The New Ontario Naturalized Garden: The Complete Guide to Using Native Plants. Rev. ed.

Pleasance Crawford is the co-author of The Canadian Landscape and Garden
History Directory and Garden Voices: Two Centuries of Canadian Garden
Writing.

Published in 1995 under the title The Ontario Naturalized Garden, the
first edition of this book filled a void in Canadian garden literature.
Although other books had been written about gardening with natural
processes and native plants, Johnson took the integration of theory and
practice to a new level. Her pioneering, much-praised, and highly
readable book was followed by Easy-to-Grow Native Plants for Canadian
Gardens, Grow Wild! Native Plant Gardening in Canada, and a regular
column in Canadian Gardening magazine. For many readers, Johnson’s
name has become synonymous with the whys and hows of growing native
plants in Canada.

The New Ontario Naturalized Garden is a very slight revision of the
original, brightened with a redesigned cover and a new insert of 31
color photographs. Otherwise, the revised edition retains the same
number of pages, the same broad sections (“Gardening with Native
Plants: The Big Picture,” “Native Plant Communities,” and “Of
weeds, Lawns, and Wildlife”), and the same richly informative 12
chapters. Except for a few updates (the Canadian Wildflower Society has
become the North American Plant Society and the Evergreen Foundation has
become Evergreen), the text is basically unchanged. The “Further
Reading and Resources” section remains a generous 37 pages but
incorporates 1995–2000 entries.

Any Ontario gardener interested in natural habitats and native plants
should read Johnson’s book. As a first-time purchase, the 2001 version
is the better choice; but the 1995 edition remains nearly as current and
every bit as inspiring.