Best Gardening Books For Beginners Uk

Whether you're looking for a full step by step guide to getting started in vegetable growing, or simply to buy a gift for a gardener friend, sometimes a website like Lets Grow Cook isn't enough. There are heaps of vegetable gardening books available covering all sorts of detail and planning. The best vegetable gardening books cover season by season plans, they give details on where and how to grow certain vegetables and they inspire you to dream of what you can achieve in your garden and we've even included the best books on allotments. We've brought together the best of the books about growing vegetables and vegetable gardening books here – with our favourites that are focused totally on the science, seasons art and delight of growing vegetables.

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The Best Vegetable Gardening Books

There are hundreds of thousands of books on vegetable gardening. Often it's the style of the writing, the practicalities and the photographs that make them successful. Mind you, any RHS vegetable book is also a sure winner! In providing our shortlist of the best books on vegetable growing and gardening we've gone for books that are:

Practical and no-nonsense books on growing vegetables
Focused on the UK climate and environment
Tried and tested – so they might have an older publish date, but if it works…
Focused on vegetable gardening
Cover how we grow vegetables- in allotments, in gardens, in yards, containers and pots. Sometimes in a small greenhouse, but always with a small budget and a lot of love.

What we've tried to do is provide several of the best veg gardening books that are general – and from well-renowned experts and organizations and then we've dived into specifics, so you'll find our recommendations on our

Best grow vegetables books

Like audiobooks? These are some great audiobooks available on vegetable gardening – here's a selection – PLUS you can get a free trial with Audible and not pay a thing for 30 days!

Best vegetable gardener planning book > buy the best veg garden planning book here
Best allotment vegetable gardening book > buy the best book on allotment vegetable gardening here
Best vegetable gardening in raised beds book > buy the best raised bed gardening books here
Best vegetable gardening hydroponics book > buy the best hydroponics veg growing books here
Best vegetable gardening in containers book > buy the best book on vegetable gardening in containers here
Best small spaces vegetable gardening book > buy the best book for vegetable gardening in small spaces here
Best vegetable gardening in greenhouses book > buy the best books on vegetable gardening in greenhouses here
Best mushroom growing books > buy the best books on mushroom growing here

RHS Step-by-Step Veg Patch: A Foolproof Guide to Every Stage of Growing Fruit and Veg: Lucy Chamberlain

The RHS is one of our go-to resources when it comes to vegetable gardening. This is one of the best RHS gardening books when it comes to vegetables. It's no surprise that their step by step book is full of invaluable advice. If there is one growing veg book that you get, then this should be it. It's one of the best vegetable gardening books for beginners. The author, Lucy Chamberlain, has been growing her own vegetables since her teens and maintains near self-sufficiency today with her own veggie patch – as such you can expect the best vegetable growing book with lots of detail.

There are extremely explicit step by step instructions on more than 50 different vegetables that you can grow – with full photos and extremely practical details on sowing, planting out, feeding and harvesting. This RHS book on growing vegetables also covers growing vegetables in raised beds, in the ground, in the containers and on balconies! Buy the RHS Step by Step Veg Patch book here.

The Vegetable Gardeners Bible: Edward Smith

There's no better place to start when it comes to books on vegetable gardening than the Vegetable Garden Bible. Edward Smith's classic is a modern class and it's a great place to start. This book is one of the best vegetable gardening for beginners UK growing season and climate considered. This vegetable growing book not only gives you very practical advice, but it's also very clear, and you can see demonstrable differences by implementing some of his tried and tested techniques.

You want detail? There is immense detail here, plus he doesn't just focus on the vegetables that everyone knows, but there are details about less well-known varieties too. Buy the Vegetable Gardeners Bible here.

Books on Vegetable Gardening for Beginners: A Simple Guide to Growing Vegetables at Home

Sustainability is key to this book which offers the basics of starting your vegetable garden and outlines the pros and cons of raised beds versus in garden vegetable growing. It's a light read but provides detailed information on making soil mixes, transplanting seedlings all the way through to harvesting throughout the seasons.

This easy to read and digest book covers the detail on the most popular vegetables in the UK – what work well as companion plants and how to deal with issues in the vegetable garden. Buy Vegetable Gardening for Beginners here.

RHS Grow Your Own Veg & Fruit Year Planner: What to Do When for Perfect Produce

Another favourite vegetable planting book from the RHS is the RHS veg planner – the fruit and vegetable year planner book. Getting started growing vegetables is tough, there is SO much choice and there are so many decisions to make. This vegetable gardening book lays it out simply for you. The RHS vegetable planner starts with what to grow when and where – and it covers allotments to gardens to terraces and containers.

