Dedication

    Acknowledgements with Thanks

    Table of Contents

    Foreward: Craig Tufts, Chief Naturalist, National Wildlife Federation

    Preface

    Introduction: Adrian Benepe, Commissioner,

                              City of New York, Parks & Recreation

PART I: Why Garden Your City?

PART II: The Elements of Success

1.  Discovering Your Gardening Spaces

2. Your Garden's Sun, Zone, Wind & Microclimates

3.  Plan. Then plan again.

4.  Water, Soil & Staying Organic

5.  Basic Supplies for You & Your Plants

6.  What to Plant: Local Hunting & Mail Order

7.  Vegetables a.k.a. Urban Farming

8.  Seed Starting, Sowing, and Planting

9.  Weeding, Deadheading & Avoiding Thinning Trauma

10. Nature's Way - Compost & Wildlife

PART III: Places to Grow

11. Window Box, Fire Escape, and Balcony Gardens

12. Terraces & Roofs

13. Sidewalk & Entrance Magic

14. The Rare Backyard Garden

15. Street Trees - The Urban Forest

16. Adopt a Tree, Highway, Median & More

17. Community Gardening

18. Gardening on Public Land

PART IV: City Gardening Resources

19. Sources, Websites, Catalogs & City Parks Departments

20. A Case Study: Garrit Stryker's Garden

Garden Journal - Notes & Sketches

Reading List & Bibliography

Index

Copyright 2005 by Barbara Hobens Feldt

....  the REVIEWS!  ...

"At last, a book about gardening that's chocked full of what so many others lack - great, practical, and useful information. Barbara's knowledge and enthusiasm ooze like sap from a spring-pruned maple. garden your city is expertly written for city gardeners...and suburban gardeners, and rural gardeners...and anyone, anywhere who loves to garden.

Light-hearted. Informative .Whimsical. And fun. garden your city is exactly what a gardening book should be. Gimme more, Barbara."

                     Paul James, The Gardener Guy

                         Host of Gardening by the Yard, HGTV - Check out gardenerguy.com  

"Barbara's book takes you on a journey of preparation and revelation. You'll come through the reading ready to grow and wonder on your own."

                    Craig Tufts, Chief Naturalist, National Wildlife Federation

"It's about time! This is a real 'I can do this!' book that will inspire more individual endeavors to plant trees and start gardens in cities and towns across the country!"

                    Patricia Pyle, Community Forestry Program Director,

                              Parks & People Foundation, Baltimore, Maryland

"Barbara does it all! garden your city is not just a paean to greening every personal and public space in the inner city. It's an immensely practical guide to finding and understanding your site, whether it be a windowsill, balcony, roof, backyard or street tree pit. She misses no detail of successful plant selection and growing in a pot to a plot in a community garden or bed in a neighborhood park. Having done it all -- and inspired countless others to do likewise -- she does not minimize the challenges of creating mini-oases in a desert of steel and concrete, but she shows how meeting these challenges can be a real joy and an important contribution to better urban living."

                     Thomas Powell, Editor and Publisher

                              The Avant Gardener

"To paraphrase the popular song, if you can garden in Manhattan you can garden anywhere. Barbara Feldt shares great insights about how and, most importantly, where to garden in city neighborhoods -- insights based on her remarkable record of leading successful greening and gardening efforts in some of New York's densest communities."

                     Andy Stone, Director, NYC Program, Trust for Public Land

"People call all the time and ask the questions this book answers!"

                      Selina Rossiter, Community Gardens Coordinator

                                                       Denver Botanic Gardens

  "This book is a tool for everyone who cares about the health of their city. It is a gardening bible that smoothly organizes an impressive variety of approaches, resources, and insights. And it is the cumulative field notes (along with well-drawn conclusions) of a woman with decades of in-the-field volunteer work and environmental activism."

                    Adrian Benepe, Commissioner,

                               City of New York, Department of Parks & Recreation

 "garden your city is a welcome addition to the library of beginner and experienced gardeners alike.  It combines Barbara Feldt's wit and spirituality with her common sense of community gardening, and will help you take the edge off of urban living."

                    Gerard Lordahl, President

                              American Community Gardening Association

Representing over 450 members caring for over 360,000 community garden projects.

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