News & Updates
Opinion: Hays County’s watersheds are under attack
It is undeniable—the Austin area is booming. More people have moved to Travis County and its surrounding area, including Hays County. As populations grow, so must infrastructure, but matters become complicated in ecologically sensitive areas like the one we call home....
Our need for the outdoors: The role of nature during COVID-19
Research on the connection between human health and exposure to nature started to get a foothold in the early 1980s. The renowned biologist E. O. Wilson hypothesized that humans had an innate connection to nature. At the same time, Roger Ulrich, a professor of...
Quarantined for the very first time
Nearing the line of demarcation for achieving "octogenarian," it has been a shock to the system to face the necessity of "quarantined." Even as a youngster in a household of several children and on a city block populated by many more suffering from measles I remember...
Agriculture science looking downward for the future of feeding the world
Healthy fertile soil. It makes the grass and plants grow, which feeds people as well as livestock, which in turn are eaten by people. Dr. Nicole Wagner, assistant professor in the Department of Agriculture at Texas State University, doesn’t mince words when it comes...
New Braunfels Utilities anticipates stage one drought conditions
Rising temperatures, lack of significant rainfall and increased demand for water have caused the Edwards Aquifer to drop nearly a foot per day over the past 10 days. As of May 7, the 10-day average of the J-17 well was 665 feet, which is five feet above the trigger...
Food supply anxiety brings back Victory Gardens
“Small things count,” read a headline in the tiny, insistent pamphlet published by the National War Garden Commission in 1919. The pitch made gardening a civic duty. The victory garden movement began during World War I and called on Americans to grow food in whatever...
Central Texas Gardener: PBS show producer offers tips
Your garden need not be cancelled! Central Texas Gardener producer Linda Lehmusvirta offers pandemic-proof advice for growing food and sprucing up your yard. Spring and early summer are always a good time to get out in the garden—but of course, our notion of “getting...
Opinion: In Permian Highway Pipeline fight, property rights are the answer
There are few things Texans value more than property rights and few things closer to our collective imagination than iconic Texas landscapes and the wildlife that fills them. An ongoing battle over a pipeline in the scenic Hill Countrythreatens both – and represents a...
Austin’s Tom Spencer: ‘It’s time to plant trees’
“Austinites are the people I love,” Spencer said not long before the 50th anniversary of the first Earth Day. “But they feel terrible because of the times. It’s hard to see the future, but trees are a part of that future. It’s a good time to think about rebirth and to...