PUT IT BACK LIKE IT WAS
MID-SEPTEMBER, HALF A YEAR BEFORE TEXAS wildflower season starts, and it’s been terribly dry and horribly hot at the Native American Seed Farm northeast of Junction. The rains of spring and summer pretty much quit back in June. This morning, in the dark, Bill Neiman has a meeting with his workers. It’s time to irrigate the grasses from the river. They can’t wait for rain if they want to have seeds to harvest.
Seeds were the reason Neiman — a lean, wiry character in a long-sleeve white shirt, jeans, and work boots — greets me like an old friend. I’ve sought him out and kind of know what to expect from the quick-witted, impatient guru of native seed.
Neiman’s Native American Seed Farm is located in that sweet spot out on the western wider-open fringe of the Texas Hill Country as it transitions into the rocky scrub of the Edwards Plateau and ultimately becomes the Chihuahua Desert. Some of the farm’s 20 employees are hoeing weeds out
