Home & Garden

Plant Me Now for Winter!

Cucurbits, the family of plants that includes cucumbers, squashes, gourds, pumpkins and watermelons, offers an amazing variety of fruits, flavors and uses, but they need deeply fertilized soil and a ...

Not Your Grandma's Tea

When you think of tea, you’re probably not thinking about it having anything to do with compost. But while compost tea may not sound like a very appetizing drink, plants sure do love ...

An Unexpected Oasis

Tucked among far South Austin’s well-manicured lawns, an oasis of fruit trees, vegetables, herbs and ornamentals flourishes in a 40- by 60-foot backyard that serves as both an outdoor laboratory ...

Seed Savers

In his early 20s, Jeremiath “Jere” Gettle was known to tirelessly set off alone in his trusty Saturn into the depths of Mexico and beyond, armed with only an old road atlas, a paper map and a ...

A Winter Gardening Bed

In a relatively small amount of space, home gardeners can create a vegetable garden productive enough to provide delicious sides or even main courses during our winters in Central Texas. Year-round ...

The Honeybee

By Bambi ...

Another Plant in the Wall

This past May, the University of Texas’ 84-year-old Goldsmith Hall became home to a strikingly innovative design concept: a living wall. The 10-by-25-foot honeycomb frame on the building’s ...

By Hand

The term “heritage” applies to more than living things with pure-breed characteristics that stem back to the age before genetic modification and human tampering. Right along with the resurgence ...

An Edible Legacy

For many, heirloom seeds and heirloom plants varietals are prized possessions. These seeds were often brought via immigration from distant homelands, and many heirloom plants have been developed ...

Merrideth Jiles

Merrideth Jiles never intended to have a career working with plants. The Atlanta native graduated from Georgia State University in 1992 with a degree in commercial music recording and worked for a ...