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Using the Garden Organic Guidelines

Basic good gardening techniques are a vital part of organic gardening. These guidelines are designed to be used in conjunction with a good gardening book such as the HDRA Encyclopaedia of Organic Gardening. See the full selection of Garden Organic books available at trade prices.

The Garden Organic Guidelines are divided into sections, each covering different aspects of garden management. See the Contents page.

Each section starts with an introduction to the general organic principles relating to that aspect of gardening. It is worth making yourself familiar with this information before moving on. The main body of the guidelines covers both organic gardening practices and the materials and products you can use in your organic garden. These are divided up into four categories - depending on the organic acceptability of practice or product.

The organic confusion

In these guidelines, the word organic has two meanings.

From 'Best Practice' to 'Never Acceptable'

When browsing the Garden Organic Guidelines, you will be welcomed by four different 'smiley faces'. These faces indicate the 'rating' we have given to every technique, strategy, input and commercial product.

Ideally, of course, everyone would be only using Best organic practice smiley faceBest organic practice, but the 'level' of organic gardening you undertake is a personal choice, and what you can do will be governed, to some extent, by garden size and location, and personal circumstances. This is why there are two other categories Acceptable organic practice smiley faceAcceptable organic practice and Acceptable, but not for regular use smiley faceAcceptable, but not for regular use so you can garden organically even if you are not able to follow the best organic practice.

As you gain experience, and your garden develops organically, your garden should become increasingly self sufficient, so you are able to move more towards Best organic practice smiley face and away from Never acceptable in an organic garden smiley face.

If you have any comments, please pass them on to us using the comment form at the bottom of each page.
Best organic practice smiley faceProceed to the Garden Organic Guidelines.
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Members' Comments

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This is clear but should perhaps also have an explanation of why things fall into the Never category - e.g Some familiar practices are harmful to beneficial pests, or build up residues .....and so should never be used - even if you are tempted to adopt a quick fix......
Polly - 01/14/2009 - 11:48
Smilies
This is clear but should perhaps also have an explanation of why things fall into the Never category - e.g Some familiar practices are harmful to beneficial pests, or build up residues .....and so should never be used - even if you are tempted to adopt a quick fix......
Polly - 01/14/2009 - 11:48

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