The Good Web Guide to Gardening - Hardcover

Little, Sue

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1903282004 ISBN 13: 9781903282007

Publisher: Good Web Guide Limited, 2000

Synopsis

This guide to gardening websites contains information on general sites with helpful tips and advice, as well as details of more specific interest sites such as individual or personal garden sites to explore. It is aimed at every type of gardening enthusiast. The book gives details of websites with practical month-by-month garden hints and tips to follow throughout the year. It recommends sites which deal with gardening problems and the general planning, preparing, growing and nurturing of your garden. Advice is given on where to buy seeds, exotic plants, garden tools and any other accessories online. There is a section on specific sites with tested searchable databases to investigate listings of plants, product sources etc. Also included are websites for specific gardens and gardening organisations such as the Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew or The Royal Horticultural Society as well as smaller, more personal sites. These sites are rated by the author for content as well as for their practical features such as visitor's information and important design matters such as ease of navigation, and the maintenance of hot links.

About this title

Review

Gardeners are particularly well served on the Web. A host of sites offer information: general advice, specialist information on, say, techniques or individual plant species; there are suppliers and plant finders; there are chat sites and discussion forums; there are sites in which gardeners record their activities (and obsessions) for the world to enjoy. As always, finding one's way about and sifting the good from the indifferent and downright bad is a discouragingly time-consuming business. The Good Web Guide people have therefore turned their attention to this favourite activity. The results, as is generally the case with this publisher, are lively but business-like, with sites rated for content, reliability, ease of navigation and overall performance. Inevitably, perhaps, the Web being what it is, there is a preponderance of US sites, but Sue Little has worked hard to find UK Web sites that are relevant and useful. The book's first assessment is of the Royal Horticultural Society: hearteningly, it receives a top rating. This initial group of so-called "Essential" sites is followed by a group dealing with the practical business of working in the garden, planning, advice and so on. This is followed by Armchair Gardening and Spending Money (so easy on the Web), Individual Plants and Families, Online Resources (such as databases of gardens) and Gardening for Different Abilities, including gardening for children. All in all, a very useful, nicely judged resource. It comes with a CD-ROM to link to the Good Web Guide's own site. --Robin Davidson

From the Author

Gardening on the web!
It has been both a fascinating and frustrating experience compiling the good web guide to gardening. Fascinating, because the search for good sites has led me all over Europe, North America, and Australasia, 'visiting' the cherished gardens of plant lovers and gardeners, looking in on their passions and projects. I've also witnessed the internet gardening scene changing, energising, and reinventing itself in just a few short months, which is why the parallel website project is going to prove so uniquely crucial, keeping up to date with all the changes and new sites that are emerging weekly. Frustrating, because of course like any gardener, I'd rather be outside in my own patch, and because as we all know, the still-infant web can sometimes be slow and inefficient. Overall, though, the journey has been a great pleasure, as I've picked up a thousand ideas and inspirations on the way, and hopefully made it quicker and easier for us all to spend more time in the garden and less time wasted on fruitless searching and surfing.

Edition details

• Publisher: Good Web Guide Limited
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1903282004
• ISBN 13: 9781903282007
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 160