Local gardeners are experimenting with straw bales, taking advantage of the internal composting to help their garden grow. As a little boy growing up on a Minnesota farm, Joel Karsten wondered why the ...

Planting vegetables in straw bales can be a lot easier – especially on the back – than traditional gardening in the dirt, according to local master gardeners. You don’t need containers and only a ...

Bad soil? Not enough soil? Maybe even no soil? Skip the ground and try planting fruits and vegetables in straw bales instead, suggests Joel Karsten, author of “Straw Bale Gardens” (Cool Springs Press, ...

Upon retiring in June of last year, one goal was to plant a big, beautiful vegetable garden. With great enthusiasm, I set to work diligently rototilling, planting and fertilizing. Unfortunately, ...

The straw bale home of Elise Lang and her husband, Michael Pierce, was finished in 2001. SPECIAL TO THE TELEGRAPH Winding under the canopy of trees shading the long driveway, goats and sheep peered at ...

When you hear about a straw bale building, you might think of a big bad wolf huffing and puffing. But these houses are not just in fairy tales. Builders in San Diego County are turning to straw bales ...

Baling, like eating onions, is something I wasn't fond of as a child, but like much better now that I'm an adult. While I viewed baling hay and straw as an odious chore when I was younger, now I look ...

Yvon Chouinard and the architect who designed his Ventura, California, home explain why the waste material is the next step in the fight against climate change. Photo by Tim Davis and landscaping by ...

Causes of fires in baled hay or straw Moisture content is the main factor that causes hay and straw to spontaneously combust. Hay fires are more common than straw fires, for reasons involving the type ...

When I sold our horses two years ago, our family took a break from baling straw. For the next few years the baler sat idle because we no longer needed it for bedding. But earlier this summer when I ...

Get started gardening in driveway planters. Here are easy straw bale gardening instructions to add some food and flowers to your sunny driveway. I was smitten with my driveway last summer. For several ...