Planting the Wild Garden by Karen O. Galbraith, illustrated by Wendy Anderson Halperin (Peachtree, 2011), captures the mystery of how plants get into the wild. The first pages show two gardeners planting a garden; the rest of the book depicts the seeds spreading by nature. As the wind blows and birds move from place to place, the seeds are planted in new places.

I loved how the soft and detailed watercolor and pencil illustrations capture the growing of these wild seeds, much as the first page captured the growing vegetable garden’s various stages of growth. In the end, the book comes full circle in showing how humans have spread seeds too, and how, together with the elements and the wild animals, we’ve all planted the beautiful wild gardens of the world.  A bibliography for further reading is included.

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Green by Laura Vaccaro Seeger Pets — 2011 Fiction Picture Books (Cybils Nominees) Daisylocks by Marianne Berkes Wild Symphony by Dan Brown