Book Recommendation -  KNOTT'S HANDBOOK FOR VEGETABLE GROWERS

This is not really a new book, but it might be a new book to most backyard vegetable gardeners.  If nothing else, just a brief scanning  of it easily  dissipates any notion that farming is a simple activity...

1957 edition.

Since it was published in 1957 by James Edward Knott, a Professor of Agriculture at the University of California, this little green, spiral bound volume has been a mainstay reference manual for commercial growers. Prof. Knott has passed on, but his  handbook has continued to find new editors.  The current edition, although dating to 1997 and still in print from Wiley-Interscience, is now edited by Donald N. Maynard and George J. Hochmuth.

Cover from latest edition (1997)

Knott's volume provides farmers with  practical  information  such as how many seeds are needed by weight or number for different spacings per acre  for specific crops. It includes comprehensive listings of pests and diseases affecting for most vegetables and the  effectiveness of  remedies (albeit usually herbicides or pesticides).  There are also tables and advise about calculating how much fertilizer or soil amendments that might be needed per acre for particular vegetables as well as data on the composition of typical manures and other organic materials, i.e. fish meal, vetch hay and buckwheat straw, that might be added to soils.

Growers can also  look up  how many  feet per minute that a tractor travels at varying low speeds starting at 1 mile per hour, or they can review charts showing how much water is needed to penetrate to difference depths in an acre based on soil type.  The handbook also covers average crop yields, what parts of a vegetable are marketable and the necessary associated storage conditions for it. There is even a section that shows the   nutrient value provided by different vegetables. For us backyard gardeners, it is an education into the complexity of the factors that farmers must take into account before, during and even after when the seeds and plants are in the ground.

In researching background information for this post, I came across a surprisingly wide variety of options about how you can get a copy of Knott's Handbook. You can buy the current edition from Wiley-Interscience for about $100 or get an Amazon Kindle edition is a little less.  Used book copies range typically from $5.00 to $20.00, but I saw one seller on eBay asking $200+ for a first edition.  I also came upon alternatives to these options that might interest the local farming community or other frugally minded types.  There are public electronic versions of the current 1997 edition available from Internet Archive as well as this PDF version available from the website of the University of Missouri's Extension Service.

FWIW:  The Internet Archive (www.archive.org) is a marvelous resource of the Internet providing open public access to millions of digital resources including folk music, videos, books etc. To get you hooked, a few of the specific resources are the Grateful Dead, Old Time Radio Shows, and TV News.  CHECK IT OUT...

And remember:

"Farming is a profession of hope." - Brian Brett, Canadian Author