Listed here are some helpful websites for growing, preparing or preserving your own food. (Please let me know if any of these links are broken – sometimes websites or publications disappear!)
Gardening Information
While gardening books and other sites can be very helpful with general things, like preparing new gardening beds and cultural requirements for the crops you wish to grow, your extension service can offer you information unique to your area. It’s a good idea to supplement your generic resources with whatever you can get from an extension office, as they know what varieties grow best in your area, what the local insect and weed pests are, and what diseases are problematic where you live.
To locate the extension office nearest you, check this site:
Cooperative Extension System Offices
For more general gardening information, gardening magazines are often good resources. They probably all have websites, but here are two of the best:
There are numerous gardening forums besides mine, and some of them are even as good! 
Dave’s Garden is one of my favorites. One of my favorite sections of this website is the extensive plant list, with descriptions and ratings from other gardeners.
Another friendly forum is at Renee’s Garden Seeds.
About.com also has some good, if brief articles on vegetable gardening.
Most of the Cornell University site is dedicated to commercial growers, but they do have a section for vegetable gardeners that is excellent. What I really like at their site is their Plant Database. It lists almost all available varieties of fruits and vegetables (they have everything, but I’m just interested in food, here) with descriptions and comments. Not all the entries have comments, but by joining you can add to and update the list.
The National Gardening Association offers vegetable/fruit growing information in their Food Garden Guide and under “Edibles” in the Gardening Articles section.
The United States Department of Agriculture website is also a good source of information, especially their Plant Database.
For an excellent chart of last/first frost dates, check out the National Climatic Data Center. It that one is too complicated for your tastes, Dave’s Garden also offers a good one. Again, your state extension service can help you with this information, too.
List of organic options for Fertilization and Amending Soil
How to make newspaper pots:
Lot’s of videos on YouTube. This one (and others) use tape to hold the ends together – you can just fold the top down and skip the tape, which won’t biodegrade in the garden.
Dave of Dave’s Garden shows you how to make round ones. They seem a bit thin to me, I’d use more than one layer of newspaper.
Specific Growing Information
Blueberries
North Carolina State University Extension Service (for growing in the south)
Seed/Plant Retailers
This is not intended to be an exhaustive list, just a list of retailers I think well of. If you’d like to recommend an addition to the list, especially for regional sources, please send me a comment.
Seed of Change – Certified organic seeds for home and market growers.
Territorial Seeds – Especially suited for growers in the Pacific Northwest. Download their excellent planting chart, too.
Nichols Garden Nursery – Family owned and operated, they used to specialize in herbs.They still offer a wide range of herbs, but not like they used to. They do still offer some unique vegetables though.
Vermont Bean Seed Company – huge selection of dried bean seeds, along with a good selection of everything else at very reasonable prices.
Totally Tomatoes – owned by the company above, they have the biggest selection of tomatoes, including heirlooms I’ve seen anywhere. Also a large variety of peppers.
Heirloom Seeds – just what it says
Renee’s Garden Seeds – an especially good place for old-fashioned flowers, as well as vegetable seed
Seed Saver’s Exchange – You’ve probably heard of them. They are a non-profit organization dedicated to saving the huge diversity of world seed. If you join, you have access to thousands of varieties of just about every crop you can think of. I like what they are doing, but did have trouble both with receiving what I requested from the exchange and with the seeds I bought from the catalog, so buyer beware.
Johnny’s Selected Seeds- large selection of unusual and proprietary fruits and vegetables, as well as an extensive list of medicinal herb seeds.
Gardening Supplies
Peaceful Valley Farm & Garden Supply
Other Interesting Blogs and Websites
HOMEGROWN.ORG is an online community of people interested in all things Homegrown: growing, cooking, crafting, brewing, preserving, building, making and creating.
Are you a Kitchen Gardener? Join the discussions at Kitchen Gardeners International, a group formed to promote eating REALLY locally – from one’s own backyard.
Food Preservation and Storage
For information on preserving your bounty, check with your extension office. Also, the National Center for Home Food Preservation has current research-based recommendations for most methods of home food preservation.
While you’re there, check out the Publications link. There are some good web pages here, including many down-loadable PDFs.
For beginning canners, I especially recommend the USDA Principles of Home Canning.
The University of Georgia Extension Service has a number of Food Preservation Publicati0ns worth checking out. They also offer a recipe book and demonstration DVDs.
Here’s some extensive information on pickling vegetables from various university extension offices:
If you’re not sure how long you can safely store refrigerated or frozen food, there’s is a helpful chart here that offers a guideline of how long to store various foods for safety and quality.
Books you should have:
So Easy to Preserve Cooperative Extension University of Georgia
Ball Blue Book Jarden Home Brands
Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving Kingry, Devine
More…
I found this article explaining how the author built his own dehydrator. I have a similar one (which I didn’t build – I picked it up at a garage sale 20 years ago!), using ordinary light bulbs and a small fan, which is placed in front of the bulbs, not at the back as in this one.
Nesco/American Harvest Food Dehydrators
Articles on basic gardening subjects:
This page has the following sub pages.
- Rotating Garden Crops
- Pruning Tomatoes
- Organic Fertilizers
- Understanding Vegetable Plants
- Soil Amendments
- Critical Moisture Periods for Selected Crops
- trellis photo
- Seedling Primer
- Plant Families
- Harvesting Cucurbits
- Homemade Dehydrator
- Average Recommended Length of Storage for Vegetable Seeds
- Making Herbal or Fruit Vinegars
Thanks for the links! I’m always interested in finding new resources.