Houseplants for Dummies

by Larry Hodgson and The National Gardening Association

Book Overview

Looking to bring some outside greenery indoors? Maybe you already have an indoor garden and are looking to create a botanical jungle. Whatever the case may be, houseplants are an ideal inexpensive way to beautify your dwelling. You'll be rewarded with purer air and you're sure to enjoy watching your plant sprout, climb, and even flower. Of course, before you start working on crafting a greenhouse, you need to know what kinds of plants you can grown...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0764551027
• ISBN13: 9780764551024
• Release Date: August 1998
• Publisher: For Dummies
• Length: 384 Pages
• Weight: 1.52 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 7.5" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

A "Bible" for Novice Houseplant enthusiasts

Feel like you do not have a "green thumb"?, yet know friends or family that can take a dead stick and make it grow? This is a perfect book for anyone wanting to get houseplants started, enjoying them, and also helping put oxygen back into your home. From the very easy beginning houseplants such as an airplane plant, or prayer plant (it gives both the "botanical" names and common names, to more exotic plants such as moth orchids and beginning Bonsai's, the book explores the in's and out's of hundreds of houseplants. Watering, fertilizing, when to repot, what is easy to grow, what is more difficult, pests, how to rid pests naturally, without chemicals, and even a whole section of color photos of your most common houseplants are included. The tips are incredible. I have loved house plants for years, but have not grown them in a long time. As soon as I opened the first chapter, the book had me excited about having houseplants in every room. Great book for the novice to even intermediate house plant person. Great gift idea also.

Keith Simmons Sr.

This is a very good book for someone who has no clue about plants and a good reference for those who already have some knowledge about the care of plants

Who cares about organization!

So what if the organization of this book isn't to some peoples likings (as some reviewers have remarked)! This book saved several of my tropical plants lives. I'm a long time plant lover and propagator but was unfamiliar with tropicals and a few other plant families. I primarily raised cacti and spider plants.I was baffled by the brown bumps on my White Bird of Paradise plant but figured they were a part of the plant since they looked like wood bumps. After reading this book I found out they were bugs called Scale which suck the life from the plant and, when hatched, can jump from plant to plant. I also found out that what I had thought was just a problem with dust was in fact mildew, another potentially devistating disease. My plants are now all very happy.I have hard water in my area and found out about the need to use vinegar and water to "rinse" the salt from the soil in hard water situations. I've also always suspected that the tags that come with plants are bogus and this book explains exactly why. I was so surprised about this book to tell you the truth. I got it from the library to see if I could figure out the above problems then had to buy the book.I have other books that have all the "pretty pictures" but they are typically useless. I'd rather have a book that was informative and accurate. If you ant to keep your plant healthy and happy for the length of it's natural life, this book is among the ones to add to your shelf. If you want a book for plant identification then either get a Peterson Guide (all very good) or do a google image search with "tropical plants" or "flowering indoor plants", etc. I do that when looking up new varieties of herbs, medicinal weeds and other plants. Find the name then use a book, not all websites are good information.

Clear and Sound Information

This book is well written and provides sound information and guidance. I bought the book because I know little about houseplants. After a few minutes of reading I went to the nursery as an informed consumer. The salesman in the store where I bought my plants confirmed that the book is excellent. You can look up a topic in the index and find out what you need to know in a few minutes. There is a description of the care required for many, many plants and the advantages and disadvantages of each. This book gives the uninitiated the inside scoop.

Informative

This book is informative and very easy to understand! I love all the information about each type of houseplant. Plus, now I know how to propagate and make my houseplants look the best they can.