Do you garden in Florida or know someone about to move there? Here is the second edition of that classic by Monica Brandies, Florida Gardening: the Newcomer's Survival Manual (2nd Ed.), with all the information a newcomer needs to prepare for the move and then have a great Florida garden. Laugh off the garden perils of a muggy buggy climate with Monica’s famous advice, always served forth with a warm smile. Save money by preventing "newbie" garden errors in Florida's upside down climate. Get this helpful book on sale for $18 by clicking the "Buy Now" button below. Free postage to USA addresses.

Monica is also the author of Herbs and Spices for Florida Gardens, her autobiographical book, Bless You for the Gifts, and, with me as co-author, A Cutting Garden for Florida.

Recently I published a classic biography of gardeners, Who Does Your Garden Grow, by British author Alex Pankhurst. It is the paperback edition and it tells the stories behind favorite cultivars in our gardens: how they were created and for whom they are named. Click here to read an excerpt.

In 2006, Rex Murfitt's book Creating and Planting Alpine Gardens, won a Quill and Trowel award for book writing from the Garden Writers Association. It is a 276-page paperback that entertainingly tells exactly how to build rock gardens and work with alpine plants. What a treasure trove for gardeners who downsize! It has a chapter on alpine houses and a directory filled with great plants to make your garden wonderful. It is now available for Kindle from Amazon.com. It is the sequel to our award-winning rock garden classic, Creating and Planting Garden Troughs.

Here is an offer for the free illustrated e-book by Betty Mackey called Gardening in Small Spaces. It takes up only 1.4 MB and you can email it around legally. For a free email PDF copy, write to bbmackey@prodigy.net and ask.

And for trough lovers, here's papercrete. There are free instructions on the trough page and further info about the 2.0 edition of the papercrete CD. It is $10 postpaid in the USA and Canada). This is Betty's original technique, developed through trial and error and shown at the Philadelphia Flower Show and taught at workshops at Longwood Gardens.

Buy the papercrete trough CD for $10 with PayPal with the BUY NOW button below.

Click the tulip image above to link to art and photos by Betty Mackey which are featured on ImageKind.com.

HOW TO MAKE PAPERCRETE TROUGHS AND PLANTERS CD

$10 postpaid to USA addresses.

Garden Book Lovers,Welcome! The authors here at B. B. Mackey Books work with me to craft readable, illustrated, accurate, practical, entertaining, and sometimes award-winning garden books. Take a look at all our titles. We offer books on rock gardening and troughs, miniature and fairy gardens, regional gardening, garden journals for your notes, and the papercrete CD about making troughs.

NEW! Now available! For $20 postpaid, buy Betty Earl's book, Fairy Gardens: A Guide to Growing an Enchanted Miniature World. This colorful book tells how to make and plant fairy gardens including the houses, accessories, and plants, plus little-known fairy lore. Buy with Paypal for $20 postpaid (USA addresses) by clicking the purchase button below. Or email betty@mackeybooks.com and ask for a descriptive order form.

On this site you'll find free trough-making instructions and many effective garden how-to tips for many seasons. Read on for introductions to the authors, feature articles, links to other sites, and secure and reliable PayPal links for instant garden book and CD purchases. There's some art available, too. Thanks for visiting! Betty Mackey, Publisher

Paperback Edition! Creating and Planting Garden Troughs. 168 pages, paperback. Introductory price $21.00 postpaid. ISBN 9781893443211. Fingerut and Murfitt. Click below to buy.

Here is the authoritative guide to creating and planting garden troughs, updated in 2011. Troughs can be made at home with hypertufa, a relatively lightweight concrete-based mixture, and formed in simple molds. Like stone, hypertufa troughs are weatherproof, last for decades, combine well with other landscape materials, and make the perfect environment for miniature gardens. Each trough can have its own micro-environment with the size, soil type, rocks, mulch, and siting for the dwarf evergreens and rock garden plants that can be showcased in trough gardens. Authors Joyce Fingerut and Rex Murfitt present information on making and planting successful troughs in a readable yet thorough manner. This book includes hundreds of photographs, clear drawings, a well-tested hypertufa method and recipe, trough-planting technique, a guide to plants, illustrated sample planting plans, and a checklist for hypertufa ingredients and supplies. The updated bibliography, plant and subject indexes, and the resource list add to the value of this classic book, which has been acclaimed in reviews and is a recipient of the American Horticultural Society Book Award.

Citrus: How to Grow and Use Citrus Fruits, Flowers, and Foliage, by Monica Moran Brandies. November, 2010. This book not only helps you choose citrus for growing in a garden or sunroom, it tells how to use citrus in many ways. Grow it or buy it, but never waste anything from citrus. Use the peels, fruit, blossoms, and foliage. Make your own juice, foods, marinades, colognes, air fresheners, cleaning supplies,and more. Full color, 72 pages, $16.95 postpaid to USA and Canadian addresses. Click the Paypal "Buy Now" gold purchase button above to order it. Click here for more citrus book information.

Best of Green Space: 30 years of Composted Columns, by Duane Campbell. 224 pages, paperback, SALE! $15.00 postpaid .

For great reading take a look at this new book which has garden technique crossed with curmudgeonly humor in short pieces arranged according to the calendar. You'll come away with Duane's popular garden advice (his syndicated column runs in many newspapers), new ideas for your garden, and many a laugh. The reviews are great. Click the Paypal button just above this paragraph to purchase it at this special price. Illustrated, indexed. If you don't use Paypal send a check for $15 to B. B. Mackey Books, P. O. Box 475, Wayne, PA 19087 and say what you are ordering and where to send it. Click here to read an excerpt.

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Here is the second edition of Nellie Neal's popular book for Southern gardeners, Questions and Answers for Deep South Gardeners.

It is packed with great reality-based information that you need if you are trying to grow great landscape plants and veggies where it is hot, hot, hot and humid. New questions and an extensive pruning guide to everything have been added. Only $14.95, postpaid. paperback. Click the gold purchase button just above to purchase it with PayPal (or credit card via PayPal).

The new paperback edition of the trough book is here now!