Allergy-Free Gardening: The Revolutionary Guide to Healthy Landscaping - eScholarship

Urban Farm DB summary

This is a review of Thomas Leo Ogren's book "Allergy-Free Gardening: The Revolutionary Guide to Healthy Landscaping" (2000). The reviewer notes that while the book attempts to quantify plant allergy potential, it overstates the case against many common North American garden species. Ogren's OPALS system for allergy classification considers various factors but lacks a clear explanation of how these factors combine into a single score, suggesting a reliance on subjective estimation rather than scientific objectivity. The book's focus on planting only female plants to achieve an "allergy-free" garden is criticized for undermining efforts to consider the holistic value of native plantscapes.