What I expected... This book was pretty standard for what I expected. I needed to know the benefits and costs of keeping my plants in containers instead of just planting them outside, because I'm sick of bringing them inside every time the weather dips below freezing, only to take them right back outside because my cats love to chomp on them. I liked it enough to check out regular Gardening for Dummies, too.
Container Gardening for Dummies As someone with a "black thumb" (I can generally kill a plant within 24 hours!) I found this book to be very helpful. Even though there are huge amounts of real and applicable information here, the author manages to keep it fun and very readable. The best part is that since reading this book and putting it to use I haven't lost one plant! In fact, they seem to be thriving.
The only reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is the layout. I feel more thought could have been put into the way the chapters are put together. Specifically, the fact that I had to skip past all the design ideas to get to the care information in the back. Even with this one minor flaw, I still highly recommend this book to anyone interested in starting their own container garden.
A Great Basic Starter Book I found lots of very useful information from pot sizes and soil (and soil-less) mixes as well as useful info on lots of plants, needs, watering etc. As container gardening is quite different than planting in the ground, I found this book VERY useful and different from all the other normal gardening books. I am a beginner, but love to research stuff to death and I find this book does give you a very good foundation to get started and do well.
Very informative I'm a beginner to gardening and found this to be a wonderful book. It even has a section on which conifers (Christmas-tree-type trees) can be grown in containers. This is great - I'm going to grow my own little forest on my balcony.
Very Helpful! I originally checked this book out from the library, and after renewing three times and being told I couldn't renew it any more, I broke down and bought my own copy. It is VERY helpful in explaining the types of plants that do well in containers, and how to take care of them, how to deal with pests, how to "winter over," and so on. There is an entire section on what you can put plants in (be creative!), what the different types of soils are and what that means to you, and what plants do well in whichever type of light you have. I keep my copy of this book handy, and refer to it often. It's the single best reference book I've found on the subject of Container Gardening. Herb Gardening for Dummies is also good, but not QUITE as good as this one.