As a little boy growing up on a Minnesota farm, Joel Karsten wondered why the healthiest weeds seemed to be ones growing out of broken down straw bales. Years later, after earning a degree in ...

Using T-posts and wire to support climbing plants such as tomatoes or cucumbers makes a straw bale garden more productive, says Joel Karsten, author of Straw Bale Gardens Complete. Much of the produce ...

Some gardening tasks (despite being good exercise) are just not very enjoyable. Digging in red clay, weeding and bending over to pick bush beans come to mind as three seasonal “pains.” Enter growing ...

Some gardening tasks, despite being good exercise, are just not very enjoyable. Digging in clay, weeding and bending over to pick bush beans come to mind as three seasonal “pains.” Growing them in ...

Straw Bale Gardens Complete provides an abundance of inspiration, with detailed steps for planning, planting and harvesting a straw bale garden. Joel Karsten inspects tomatoes growing in straw bales.

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 ...

Craig LeHoullier gathers tomatoes from his vines in his lush container and straw bale garden at his Raleigh home in 2015. LeHoullier just published his second book “Growing Vegetables in Straw Bales.” ...