Perennial vegetables are a joy to grow. Whereas traditional vegetable plots are largely made up of short-lived, annual vegetable plants, perennials are edible plants that live longer than three years. Grown as permaculture plants, they take up less of your time and effort than annual vegetables do.
Martin Crawford's book outlines the benefits of growing perennial vegetables:
- Perennials provide crops throughout the year, so there's always something that can be used in the kitchen. You avoid the hungry gap between the end of the winter harvest and the start of the summer harvest of annual vegetables.
- Perennial vegetables are less work. Once planted, they stay in the ground for many years. They are the classic plants for no-dig gardeners.
- Unlike annual vegetables, perennial vegetables cover and protect the soil all year round. This maintains the structure of the soil and helps everything growing in it.
- Humous levels build up and nutrients don't wash out of soil. (Cultivating the soil for annuals exposes this humous to air on the surface, causing the carbon to be released as carbon dioxide.)
- Mycorrhizal fungi, critical for storing carbon within the soil, are preserved. (They are killed when soil is constantly dug for annual vegetables.)
- Perennial plants contain higher levels of mineral nutrients than annuals because perennial vegetables have larger, permanent root systems, capable of using space more efficiently, and they take up more nutrients.
How to grow perennial vegetables gives comprehensive advice on all types of perennial vegetable, from ground-cover plants and coppiced trees to plants for bog gardens and edible woodland plants:
- In Part One Martin Crawford outlines why we should grow perennials. He then explains where and how to grow them in perennial polycultures, in forest garden or aquatic garden settings. He outlines how to propagate them, how to look after them for maximum health and how to harvest them.
- Part Two is a plant-by-plant reference of over 100 perennial edibles in detail, from familiar ones like rhubarb, Jerusalem artichokes (sunchokes), horseradish and asparagus to less common ones such as skirret, nodding onions, red chicory, Babbington's leek, scorzonera, sea kale and wild rocket.
With beautiful colour photographs and illustrations and plenty of cooking tips throughout, this book offers inspiration and information for all gardeners, whether experienced or beginner.
Martin is a true pioneer and his work deserves respect and celebration. - Permaculture Magazine
Martin Crawford is a frontiersman, a pioneering teacher and an inspiration. Both his work and his garden are national treasures. - Chris Nichols, Director of the Ashridge MSc in Sustainability and Responsibility.
Martin started his working life a computer programmer but his passion for organic gardening quickly led to a change in career. He has had broad and varied horticultural/agricultural experience over the years - experience that led him to the concept of forest gardening as a sustainable system that can flourish in our changing climate conditions. This led to the founding of the Agroforestry Research Trust, a non-profit-making charity that researches temperate agroforestry and all aspects of plant cropping and uses, with a focus on tree, shrub and perennial crops. At his forest garden in Dartington, Devon, Martin systematically researches plant interactions and unusual crops. He also runs a commercial tree nursery specialising in unusual trees and shrubs, and has a large trial site, researching fruit and nut trees.
Martin teaches courses on Forest Gardening and Growing Nut Crops, writes books and edits a quarterly journal, Agroforestry News.
Title: How to Grow Perennial Vegetables: Low-maintenance, Low-impact Vegetable Gardening
Author: Martin Crawford
ISBN: 9781900322843
Binding:
Publisher: Green Books
Publication Date: 2012-04-05
Number of Pages: 224
Weight: 0.5399 kg
A lot of information is packed into a relatively short space... Lots of the plants listed were new to me entirely, or as an edible possibility. Now I'm not only thinking where edible perennials may fit on my allotment, but also in my garden too! This is an informative and detailed book, which I shall be returning to again and again.
* vegplotting.blogspot *
This lovely book makes it clear that we are not just missing a trick, we are missing a feast.
-- Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
I admire tremendously the first-hand experience which informs Martin Crawford's writing. This book leads us down the path to a wealth of perennial vegetables and tells us how to combine them successfully.
-- Anne Swithinbank
A really useful book... Let us start freeing ourselves from the tyranny of the annual sowing, thinning and planting regime.
-- Bob Flowerdew
At last an in-depth book on perennial vegetables combined with Martin Crawford's usual diligence of research - essential reading.
-- Ben Law