Creating a Wildscape
Holiday Shopping
Shopping Your Conscience
Go Soak!
Renewable Energy
Gifts of Roses

(greyed articles available in printed version - subscribe now!)

As you can see, this issue marks an important step in our growth. We are so grateful for the support you, our readers and advertisers, have given us over the past two years! Because of that support, we are able to make the magazine bigger, provide more information, and add a little color to our pages. We hope you enjoy the new look and hope you’ll let us know what you think.

The illustrations on the cover and on page 17 are original art done by artist Victor Martin. A teacher and naturalist, Victor enjoys painting native flora and fauna. He specializes in watercolors and acrylics of humingbirds, wrens, cardinals, roadrunners and other songbirds in natural settings. For orders or information, call 512-515-5538.

This has been an eventful fall for us. The Renewable Energy Roundup in Fredericksburg in September gave us an opportunity to meet many interesting people and find out what is going on in Texas in the sustainability world. (See article on page 14.)

Perhaps the most exciting thing to happen this fall was rain. After months of horrible heat and despicable drought, we finally got a little rain and cool weather. It’s going to take a lot more, however, to bring nature back to normal. Trees are dying all over the state from lack of rain and heat stress. Even the swamps of east Texas are drying up. Rivers look more like creeks and creeks look like paths.

All of us help to restore nature to its proper state by conserving water. Even though mandatory water restrictions may have ended, we still need to make sure that water is not wasted. Planting adapted and native plants is one way to help. The best, and easiest, and most important way, however, is to create a soil rich in organic matter that will hold and filter any rain that does fall from the sky. Making our soil rich means that plants grow beautifully, and it also means that water is held in the soil and channeled to the aquifers to be conserved rather than wasted by running into storm sewers, or rivers, and into the ocean.

The winter is a great time to build the soil by adding mulch and manure and other organic materials. It is a great time to build compost heaps or start sheet composting projects. The weather is nice and it is pleasant to be outdoors. Let’s take this opportunity to feed the earth as she has fed us all summer!