 The following is a production of New Mexico State University. We're back at the Dallas Arboretum, at the Texas Pioneer Adventure exhibit where we've learned before how people lived in the Black Land Prairie, how they even used the prairie to build their homes, and how they used the plants that are native here in their landscapes. Maria, how did they grow gardens and field crops here? Well, they had two major types of gardens. One type called a kitchen garden that had both food, plants in it, but also useful plants and medicinal plants. And a crop garden was a larger garden that we'll talk about maybe in a few minutes. This plant is the fever-few, and they use that to reduce fever. The name fits. It certainly does, and you know doctors were few and far between, so they had to have their own plants to take care of many of their problems come free here. That is a plant that they would use to heal bruises, cuts, burns, anything like that. The rose mallow is a beautiful plant. It has huge blooms on it, but the medicinal use for this was to cure sore throat. But you can use it for an ornamental until you need it. You certainly can. It's a very popular plant. We can walk down this little path here. I'll show you the whorehound, which is still used in many places today to flavor food and candy. It was good for sore throats. I've heard of whorehound candy. My wife talks about that. I think when she was little, she had some. Yes, my mother used to, too. The tansy plant here cures upset stomachs. And the yarrow here, with its beautiful bloom, I think is a gorgeous ornamental. But it also has a medicinal effect of staunching blood flow. So this was an important plant to have around. I always thought of this just as an ornamental. I knew it was herbal, but I didn't know how. And this is a different garden over here. Yes, it is. This is our useful plant garden. And in here we have a real variety of plants the pioneers would have used in different ways. Matter? I remember that one from another show we've done. Yes, Matter Dyes Fabric Red. And you've got plants to make fabric here. That's right. We have cotton, both brown and white cotton. And then we have a flax plant over here. And the yarrow is over here in both places. Right, because not only was it a medicinal plant, but it could be used to dye fabric as well. Okay, and this one, this is a pre-plant. It is. It's a wax myrtle. And the pioneers used this to make candles. It smells good. It does. It smells wonderful. They would use animal fat to make candles. That's right. They would use animal fat and they would put this in also and it kept them from melting us quickly. Probably made it smell a lot better. Yes, and then the Texas Summers, you need candles that won't melt too quickly. Okay. The Golden Rod Dyes Fabric Yellow. And we also have over here tick seed. Some people know it matter as choreopsis. I know it by that name. And in addition to being a beautiful yellow flowering plant, they would take the seeds and put them in their mattresses and pillows that they stuffed with corn husks and it would keep the ticks out. And what's this house over here? This is a reproduction house that is dedicated to Ferdinand Lindheimer, who is the father of Texas Botany. That's the plant here I recognize. Garlandheimeri, I don't know where the name came from, right here. That's right. Excellent. And what else? We have Lindheimer's Daisy, which is a wonderful yellow flowering plant that we love. Using his plants at the house dedicated to him? Exactly. I see a field crop over here. So they had their own, besides the kitchen garden, they had their fields. That's right. This is an example of a crop garden. The corn and cotton were the two primary crops and they grew enough for their own use but much more so that they could sell it. That was the only way they had any money. That was in the days before tractors, wasn't it? Exactly. This is a 19th century horse-drawn plow and of course that one uses human power. A little more labor involved here but this is for the smaller gardens, wasn't it? Right. Now is this what the women were using mostly? Well, actually every able-bodied person in a family was out there working in the fields to get the crop in because it was their life. That really makes sense. But the women were special. And we have a garden over here dedicated to the early women botanists here in Texas. This is the butterfly garden. And it is dedicated to the women botanists of the early 20th century who explored here in Texas. And we're Mary, Sophie, Young and Ellen Quillen. What a nice, pleasant place to dedicate to them. It is just beautiful. Thanks for the tours of the garden. And we're so glad you came. Thank you. The preceding was a production of New Mexico State University. The views and opinions in this program are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of the NMSU Board of Regents.