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Dec 30, 2024 | 
texasobserver.org | Jessica Pishko |Megan Kimble |Mike Hixenbaugh |Monika Maeckle
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May 25, 2024 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
Fans of agarita have been enjoying a bumper crop of the bright, tart berries this spring, but climbing temperatures are likely to cut the season short. Some foragers don’t mind. “The hot weather will shrivel any remaining berries, but even then they’re worth tasting with a nibble as they enter a raisin-like stage,” said Mark “Merriwether” Vorderbruggen, founder of the Foraging Texas website.
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Mar 20, 2024 | 
texasbutterflyranch.com | Monika Maeckle
Texans may need to brace themselves for a change of scenery during wildflower season. Bastard cabbage, an invasive annual, has taken up residence throughout the state. The plant is dominating our river bottoms and peppering trails. Some highway intersections look like Bastard Cabbage Central–masses of yellow, three-foot high flowers. This feisty interloper is most content in cool temperatures and disturbed soils.
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Mar 17, 2024 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
Colorful palettes of bluebonnets and other wildflowers are popping up on Texas Hill Country highways and landscapes as the 2024 wildflower season begins to blossom in full bounty. Peak wildflower viewing typically occurs in early April, but it might be here a bit early this year, according to Andrea DeLong Amaya, director of horticulture at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin.
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Nov 2, 2023 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
San Antonio may be the first city in Texas recognized as a Tree City of the World, but the city has lost an abundance of trees this year. A recent walk through Olmos Basin Park revealed dozens of dead and damaged trees, many with snapped and broken trunks, their fallen limbs blocking the trail. Across from Blue Star on the San Antonio River, the sounds of a loud snap interrupted a dog walk as a 5-inch sycamore tree branch fell to the ground.
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Sep 1, 2023 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
BeforeDonald and Melanie Gerber moved to San Antonio from the West Coast three years ago, they made a deal. If Donald would agree to leave his childhood home for the Lone Star State so the couple could be closer to their three grandchildren, Melanie would help him start a native plant nursery. This week the couple’s “deal” came to fruition: Pollinatives, San Antonio’s second all-native plant nursery (technically located in Converse), opens its doorswith a grand openingFriday.
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May 18, 2023 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
After several years of sparse output, Texas Hill Country agarita bushes are having a banner berry season. The fruits of the most common species of barberry found in Texas are ubiquitous in parts of the Hill Country right now. Agarita berries look like small currants. The spiky-leafed bush forms thickets and its fragrant, yellow flowers are among the first blooms to appear each season, usually in February. Red berries follow in April and continue ripening into June.
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Apr 12, 2023 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
The Texas Hill Country is recognized as a unique and special place filled with lifegiving rivers, seasonal streams, ancient rock formations, prehistoric artifacts and a range of biodiversity that defies the region’s meager topsoil, unpredictable rainfall and cycles of drought and wildfire. In Armadillos to Ziziphus, A Naturalist in the Texas Hill Country, David M.
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Apr 5, 2023 | 
sanantonioreport.org | Monika Maeckle
Dozens of cars packed a North San Antonio parking lot this past weekend for the soft opening of the city’s first native plant nursery. People waited in line to purchase native milkweeds, hard-to-find heritage plants and reliable native bloomers like goldenrod and Texas lantana at The Nectar Bar, located at a former food truck park at 14732 Bulverde Rd. Elena and Fernando Arriola drove 40 minutes from Spring Branch to attend the opening, which was promoted heavily through social media.
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Mar 26, 2023 | 
texasbutterflyranch.com | Monika Maeckle
“I am out and about all over Austin most days. Normally I’m pretty good at spotting monarchs as I’m working in yards or driving to and from locations. This year I’ve seen just one. It was two weeks ago…”Barr noted the “weird weather” Texas has experienced in recent weeks, unseasonably high temperatures in early March, followed by a week of lows.