Seasonal chapters explain what to do and when and how you can take your vegetable growing to the next step. These aren't fancy new techniques, they're tried and tested and they work. And this is a fabulous book to use to plan your vegetable garden. Get started now and buy the Grow Your Own Veg Planner here.

RHS Books on Vegetable Growing are GREAT – here are some of our other top picks

RHS Gardening throughout the Year book: This book covers more than "just" vegetables – but its great for companion planting and how to make your garden look glorious no matter what the time of year: Buy for month by month inspiration
If you're an RHS fan then you can't go far wrong with the RHS grow your own veg & fruit bible – buy this easy to follow, no nonsense RHS favourite here.
One of the best ways to grow your garden is to propogate your own plants – this RHS book on propogating plants will pay you back in quick time. Buy RHS propogating plants here.

The Best of the Books about Allotments: Allotment Month By Month: Grow your Own Fruit and Vegetables, Know What to do When

The best allotment books come with a beginners allotment plan and, an allotment planning guide. This is our favourite book for growing vegetables in allotments. Ok, so it also covers fruit as well, but it's an awesome read and excellent guide to using allotments to their biggest potential. This month by month allotment book provides really clear advice. The allotment month by month book discusses crop rotation, dealing with pests and how you can use specific techniques to get a head start and get around problems in allotments. The uniqueness of growing vegetables in allotments aren't always covered in the best gardening books, so this allotment growing book lays it out clearly and is the best book for growing vegetables in an allotment. The allotment book includes everything you need about allotments for beginners, a beginners allotment plan, an allotment year planner and an allotment growing guide.

The title of this best allotment book says it all – month by month – and that's exactly what it provides and it's designed specifically for the UK growing seasons, so you'll get the best details on sowing, harvesting, pesticides. We love it. Buy your copy of Allotment Month by Month here.

Other great allotment gardening books you might want to consider:

The RHS Allotment Handbook and Planner – this great allotment planner book comes from the Royal Horticultural Society and is a good beginners allotment book with step by step advice. Buy the allotment handbook from the RHS here.
The RHS Allotment book – RHS Allotment Half-hour – is a great allotment gardening book for those who don't have much time. Buy the allotment halfhour from the RHS here.
Allotment month by month notebook – this planner, allotment journal and plants journal is great – lots of space for personal notes! It is a great complement to any beginners guide to allotments Buy this gorgeous gardening journal here.

Best Raised Bed Garden Book: Veg in One Bed: How to Grow an Abundance of Food in One Raised Bed, Month by Month

Huw Richards Raised Bed book is our favourite book on vegetable gardening in raised beds, but it's also about so much more than that. The author of this best book on raised bed gardening for beginners, Huw Richards, focuses on organically and cheaply aiming to become more self-sufficient in gardening while doing it in a raised bed. This raised bed vegetable garden book contains clear photographs and full detail about how to grow in what part of the raised bed and when. This is the best of the raised bed gardening books – it's the perfect guide to raised bed vegetable gardening for beginners.

Richard's "no-dig" techniques are great for those who might be a little less mobile or want to make it SERIOUSLY easy on themselves with vegetable gardening. The best book for raised bed gardening also includes a great plan for growing all the vegetables you need throughout the year in just one bed. Buy Veg in One Bed here .

RHS Grow Your Own Crops in Pots: with 30 Step-by-Step Projects Using Vegetables, Fruit and Herbs (Royal Horticultural Society Grow Your Own)

At Lets Grow Cook we LOVE growing vegetables in pots and this is our positively favourite vegetable gardening in containers book. One of the reasons we love growing vegetables in pots and containers is their portability – not just within the garden or yard, but between different properties too! This RHS book, our best growing veg in pots book, focuses on full-on growing vegetables in pots and containers. This is the best of the vegetable garden books that is focused on growing vegetables in pots and containers.

It's full of techniques that every container vegetable gardener should know and contains directories on companion plants and the best ways to grow more than 60 vegetables (oh and there are a few fruits and herbs in here too!). We love it. Buy your copy of the RHS Grow Your Own Crops in Pots here.

