This year more than any other has seen an interest in gardening that’s “off the charts”, both for food supply purposes and as a therapeutic activity. Your library has a number of online resources that you can access as long as you have a library card. If you don’t, email us at comments@tbpl.ca with your name, address and phone number and we’ll set you up with one.
We’ve set up a gardening shelf in cloudLibrary with a variety of nonfiction titles for both adults and children. Access cloudLibrary on our website at tbpl.ca/ebooks. Here a few gems.
No Waste Organic Gardening offers great hacks for a DIY compost bin, building a raised garden bed without tools and many other tips, tricks, and solutions to save you money and the planet at the same time.
Kids’ Container Gardening provides basics on plants and gardening with its numerous illustrations and 18 time-tested and proven projects, organized by season.
Gardening for the Zombie Apocalypse is a quirky title for a book that is “irreverent, straightforward and useful” that even complete beginners will appreciate. You’ll learn how to sow and grow 20 key crops, how to plan and plant for maximum nutrition and perhaps undertake some rather off the wall projects such as “dinner in a dustbin”. A fun read to be sure!
Let’s not forget about fiction so here are a few titles in cloudLibrary with a gardening theme.
Lavender Lies by Susan Wittig Albert is the eighth China Bayles cozy mystery. Each chapter starts with lavender lore, recipes and plant folklore.
The Lost Garden by Helen Humphreys takes place in London during the Blitz of World War II. Gwen Davis volunteers to supervise a potato growing effort at a country estate and discovers an abandoned garden on the estate.
Nora Roberts’ In the Garden Trilogy (Blue Dahlia, Black Rose, Red Lily) is a mix of romance and suspense set in a historic Southern mansion that houses a gardening business.
Two other resources are found on our My Giant Search page (tbpl.ca/virtualcollection). First, click on the Sleeping Giant, then go to eBooks on EBSCOhost. Home & Garden is the category where you will find titles such as From Seed to Table: a Practical Guide to Eating & Growing Green. Sign up for an account with Ebsco to download a seven day loan to your mobile device or a pdf to your desktop.
The Home Improvement Reference Centre provides full colour pdfs to download, print or email. Once you’re there, click on the Outdoor image and you’ll see a number of categories. Select yard & garden projects for plans such as how to build a compost bin or a raised garden bed.
Whether you’re an armchair or a hands-on gardener we’re sure that you’ll enjoy the resources the library offers.
Sylvia Renaud – www.tbpl.ca If you have a comment about today’s column, we would love to hear from you.
Thunder Bay Public Library's Book Blog 
So many seed catalogs were completely sold out by April! This was going to be my first year of having a garden (as an adult) long before the pandemic hit, and I was both annoyed and delighted by the massive increase in interest that gardening has received this year!
Hammocks were also in high demand! 🙂