ALAN HUBER

Horticulture Student in Athens

My childhood was a tale of the best outdoor experience a kid could have.

Throughout my preschool years, I spent afternoons at my Nana's house who taught me everything from site words to gardening and bird watching. The love of the outdoors only grew with me from there. This passion turned into afternoons at home spent venturing through my backyard to find the coolest plant and rock while watching the birds at the birdfeeder I insisted we buy. My friends and I rode our bikes upon my request around the neighborhood and dreamed up fantastical worlds using the beauty we saw around us.

However, this passion of nature was put on pause for a while. I began to play more video games as middle school came around and I became less involved with the natural world I once loved. While still buried, the outdoorsman in me still crept up as I walked home from middle school every day on the nice trail that backed up to the end of my neighborhood. To my delight I was still able to listen for the calls of birds and name them like my Nana had taught me.

High school brought more changes again, the love of nature was back in full swing! I picked up bass fishing and inherited some fly fishing rods. Then, I bought a fishing kayak and spent weekends strapping it to the roof of my Dad's 2001 Honda Accord and going out on the lake. The first ideas of college began to swirl in my mind with no idea what I wanted to do and be in my life.

While applying to UGA, I saw Plant Biology was an offered major and that was the first intro I had to plants. From there, my ideas grew and my love of plants blossomed into what it is today. One major change later, I have settled in the most hands-on and outdoorsy plant science major available, and I LOVE it.