The book includes in-depth profiles of 32 vegetable producers.
Individual chapters cover fundamental aspects of economic and environmental sustainability.
The practical implications of sustainability, getting started, farm business management, and marketing. The chapters that follow discuss essential production processes, focusing on soil fertility, composting, crop rotation, cover crops, tillage equipment and field preparation, seeds and transplants, irrigation and spraying systems, harvest and postharvest handling, season extension, integrated pest management, and environmentally friendly strategies for managing insects, diseases, weeds, and wildlife. A final chapter profiles the experiences of individual vegetable growers and provides their enterprise budgets for a number of crops. The grower profiles offer real-life examples of how farmers think about and deal with specific conditions. Appendixes include additional information resources, sources of supplies, a work sheet for developing vegetable enterprise budgets, vegetable crop nutrient recommendations, and useful conversions and calculations.