book to anyone who is solely interested in water-wise gardening in California and finding plants that are adapted to summer dry climates, but if you are a beginner with an interest in native plants with a few non-natives for accents, you will need another more specific book to supplement this one, as I think one would be a bit confusing. It is still a remarkable achievement and I don't mean to sound negative because I would still recommend this book- but I thought it was something potential readers should be aware of, even though it is perhaps a nit-picky thing. I think the editors bit off a fairly big chunk with this one, and overall did very well. Hopefully in future editions, these minor problems will be resolved.

I have an older version 1990, but I've heard the new version is even better. This book is a no-nonsense reference book. It's clearly organized by plant type: trees, vines, shrubs, etc. Within the categories it is organized in tables with nice clear photos; it's great for plant that you don't know the name of and need to find by appearance. This is a great book for any Bay Area gardener who wants to plant responsibly and control their water requirements. And yes, every Landscape Architect I know owns this book.

With the front lawn, like, gone, we needed to replant, and quick, Dude. Luckily, we'd found the dough to get "Plants and Landscapes for Summer-Dry Climates of the San Francisco Bay Region". This book, like, totally rocked as we planned a low H20 garden with some RAD native California and Mediterranean plants. From picking a groovy tree (Manzanita) to planning an awesome flowering hedge to hide the neighbor's gnarly rusty gas-guzzler (Ceanothus) to planting a funky giant "fried egg" poppy plant (Matilija...or, in Latin it's Romneya Coulteri, Dude), this book has for sure been our right-on resource. Man, this book is literally it - the sweet way-to-go gardening book for us Californians.

This is one of the most helpful books I have ever purchased as a guide to what plants work best in the Mediterranean climate of many parts California. Illustrated with hundreds of color photos so that you can see what the plants look like. It also notes water requirements of each plant - I discovered I was watering plants that don't really want or need summer water.

This book is as useful as it is beautiful.

The photographs are inspiring, but the sheer volume of detailed text is terrific. It's like having an encyclopedia and coffee table book, all in one. Every January I pull it off the shelf to flip through the pages and dream of spring.

I find it to be less commercial than Sunset Garden--less interested in design and trend, more in water-saving and ecology--but FYI, there is a lot of overlap. While if I could only have one book for California gardening, it would be Sunset's, this one is much more fun and inspiring.