00:00One of the best backyard growers in all of Texas is Mike Heap, who's now the go-to source
00:06for South Texas native plants.
00:08You can't get it yourself, so somebody like Mike Heap, who could just go and collect these
00:13seeds.
00:14He collects seeds roadside, and then ends up growing 100, 200 of that species, you know?
00:18He's propagating all this stuff, and people collect the nectar of knowledge, and then
00:22they're covered with the piling of knowledge they go share with the other native plant
00:26people.
00:27I'm still working on the allergies.
00:28I can see that.
00:29You know, I'm trying to generate some good stuff here.
00:32You got it going.
00:33It's good.
00:37So we want to get some plants for you for this house where we're killing the grass.
00:41You're the best native plant nursery in the valley, because you've got stuff that I don't
00:44even think is in cultivation anywhere else.
00:47I had a sign out front back in the early 90s.
00:51Well, it was God getting even with me, because it became just a target for, like, beer bottles
00:56and stuff.
00:57You know, the same kind of thing I did in high school, you know?
01:00Yeah, it just, you know, everything works out that way, my karma or whatever.
01:04Yeah.
01:05Let's see some of the stuff you got growing.
01:06Let's select some plants, crotons, and then maybe we'll get a cypress and an ebony.
01:11Where do you get new stock from, since you're, like, kind of the only game in town?
01:14I get a lot of my seeds off of right-of-ways.
01:18Like if I drive out to this one farm road, and I get out, and there's a bunch of brush,
01:23I walk fence lines and collect my seeds and stuff.
01:26I've met a lot of interesting people that way.
01:28They won't stop and ask what I'm doing, and when I tell them, I end up riding around their
01:32ranch with them and looking at stuff.
01:34That's nice.
01:35That's a cool way.
01:36Yeah.
01:37So this is Montezuma cypress.
01:39Oh, nice.
01:40Who's this?
01:41That's Zanbeckias.
01:42Ah.
01:43A critically endangered member of the citrus family.
01:45Yeah, they're rattan trees they found in the woods south of San Benito.
01:50I got to get this guy.
01:52That one's kind of a collector's item.
01:55This is a runion tree, which some people say is the most rare tree in the state of Texas.
02:01We know of 10 that are growing in the wild, and that's it.
02:04In 1984, my brother found some in the wild.
02:07That's those, speaking of those 10.
02:10That's the Fish and Wildlife Tract.
02:11Yeah, well, they bought that because I called them up and said, hey, we found some runion
02:15trees.
02:16Within a couple of weeks, the Fish and Wildlife Service bought 2,400-acre block of land where
02:21they saved those trees.
02:23You know I love coming here.
02:24I want to come move in one day.
02:25You're going to find me sleeping under the tables one morning, you know?
02:28Hanging out with the dogs.
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