Magic Muck - The Complete Guide to Compost

Muck, Lady

ISBN 10: 1857932617 / ISBN 13: 9781857932614

Published by Pavilion, London, 1994

About this Item

A Fine unmarked copy with dustjacket which has a little wear to bottom. Lady Muck is in fact Jane Down, who runs her own compost company and is a popular lecturer on horticultural matters and has even named her cat compost. Here she guides us with warmth and humour through the history of composting and reveals her secrets on how to create and maintain a compost heap to suit every garden. Delightful illustrations by Tim Coath. A1C Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.

Seller Inventory # 002539

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Magic Muck - The Complete Guide to Compost
• Publisher: Pavilion, London
• Publication Date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1857932617
• ISBN 13: 9781857932614
• Binding: Hard Cover
• Illustrator: Tim Coath
• Edition: First Edition.
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
• Seller catalogs:
  • Flowers and Gardening

About this title

Synopsis

Provides the history of muck, discusses the five types of soil, describes how to make a worm bed, and explains how to create and maintain a compost heap

Reviews

Lady Muck, aka Jane Down, is familiar to many in Britain, where she markets the less common renewable resource produced by her father's large herd of dairy cows. Her book is part historical treatise and part reminiscence of her own rise to the top of the compost heap. Unfortunately, the hands-on information here-commonsensical instead of revelatory-is confined to one brief chapter and a second small bit about worm bins. Lady M.'s breezy style lightens the more tedious sections-e.g., an in-depth exploration of soil-and she also fascinates with such tidbits as Britain's importing of bonemeal made from the remains of men and horses killed at Waterloo. Although the earnest backyard gardener may skip straight to the info on composting techniques, other readers may relish this leisurely trip along the highways and byways of composting and delight in an evening spent with the entertaining Lady Muck.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A hundred pages may be a bit more than most gardeners need to know about compost, but Down's treatise certainly is comprehensive. She begins with a description of the five basic types of soil, then explains how to create and maintain a compost heap. There's a chapter on worms (of which there are more than 1,800 species), which explains how to make a worm bed. There's even history of muck, going back to ancient Mesopotamia and Greece. Written in a humorous vein, with 30 whimsical black-and-white drawings. George Cohen