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| Kay
and Joel Klumpp purchased their home in north Austin four
years ago. Joel, a Master Gardener for fun
as well as a water quality specialist by profession, has
created an attractive and earth-wise landscape just a bike-ride
away from his work. |
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Kay and Joel
have gorgeous oaks throughout the yard which provide a
shaded canopy so that their St. Augustine lawn needs no
watering. |
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Worried,
however, that there is oak wilt creeping into the neighborhood,
they’ve begun planting some understory
trees such as Persimmon, Mexican Plum and Roughleaf Dogwood
as their best defense against the disease. |
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Wanting
to add color and texture to the turf-filled yard, they
created new beds and killed some of the St. Augustine
by scalping the turf and then adding mulch on top, an approach
that took relatively little manual labor. |
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You are greeted
in the back yard by four chickens. Joel built what he calls
a chicken tractor, the triangular structure at the rear.
The bottom is open and the chickens are attracted there
each day for food. After they’ve “fertilized” one
area, he then moves the tractor to another spot in the
yard so it too can benefit from the natural nutrients! |
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The chickens provide
an added benefit as they till the compost beds as well.
Joel, who never liked turning the compost, said the chickens
now do the work for him. |
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The
raised garden has a wide variety of lettuces and tomatoes,
most of which are watered by their two rain barrels. |
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The
Klumpps can sit on their screened-in porch and enjoy
the lush back yard and the cavorting chickens without fear
of being attacked by mosquitoes. |
