A Strong Start
The Garden Club is in full swing at the SRSS with so much to do while the weather holds out.
The 20 garden boxes that were set up in the spring had great success due to a lot of community support over the summer. With a very dry summer, it was a challenge to keep the gardens nourished throughout the summer. With the community excitement and intrigue, the garden produced a lot of veggies along with the wild flowers bringing in some butterflies and bees.
With a lot of growing support, we started off the year with a lot of interest. We started off with a workshop with Dorinda Penner from Sunshine Greenhouse to set up our own Greenhouse at school. She shared her experience with Basil planting which is then used fresh in the "Chinos" restaurant at their own greenhouse.
In our first hands on session, we were able to get the green house up and running. We also learnt so much from our workshop that will be very useful for the future: Wooden floor of the greenhouse must be moist to create a humid environment for the greenhouse; Do not water plants until there is visible life; If the roof is dripping we need to open the ventilation
This week, we set up a weekly watering schedule for the greenhouse to ensure life will continue to grow inside. Then we took our shovels outside to dig up outside herbs to add to the greenhouse (chives, oregano, thyme, rosemary, basil, oregano, chamomile, sage).
The team had a lot to do in short period of time. The roots were fairly deep and needed a lot of power to reach the bottom to transplant them. We met some new friends long the way...
We were able to fill most of our containers and collect most of the herbs and transplant them all the the greenhouse (which is in full swing)
Next week, we plan to do some harvesting; we have an abundance of carrots and veggies that we plan to donate to local charity; we already have started with the smaller ones that, I have been assured, are still great to eat.
We are trying to get our hands dirty as much as possible while the weather and the harvest lasts, but have been thinking about our future goals for the club and the season. We will have a lot of "waste" after the harvest so starting an outdoor compost will be something to start then we will need to do a clean up around the current garden boxes.
Dorinda Penner also discussed the importance of bees to pollinate our garden so to always plant flowers and fruit trees (they will cross pollinate with each other/cross curricular with culinary) to provide pollen for bees. So we will start writing grant proposals for future fruit trees. Dorinda has also offered to come back to put on another workshop for us in the next couple weeks.
We have had a great start to the year with a great bunch of students and look forward to all of the possibilities that are ahead of us this year.