Member Reviews

Great read on fruit gardening with pictures and detailed how tos on grafting, pruning, and other vital aspects of gardening. There are many tips and tricks for the beginner. I especially enjoyed the chapter on pests and various susceptibilities of different fruits.

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Nice and informative book. I was very excited to learn about strawberries and I can't wait to start planting them in my backyard. This book teaches you how to choose the right fruit based on where you live, managing pests and diseases and other tips. I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review

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I didn't realize what all went into having fruit trees! I am glad that I read this book before I started this kind of project. I believe that this book would be an asset to anyone who is wanting to have fruit trees but there are a lot of things that you need to be aware of before you even start and this book is a great resource.

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This is the best book for a beginner that wants to grow their own mini fruit garden. The real pictures allow you to see all of the things that the author is talking about. You find out what you need, what it will look like, and much more. It gives you the exact utensils that you need for each part of making it. The best part is that it shows you what the fruit will look like at the correct time to pick them to eat. Again, this is the book to read when you want to know all about growing your own mini fruit garden.

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Whenever I pick up a gardening book, I feel trepidation, as I wonder if the gardening tips within will be appropriate for my Northern climate. Okay, maybe Northern is a strong word, but as a Canadian living in zone 4, I am not the intended reader of many a garden book. I am happy to report that the tips contained in "Grow You Own Mini Fruit Garden" are not only applicable to colder climates, but actually really helpful! Since it includes tips for both in-ground and container planting, many of the more tropical plants can be planted in a cold region, as long as the container planting recommendations are followed. It even has the Celsius to Fahrenheit conversions of all temperatures, which is always thoughtful and appreciated!

From how to prep your soil and choose better cultivars for you to reaping the rewards, this book offers a plethora of tips on how to adapt fruit cultivation to smaller urban or suburban spaces. There's even a whole section on basic pruning tips, which, considering how complex that subject is, was a nice surprise. The images also have a good balance of both useful and pretty, which is great! Nestled between aesthetic photographs of strawberries dangling off the plant are less pretty pictures of roots, crowns, and dead stems, as well as diagrams, which is infinitely more helpful than a description alone.

I've been doing a truly ungodly amount of research in planning for my own garden this summer, and this book has been a huge help. My favorite thing about this book is that it answers a few questions even my thickest, most in-depth textbooks didn't cover! It provides a good range of knowledge, from explaining basic terms, to step-by-step instructions for techniques, to more in-depth theory. It may be a bit basic for the more adept gardeners, but the explanations are so good that even the most knowledgeable fruit cultivator might learn a thing or two.

My only criticism would be that it is missing a few points on overwintering more fragile plants in colder climates. That is something very specific that I don't necessarily expect to read about in an average gardening book, but it would have been nice to expand on the subject a little.

All in all, an excellent book that I highly recommend to anyone interested in growing their own fruit in an urban context!

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This is an excellent book in preparing, choosing, growing, tending and much more to having a fruit garden. In fact the only book one needs to grow fruit, especially a mini fruit garden.
There is so much easy to understand information, that having a fruit garden will become easy. From berries, climbers and trees there is something for everyone, if not everything for everyone.
Really great book
Two years ago we sold our farm, including 2 acres of orchards, mainly heritage apples and pears, with berries as an understorey. We now have a citrus garden in pots and espaliered trees,. This book is perfect for us in every way.

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For some reason, this book will not download for me. Not on my Kindle, nor any of my other programs. It's too bad, because this is a subject that I am very interested in. Therefore, I cannot leave a review.

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Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden by Christy Wilhelmi is a great read if you are into gardening or learning about growing fruits. Ms. Wilhelmi takes you through basically everything you need to know from planning, to working with your soil, to pruning. One thing I truly admire about this book is that she takes you through growing organically and encourages you to do everything in your power to avoid chemical use. This is a quality I wish more authors and gardeners/farmers would adopt.

The book was written in a manner such that I was interested enough to read it cover to cover. I found I enjoyed poring over the pages to learn all I could about growing the different fruits. This would also be a great reference book to have on hand because she takes you through fruit diseases and how to treat them in an easily approachable manner. It would be a small thing to go back and find the disease of a certain plant and how to treat it.

Finally, a few words about pruning. Even as an Extension Master Gardener Volunteer who has had training in the area, pruning still scares the dickens out of me; however, this book takes the fear and the unknown out of every part of controlling your plants through pruning.

Bottom line, this book is fun, informative, and it takes the guess work out of growing your own fruits. There is no doubt in my mind that you will learn something new by reading Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden. I would absolutely recommend this book to my friends and family.

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Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden by Christy Wilhelmi has a lot of information for those who want to grow your own fruit garden. There is help for choosing the right plants and pots / places, pruning the trees, managing pests, and more. This one was a good read and had some helpful information.

