By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

Writing a few days ago about the Owen Dell garden that won a Western Garden Design Award but failed to get photographed reminded me of this great book that's been on my desk for months.

In fact, if you happened to read that post, you'll recognize the garden on this cover of Sustainable Landscaping for Dummies.

Owen Dell, the Santa Barbara landscape architect who is the author of this book, has been into sustainable landscaping his whole career -- long before the term came into existence.  He's been preaching as well as practicing a long time, too -- lectures, workshops, even a regional television series, Garden Wise Guys, which you might call a sustainable-landscaping sitcom. 

Bottom line, he knows this subject thoroughly and is used to breaking down its complexities for those of us less versed.  He's put his heart and soul into this book, and it shows.  I highly recommend it.