Why California Needs Its Own Book
Few places let you plant this freely. Cool-season crops run through the mild winter, warm-season crops through the long dry summer, and the frost that dominates other regions barely registers along much of the coast. But the state is a patchwork: a foggy San Francisco backyard and a hot Fresno lot keep different calendars in the same month.
Water is the discipline California gardening is really about. Dry summers, drought years and water rules mean the successful garden is built on mulch, drip and smart plant choice. The book trades the frost obsession of northern books for the water strategy California actually needs.
Planting Season California fixes that. It calibrates to the region, gives the local shifts throughout, and works with your ground and your weather instead of against them.
What You Get Inside
The Full Chapter List
Seventeen main chapters plus a nine-part plant library. Every chapter is written for California. Every chapter assumes you want to eat what you grow.
The Plant Library (parts 1 through 9)
- Part 1: Leafy greens and brassicas, with the cool-season windows that suit California
- Part 2: Fruiting vegetables, with year-round vegetables, tomatoes, citrus and avocados and the timing that works here
- Part 3: Root vegetables, with soil and season notes for the region
- Part 4: Heat-lovers and warm-season survivors
- Part 5: Legumes, beans and peas through the local seasons
- Part 6: Herbs, the ones that thrive and the ones to baby
- Part 7: Fruit trees, vines and perennials suited to California
- Part 8: Regional and native edibles worth a place in the garden
- Part 9: Companion plants and flowers
Each plant entry includes California sowing windows by season, spacing, sun, water needs, companions, common pests, common diseases, a kitchen-use note, and a realistic local tip.
A Sample from the Book
Most of the country gardens against the frost. California gardens against the drought. The season is long and mild, the winter grows lettuce and peas, and the summer grows tomatoes for months, but the water has to come from somewhere, and for half the year it does not fall from the sky.
The other truth is that there is no one California. A backyard in the Richmond fog and a lot in Bakersfield share a state and little else. Know your microclimate first; everything in this book follows from it.
Who It's For
You just moved in, the yard is bare, and you want food growing next season. The book walks you through your first year, step by step.
You followed generic advice and lost crops to the wrong timing. This book tells you why, and gives you the calendar built for California.
You gardened somewhere else and moved. California keeps a different schedule. The book recalibrates your timing to local reality.
You rent, or you are short on space. The small-spaces chapter is built for patios, balconies and raised beds.
You want real food, lower grocery bills, and a yard that feeds the household year-round. The book is the 12-month plan for that.
You know your way around a garden. The plant library and the California-tuned calendar are the reference you keep on the bench.
Pair the book with the free Planting Season app
The book is the full reference; the free app is the day-to-day. California is covered month by month, with reminders tuned to your region and a mobile plant library you can search from the garden.
Open the Planting Season app →Why This Book, Not Another
Planting Season California is written for California and nothing else. If a paragraph could apply unchanged to another part of the country, it does not belong in this book. The voice is plain and direct, the neighbor over the fence, not a textbook.
It is built to last: a genuine reference you come back to every season for years, paired with the free app for the day-to-day.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does it cover both coastal and inland California?
Yes. The book plans around the state's microclimates, the cool coast, the hot Central Valley, the foothills and Southern California, and the plant entries flag the differences.
Why is it so focused on water?
Because in California water, not frost, is the limiting factor. The book builds a garden around mulch, drip irrigation, drought-year rules and plant choices that make the most of a dry summer.
Can I really grow year-round?
In much of California, yes. Cool-season crops run through winter and warm-season crops through summer. The book gives you the month-by-month calendar to keep something growing all year.
Does it work with the Planting Season app?
Yes. The app covers California month by month for free, and the book is the deep reference to pair with it.
Grow food every month of the year in California.
Planting Season California is coming soon to Amazon in paperback and Kindle. Be first to know.
Every book includes 3 months of Pro free.
Gardening in another region? Browse the whole series →