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Mini fruit garden seems an adequate idea but it’s daunting to know what goes where, with what soil, and how will it fit. This book gives you an idea of what to do with all those questions and then some.

What did I like? While this book gives coverage on pretty much every plant and tree in my fruit garden it also delves a bit more on planting, pruning, and pest control also. So a wealth of information for anyone thinking about starting their own garden and then also some help with dwarf trees I found helpful.

Would I recommend or buy? I recommend buying the paper copy and it’s going on my wish list. I found a ton of ideas, like vertical planters and I loved the pruning section. Lots of suggestions and diagrams there to help with the task of pruning. Five stars... I’d love a copy of this book!

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Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden: Planting and Tending Small Fruit Trees and Berries in Gardens and Containers by Christy Wilhelmi
Publisher: Quarto Publishing Group – Cool Springs Press
Genre: Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden
Release Date: April 6, 2021

Grow Your Own Mini Fruit Garden by Christy Wilhelmi is an interesting resource for starting your own fruit garden.

The author provides information on how to choose the best fruit for your climate, how to care for your fruit garden, pruning tips, as well as suggestions for managing pests and disease in your plants.

Overall, I found this to be a good resource with good information and beautiful photos.

I'm so grateful to Christy Wilhelmi, Quarto Publishing Group – Cool Springs Press, and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy of this ARC ebook in exchange for my honest review.

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I would have loved to read and review the ARC of this book. Unfortunately, it wouldn't download in any format

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I wasn't a big fan of this book. I love gardening and love my fruits so I was hoping for lots of inspiration but it fell flat for me. There's lots of detailed information about things like grafting, planting, pest control and such, but I was hoping for way more about the fruits themselves and far more variety of fruits. Also, I was bothered by her pest advice. She tells you not to poison garden pests like mice and squirrels only because it could poison predatory animals up the food chain like cats, and she says things like "since some states and provinces have laws against trapping pests out of season, or killing squirrels and raccoons, we'll focus on humane options here." The only reason she's not suggesting killing squirrels and raccoons is because it's illegal in some places? Ew. And then she recommends trapping and releasing squirrels to another part of the city. What if they have babies? Just no. Leave your squirrels alone or provide them with something else. My yard has elderberry shrubs, a cherry tree, strawberries, rhubarb, bush cherries, red raspberries, black raspberries and other fruits (not even getting into the veggies and other edibles), and while I have often sent my boys outside some summer days to scare pesky robins from the cherry tree (reflective scare tape works best for us there), I have never felt the need to trap or poison the squirrels that visit our yard. And then she recommends killing animals like mice and voles that aren't legally protected with kill traps. Wildlife deserves a place outside. Besides that, I also just didn't really get any new information or the sense of fun enthusiasm or inspiration that I often get from gardening books.

I read a temporary digital ARC of this book for review.

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Its a very helpfull book when you want to start a fruit garden. Everything is explained very well and its easy to follow all the steps. Cant wait to try them out!

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From mouthwatering photographs to detailed instructions to fun fruits, this inspiring makes me itch to plunge my hands into gorgeous earthy soil (currently -36C where I am). You will discover a vast array of instructions from the very beginning including choosing where your plants will go (and there are options, even for balconies), materials of containers if applicable (terra cotta, plastic, ceramic...) and soil preparation. Thankfully there are container and in-ground options. The point is, there is something for every gardening zone here, every ability, from vertical vines on a fence to shrubs and trees in the ground.

Learn how to plant, water, prune and harvest a plethora of fruits including stone fruits (passion fruit, dragon fruit, pears...) and berries (blackberries, blueberries. strawberries...). Grafting is a focus as well as the two kinds of cutting, safe and organic pest and disease control, chill hours, tools and pH. There are also charts on fruit susceptibility and chill hours. Of course climate is one of the biggest considerations of all. My zone in Canada is a pitiful 2a which means few fruits can be grown successfully, though blueberries, strawberries and apples usually do well. However, my zone at our Europe house is a 9b which makes the world of a difference and which is what drew me to this book. Though we grow vast numbers of fruits I wanted to learn more about others and found some in this book.

The author reminds us that EVERY gardener has failures. This is so very true. It can be easy to get discouraged but often it is down to climate and pests. We can always, always learn more. As a master gardener I learn constantly! And the more one learns the more you realize there is to learn. I like that the author encourages.

So, if you are in the least bit interested in growing fruit trees (it can be daunting!), turn to this useful book. At the very least allow it to inspire you to learn more about what you are already growing!

My sincere thank you to Quarto Publishing Group - Cool Springs Press and NetGalley!

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Feels like a great introduction to fruit trees and berry gardening that offers an overall idea of the process. Topics covered include choosing rootstock, grafting, pruning, and maintenance of espaliered fruit. Might not be a definitive guide but it is certainly a book that will guide your first year well.

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