Today I’m announcing a new regular feature: The Survival Gardener Library!

Every Friday I’ll feature a book of the week worth adding to your library. We’ll focus on gardening, homesteading, food forests, permaculture and wild plant foraging and maybe even throw in the occasional book from out there in left field.

I’ve been a book collector since I was a child and those books shaped the man I am today. From the Animals Without Backbones to The Foundation Trilogy to Florida Gardening to The Lord of the Rings, books have uplifted and inspired me over the years.

And that doesn’t even count the book that has impacted me the most: The Holy Bible. If you don’t have that book yet, go get one.

This week we’ll start the series with the must-have book Scorpions of Medical Importance:

Oh wait, no, that’s not it. I’m sorry.

This week we feature Steve Solomon’s classic:

Gardening When it Counts: Growing Food in Hard Times

I consider Steve Solomon my mentor.

We finally got the chance to meet via Skype a couple of months ago and he is brilliant in person as well. The man’s mind is a machine – yet his books are easy to read, accessible, and almost always practical.

Steve has gardened organically for years in a variety of climates. He’s farmed, run a seed company and written multiple books. I own them all, with the exception of Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades – though you can bet your broadfork I’d buy that one too if I lived within a thousand miles of the region.

Gardening When it Counts teaches you to grow food without breaking the bank or your back. It will open your eyes to the value of wide spacing, sharp tools and traditional methods.

Reading Steve is like learning from a wise grandfather who has been there, done that, and grown the potatoes.

If you don’t own this book and you are a gardener, you should.

Go get a copy. Read it. Learn from Steve – he knows his stuff.

You can learn more about Steve Solomon on his website.

*Original featured photo by my friend Jean.