Tom's Books

Safe Sex in the Garden | Allergy-Free Gardening | Growing the Perfect Lawn

Tom's latest book Buy it What the "Experts" may not tell you about Growing the Perfect Lawn The best type of turf for your needs Insider tips on fertilizing, aerating, and weed control Landscape services: what you should be getting for your money …and much, much more! What the "Experts" May Not Tell You About.. .Growing the Perfect Lawn by Tom Ogren, Warner Books, 2004. ISBN: 0-446-69093-7, $12.95. What the "Experts" May Not Tell You About... is Warner Books' new series on how to handle the public purchases of life: building a home, car repair, etc. Being a horticulturalist, Tom Ogren was asked to write the book on lawn care. Like The Complete Idiot's Guide or the For Dummies books, What the "Experts" May Not Tell You About.. . series provides a welt-organized and easy to read handbook about its given topic for the person who wants either to handle the topic themselves or be informed before hiring someone else to do it. The advantages of this "Experts" book on lawn care are that it's newer (2004 to the late 90s for the other books), devotes an entire chapter to "Fixing Up an Existing Lawn" and clearly explains the hows, whys and whens of aeration. Of course, if you're concerned about pollen allergies and thus wonder if your lawn is making life better or worse for the sufferers in your life, then you want to read this book for Ogren's insights. As the author of Allergy-Free Gardening and Safe Sex in the Garden, Ogren is particularly knowledgeable about human/plant allergic reactions. Not only does he note allergic potentials in the "Species of Grasses" and "Ground Covers" chapters, but he adds an appendix of "Twenty- Five Recommended Trees for Your Lawn" to guide homeowners into planting beautiful trees that won't aggravate anyone's allergies. Like most guidebooks, this one includes highlighted "insider's tips" and "potential pitfalls" within each chapter for quick reference. The basics (watering, aerating, fertilizing, weeds, lawn mowers and even "How to Mow a Lawn") are covered in a chatty, yet informative style. Ogren states that "it isn't my aim in this book to push or promote either organic or chemical methods of lawn care ... my job is to present both sides as fairly as possible, and let you decide for yourself." Considering how careful one must be with the chemical methods Ogren describes and that I've personally never had Ogren's problem with fly eggs in manure, why anyone would choose the chemical over organic methods of lawn care, especially if they have pets or children is completely beyond my understanding. If Ogren's descriptions of organic lawn care don't inspire you to try them first, at least follow his advice and use herbicides/insecticides/fungicides and chemical fertilizers with all the care Ogren details. If your lawn is your first real horticultural project, Ogren includes a helpful "Lawn Glossary" of terms both specific to the turfgrass industry and general to all of horticulture that will have you speaking the trade lingo fluently both to your neighbors and your local nursery. The Index is useful to look up items when you need an answer quickly. The "Resources" section, which lists URLs and books, is thin, but as none of the subdivisions lists more than 10 sources. I suspect this was a decision by the "Experts" editors to keep the section "to the point" for the beginning lawn owner. Serious grass enthusiasts will want to follow the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program at http://www.ntep.org/ to choose exactly the right grass cultivars to grow in their own climate and soil types. If you've decided to include a lawn on your property or would like to improve the lawn you have, What the "Experts" May Not Tell You About. . .Growing the Perfect Lawn will give you the information you need to maximize your decision. Reviewed by Dorene Pasekoff, Coordinator St. John's United Church of Christ Organic Community Garden Phoenixville, PA

"Safe Sex" Gardening Buy it Safe Sex in the Garden Residential and commercial landscapes are loaded with male-only trees and shrubs since they are litter- and therefore maintenance-free. But given a choice, what would you rather do—sweep or battle hay fever? The fact that our urban forests have been propagated with male-clones is a crime on two counts: male plants are the pollen-producing offenders, and without female plants to absorb pollen, allergenic pollen counts are on the rise nationwide. In SAFE SEX IN THE GARDEN, horticulturist Thomas Leo Ogren explores this safe sex issue (plant sex, that is!), as well as many other allergy-related topics: organic gardening, protecting pets against allergies, handling allergy-related stress, and global warming’s affect on allergies.

Allergy-Free Gardening Buy it Allergy-Free Gardening Praise for Allergy-Free Gardening "What a grand contribution to fields of pollen allergy, horticulture, and the garden. Congratulations to you both: Tom for conceiving and writing Allergy-Free Gardening, and Ten Speed Press for picking it up for publication." --Walter H. Lewis, Ph.D. Senior Botanist, Missouri Botanical Gardens Author of Medical Botany "Allergy-Free Gardening should be on the shelf of every serious gardener. All allergy specialists would be wise to own a copy, and certainly the book should be in the library of every nursery and municipal park department. Perhaps most importantly of all, this text should be required reading for every college student of landscape design and horticulture." --David Stadtner, MD Allergist, Stockton, California "This book presents a new idea and does so very well indeed. Ogren, a former landscape gardening instructor, proposes that in our private and public landscaping we need to reduce the use of plants that cause allergies. Until the publication of this book, the information needed to make allergy-free choices had not been compiled in one easily accessible source; nor had a scale been devised for rating plants that cause allergies. Here, Ogren accomplishes both these aims. His introductory material presents many plants and allergies new to this reviewer, and he shows how to apply his ideas. The main part of the book consists of plants listed in alphabetical order by their scientific names, with numerous cross references to their common names. Brief annotations provide descriptions and notes regarding allergies. The most important feature, however, is the rating of plants on a scale from one to ten (with ten causing the worst allergic reactions). As David Stadtner, a practicing allergist, writes in his foreword, 'the book should be in the library of every nursery and municipal park department.' It should be in public and academic libraries as well." ----Carol Cubberley Univ. of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information

 

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