The Natural Garden (2013 edition)

As its title does not indicate, this book written by Jean-Marie Lespinasse is devoted exclusively to Potager, although some techniques can be extended to the entire garden. The term "natural" is obviously justified by the banned chemicals, but also by:
- The abandonment of the principles of weeding and turning the soil by digging after each culture, which were recommended to the late 1980s (and are still widely used!);
- The mix of species to avoid attracting pests, replacing the traditional rotation entire row;
- Culture on mounds (or teens), consisting of soil taken in the aisles around the mounds; teens emerge thirty centimeters from the surrounding soil;
- A very close cultural mode of the natural functioning of undergrowth.

This approach, commonly referred to as "synergistic agriculture" in the case of small cultures, is not entirely new: the pioneer was the Japanese microbiologist Masanobu Fukuoka in 1960, which inspired the English Emilia Hazelip in the 1980s followed by Réjean Roy in Quebec, and Jean-Marie Lespinasse.

This makes the quality of this book is:

- The author: it is internationally known for his research on apple operated throughout his professional career at INRA in Bordeaux. Besides the scientific rigor of pledge, this retiree has gardened his life, and experimented natural methods since 1997. Contrary to a widespread practice of multiplying trade publications whose interest is not always obvious, has written Lespinasse one book on the garden, updated in 2009 and in 2013,
- His consistency, with excellent presentation of the soil ecosystem. The author describes the case of his own garden (very poor, stony ground in the Graves of Bordeaux), but the method can be implemented in all French climates. Further steps have been validated after successfully checked over several years. The other two initiators of natural gardening (Hazelip and Roy) have left little data.

It should nevertheless be aware that this book is a whole, to read carefully and in full. There can suit those who only want "peck" ideas here and there. As against the reader can apply the recommended methods in stages since Lespinasse itself has not built his system in a single phase. People put off by the idea of ​​digging paths to form embankments, can create a high-performance system, by bringing additional land (as do those who garden "square")

In summary, you stand here an ecological methodology, efficient, less tiring (since no more digging-weeding), accessible and constantly improved by a scientific coupled with a true gardener.

The work is however not perfect in his presentation:

- The section devoted to the culture of each vegetable provides useful advice. But basic information is not made such deep respect for some seedlings. And even if the author indicates periods of sowing and planting, they are embedded in each heading. Actually missing summary tables (work schedule, key points) consulted a glance by beginners from the garden.

- In this new edition of February 2013, the author reported on the recent changes to its methodology. It is well past the vermicomposter, the practice of a vermicompost in situ, placed in trenches at Teen Center. Another example: teens look more and more elevated 1.20 m side square, plants and dune enjoying optimum brightness. The problem is that the previous edition has not really been altered; developments exposed end of the book by adding dune dozen pages. If I take the example of teens, the reader will first learn that these slopes are elongated and curved shape, then more flat shape, and discover extreme end a raised but flat square and 1.20 m side could represent the ideal. For a successful book which is the third edition in 7 years, this lack of investment as the author that the publisher is unfortunate!

I therefore awarded it 4 stars because it would have been easy to add some summary tables to lusage beginners and quau the editions louvrage lost its readability.

PS:
1) The neophytes will find the vegetable missing information in another work, for example the excellent The organic garden guide: Vegetable garden, orchard, ornament, or shorter and focused I start my organic vegetable garden.

2) I draw your attention to one point: the experience of Jean-Marie Lespinasse, gardener previously very popular in the movement "permaculture - cultivation on hills," is to conclude that the curved mounds are not an ideal system even if the author is careful to write clearly.

3) If you are not caught (s) gardening on embankments or square, know that a seminal work in the field of organic gardening and describing a complete system is finally reappeared in July 2013. This is a healthy garden through intercropping, written in 1980 by Gertrud Franck, an elderly lady exceptional (she experienced before Masanobu Fukuoka).