Backyard Water Gardens is a complete overview of everything you need to know in order to create a backyard water feature, from ideas, to installation, to maintaining, to stocking with plants and fish.
“A beautifully-written, practical guide to planning and creating your own rain garden.” —Green Upgrader You probably spend hundreds of dollars watering your yard, but there is an easy way to save money and resources—by collecting rain to reuse in front and backyards. In Creating Rain Gardens, water conservation experts Cleo Woelfle-Erskine and Apryl Uncapher walk you through the entire process, with step-by-step instructions for designing and building swales, French drains, rain gardens, and ephemeral ponds. From soil preparation, planting, troubleshooting, and maintenance, to selecting palettes of water-loving plants that provide four-season interest and a habitat for wildlife, Creating Rain Gardens covers everything you need to create a beautiful rain garden at home.
"It's up to every single one of us to do our bit for wildlife, however small our gardens, and The Butterfly Brothers know just how that can be achieved." Alan Titchmarsh Join the rewilding movement and share your outdoor space with nature. We all have the potential to make the world a little greener. Wild Your Garden, written by Jim and Joel Ashton (aka "The Butterfly Brothers"), shows you how to create a garden that can help boost local biodiversity. Transform a paved-over yard into a lush oasis, create refuges to welcome and support native species, or turn a high-maintenance lawn into a nectar-rich mini-meadow to attract bees and butterflies. You don't need specialist knowledge or acres of land. If you have any outdoor space, you can make a difference to local wildlife, and reduce your carbon footprint, too. "Wildlife gardening is one of the most important things you can do as an individual for increasing biodiversity and mitigating the effects of climate change. From digging a pond to planting a native hedge, the Butterfly Brothers can help you every step of the way." Kate Bradbury
Gives hands-on advice on designing and creating formal and informal water gardens with still or moving water, stones, bridges, lighting, decking, or fish. Includes a catalog of over 150 plants suitable for water gardens and over 700 photographs and illustrations.
Garden Ponds, Fountains & Waterfalls for Your Home provides essential information on designing and installing all types of home water gardens, from naturalistic to formal, plus fountains, waterfalls, streams, and bog gardens. Readers will learn how to construct each of these structures, as well as how to design bridges and stepping-stones.
“Gardentopia is that rare marriage of the art of landscaping and the technical knowledge of how to compose a landscape—boiled down to readily understood and easily executed actions. This book puts you in the driver’s seat and shows you how to chart the course to your own personal garden utopia.” - Margie Grace, Grace Design Associates Any backyard has the potential to refresh and inspire if you know what to do. Jan Johnsen’s new book, Gardentopia: Design Basics for Creating Beautiful Outdoor Spaces, will delight all garden lovers with over 130 lushly illustrated landscape design and planting suggestions. Ms. Johnsen is an admired designer and popular speaker whose hands-on approach to “co-creating with nature” will have you saying, “I can do that!’ This info-packed, sumptuous book offers individual tips for enhancing any size landscape using ‘real world’ solutions. The suggestions are grouped into five categories that include Garden Design and Artful Accents, Walls, Patios, and Steps and Plants and Planting, among others. Whether you are an experienced gardener or a landscaping novice, Gardentopia will inspire you with tips such as ‘Soften a Corner”, “Paint it Black”, and “Hide and Reveal”.
Whether it is a small container of water on a deck or patio serving as home to a few plants and water creatures or a more elaborate mix of waterfalls, fountains, rockwork, and lighting, the water garden can be a lovely, spirit-soothing addition to one's property—a place to unwind, relax, and escape the cares of the world. But while water has been a prominent feature in garden designs for thousands of years, it is only recently—with the availability of preformed kits at the local home improvement center—that installing a beautiful water garden has become a feasible undertaking for the average homeowner. And now, with the extremely clear and complete instructions in this practical, hands-on guide, a backyard water garden is easier than ever to build and maintain. Water Gardener's Bible by Ben Helm and Kelly Billing is a true bible on the subject—with comprehensive information on everything from choosing the right site and selecting aquatic plants and fish to pond management and problem solving. The pages are crammed with specifics about pond biology and chemistry, beneficial bacteria, fish health, nuisance algae, and electrical and child safety—all that is necessary to duplicate the sights, sounds, and sanctuary of a babbling brook, splashing fountain, or cascading waterfall right in the backyard.
Acclaimed landscape designer Daniel Nolan showcases the best of desert gardenscapes that have become synonymous with luxury minimalism, and presents techniques that will inspire readers to transform available space into their own modern dry garden. Hot days, cool nights, dry air, a blazing sun—California’s Mediterranean climate is not what you think of when you hear “lush garden,” but leading garden designers Nolan and his peers have revolutionized this genre with their artful designs. Nolan, the authority on dry gardens, has carefully selected 25 unique public and private garden masterpieces, diverse examples of interior and exterior gardening techniques. Readers will be treated to a complete look at crafting elevated and rustic gardens through a variety of environments, from pools and pocket gardens, front lawns, balconies, and living walls to retail spaces, museums, and vineyards. Each detailed project offers a different approach to incorporating the desert’s wild array of flora and becomes a practical tool, addressing various materials and horticultural and compositional solutions. Rich with bold architecture of spiny cacti, brilliant and muted sage, rosy succulents, bright, dusty sands, and red rocks, Dry Gardens proves that inspiration has no geographic boundaries. It will be appreciated by lovers of gardens and interior design from around the world.