LIVE OAK – The hum of a tractor’s motor fills the forest as a worker heaves an armful of pine needles into a rusted red baler. He flips a metal lever over the tawny leaves and pushes down sharply, ...

My sister Laura and Grandma Josephine tending the chickens on the family farm. Yes, that is a little genuine Minnesota straw in the foreground. Because the straw bale generates heat as the straw ...

Steve Fehnel, on the trailer, stacks straw for his brother Gary, on the tractor, in a field along High Street in Tatamy. Both Steve and Gary Fehnel are from Tatamy. The straw is a byproduct of wheat, ...

Do you recommend building straw bale homes? And/or can you insulate an existing home with straw bales on the outside of the home and then finish it using siding, wood, or stucco? I wonder why this ...

If you love the idea of dining on lettuce and tomatoes that you grow yourself, but you're not into the digging and weeding end of it, there's a solution: straw-bale gardening. Gardening with straw ...

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 ...

Straw bale building offers an affordable, sustainable solution to materials like concrete. Sigi Koko of Down to Earth Design demonstrated straw bale building will work even in wet climates with the ...