Ryan Farnau at F-Stop Farm (Credit: Jaclyn Hubersberger)

What started as a gardening hobby turned into Ryan Farnau farming nearly all the available space in both his front and back yards, with another 6,000-square-feet soon to be tilled and seeded. With a handful of local restaurants sourcing from Farnau’s farm–hardly more than a third of an acre–F-Stop is quickly joining the ranks of Austin’s more well-known urban farms, like Springdale, Rain Lily, Boggy Creek, and HausBar to the east, and La Flaca to the south.

The sustainable agriculture movement is gaining momentum here in Central Texas, thanks in part to these urban farms, the restaurants that purchase their produce, and the patrons who support the restaurants and farmers’ markets around the city. Through the use of small-scale organic growing practices, these farms operate in direct opposition to big agriculture, fast food, and the industrialized food system. [Read more…]

Gretchen O’Neil, Petals, Ink. farmer and founder (Credit: Petals, Ink.)

Gretchen O’Neil’s love affair with flowers began as a child, enamored by the confetti-colored tulips that sprawled across her grandfather’s yard. Flower growing became more than just a family pastime for O’Neil in 2002, when she started working on a small farm in the mountains of Vermont. After moving to Austin in 2003, it took the native New Englander about five years to acclimate to the sweltering heat before she could even begin to consider growing cut flowers in the Central Texas climate.

You see, many of the flowers O’Neil remembers from her youth simply won’t grow here. She gradually embraced a new genre of gardening that included sun-worshipping plants like agave, and concepts such as “xeriscaping.” Eventually, she discovered that–with enough planning–her fantasy of growing an abundance of blooms could be actualized. [Read more…]

Ryan Sansbury, co-founder of Austin’s Logro Farms

What Austin resident hasn’t heard of Jester King Brewery and Stanley’s Farmhouse Pizza? Adjacent to these local favorites is a relatively new sustainable farm you may not have heard of, but don’t doubt that Logro Farms has been gaining massive traction over the past three years.

Two friends from Houston, Ryan Sansbury and Jeremy Bastian, conceived the idea of a sustainable, full-cycle farm in Austin. After trying their hand at brewing kombucha and beer, and then making cheese, gourmet oyster mushrooms proved to be the ultimate choice. With oyster mushrooms, the duo could create a quality, healthy product while enabling its accessibility to the public through home-growing kits.

In 2013, with an outpouring of support from the Austin community through a Kickstarter campaign, Logro Farms came to fruition. “Our mission is all about low-waste local farming. We sell our products to local Austin and Central Texas restaurants, and we ship our kits all across the world. We can do fresh for local, and we can also do grow-at-home for everybody,” said Sansbury.

[Read more…]