Best Gardening Books for Small Gardens – Small-Space Vegetable Gardens

Growing vegetables in a small space is a huge skill, and author Andrea Bellamy provides some pretty ingenious ideas on how you can maximize the produce you get from the tiniest of places. This gardening in small spaces book is for you if all you have is the smallest of spaces. So whether you have a balcony, a terrace, a window sill or a tiny garden this is the vegetable gardening book for you! It is the best vegetable garden book if you have just a small space.

There are heaps of photos describing and showing how to implement Bellamy's ideas and how you can maximize the harvest from small space gardening. Even if you have a larger space, you'll relish the ideas as you'll end up getting so much more from each space! These ideas really helped us when we were stuck for space and growing vegetables. Buy Small Space Vegetable Gardening now!

Hydroponics Book for Beginners: Start Growing Vegetables at Home Without Soil

When it comes to hydroponic gardening books, this is quite simply the best book for hydroponics beginners. It is a fabulous guide to not just getting started in growing vegetables with hydroponics but how to do it without making the mistakes that the author did! For an easy way to get started growing hydroponically why not read our guide to hydroponic starter kits.

There are a lot of hydroponics gardening books, but they can be complex. This hydroponics for vegetable book will explain what you'll need to buy and what you don't as well as how not to waste electricity and figure out the best ways to grow the best vegetables suited to hydroponics. So if you're looking for the best growing vegetable book using hydroponics, then start here with this best book on hydroponics .

All that and there's none of the mess of soil and compost too! Getting started with hydroponics does require some investment, but this book helps to cut out unnecessary expenses and make all of your purchases the most cost-effective. It's an invaluable guide. Buy Hydroponics for Beginners here.

Best Hydroponic Books for Intermediates / Commerical Growing

If you're looking to go beyond beginner hydroponics, then these are more in-depth books on hydroponics and the best books on hydroponics that we've found if you're going to take your hydroponics to another level.

DIY Hydroponics: Building an inexpensive hydroponics system
Hydroponic Food Production: Everything the budding commercial producer needs to know
Hydroponics and Greenhouse Gardening: urban homesteading series

Best Book on Greenhouse Gardening – A Beginners Guide To Growing Fruit and Vegetables All Year

This is the best of the greenhouse gardening books. The best greenhouse books uk market explain what's possible in the UK climate. This greenhouse garden book starts with how to get the best greenhouse for your needs – and whether it should be glass, plastic or even a polytunnel, this guide is the perfect overview – and detail on everything you need to know about greenhouse growing of vegetables. You'll learn about airflow, cooling and how to manage humidity in your greenhouse to ensure that your vegetables don't spoil. Our guide to the UK's best mini greenhouses is here.

This greenhouse gardening for beginners book focuses on not just managing growing vegetables in your greenhouse but also how to prepare it for each season, and protect it from the more variable weather elements. It will also help you with the challenges of greenhouse ownership and how to overcome them. Get start growing vegetables in a greenhouse now by buying Greenhouse Gardening here.

Other recommended greenhouse for beginners books

If you're looking at building your own greenhouse – then this excellent book from Blck and Decker is a good option – buy this DIY greenhouse book here.
The Greenhouse Gardeners Manual might be older now (published in 2014), but its still great. This greenhouse gardeners companion is very detailed about all aspects of growing vegetables in greenhouses for beginners – it even covers how you can make a profit from growing in your greenhouse – buy this greenhouse gardening book here.

The best books on growing mushrooms -the illustrated guide to growing mushrooms

It's not been that long since we started growing mushrooms – and we are devouring the results of our efforts (you can read more about how we got started growing mushrooms here. But as with other vegetables we like to know a lot more about the vegetable before we started. This illustrated guide to growing mushrooms is quite simply the best!

Growing your own mushrooms isn't hard or crazy. This very clearly illustrated book on mushroom growing goes through the easiest methods of growing mushrooms – and you'll get full instructions on how to set up your mushroom beds. It's a worthwhile purchase for the keen vegetable gardener. Read more reviews and buy now.

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Final Words on Vegetable Gardening Books

My profile on some social media channels reads "Reader, Writer, Gardener". I'm never sure which order it should be in, but I positively devour books and always have. That there are so many books on vegetable gardening is only a mild concern for me. What's important is finding the best books for growing vegetables, so believe me it's been a labour of love working through all of the vegetable gardening books and picking out not just my favourite, but also what I think delivers the best advice and the best value for money. These are the best vegetable gardening books UK climate that I've found. The books on vegetable gardening that I've selected are practical, easy to read, they're totally focused on the UK climate and UK gardens and I hope they'll help you with your vegetable growing as much as they have me.

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