Mush! Mush! Mushroom Compost

 This summer our gardening crew has been extra busy watering, weeding, and hydrating our soil. After doing a bit of research, Alessandro discovered the function of the hyphae part of mushrooms and gave us the brilliant idea of using mushroom compost to replenish our soil and to help it absorb and retain moisture. 

Alessandro and Mia spread mushroom compost 

Will pulls dandelion weeds while the watering crew coordinates 

Just hanging out by the butterfly bush 

Watering and adding our own compost

Xavier and Connor add fresh soil to our lamb’s ear plants; 

Connor is takes home some fresh peppermint from the garden!

 Everyone took a little something (basil, banana peppers, peppermint, oregano) so that we can experiment with recipes that call for ingredients we are growing. 

Well done, everyone!💪🌱

Terracotta + butterfly garden = glorious!

 Gardening Club is officially up and running once again! We recently relocated our terracotta garden (previously located outside of the lunch link) to the butterfly garden so that our school community can enjoy all of our plants at once. This summer we also plan to create a sensory garden around the benches that will allow visitors to enjoy calming scents and interesting textures.

Our gardeners stand proud after the hard work of transferring our terracotta garden to the butterfly garden and adding some mulch! 🪴 

Connor and Alessandro successfully planted a Red Twig Dogwood bush donated by the Featherly family—well done, guys! 

That one day when we showed the thistle weed and dandelions who was in charge. 💪 

Mia creates a rock border around our patches of onions and potatoes. Our junior gardening camp, led by Mrs. Kurtz, plans to grow corn and watermelon in their plots! 

Xavier spots our first tomato! 🍅 

Our flowers are soaking up all the rain & our lilies finally bloomed! 

Allow us to introduce our garden guardian, Jeff Stripey the caterpillar

Mrs. Kurtz and her gardeners spot a monarch in the butterfly bush 🦋 

Butterfly feeders galore

 Our butterfly garden received a whole bunch of love this past week. With the help of Alessandro O., we constructed homemade butterfly feeders! We also assembled a butterfly feeder that we ordered from Amazon. Orange juice is the sweet, nectar-like substance that we added to our feeders to attract the butterflies. We were a little nervous about the state of our garden after the storm that blew through Pingree Grove, but all was intact! (Perhaps our shepherd's hook was a bit bent, and our tomato plant capsized, but we will able to set everything right again.) Our only plant casualty (despite all of the hot sun and the rabbits) in the garden so far has been the potatoes that we were trying to grow in a burlap sack.  That is one experiment we will need to start anew. 

Having some laughs while building                                           Xavier fills our feeders with o.j.                

(Tony, Mia, Will, Alessandro O., Alessandro C., & Braelynn)             

A multitude of feeders--drink up, butterflies!

We made it through the storm! 💪💚

Braiding a rope to hang our feeders & dangling some worms over our terracotta pots

Faith, the butterfly whisperer, with a Red-spotted Purple (Limenitis arthemis)

Reading in the garden on a "cool" day

Will finishes his novel in the peaceful butterfly garden

Lemon seedlings and new fruit

Yesterday we planted oregano and lemon thyme into our very own seedling pots made out of lemon rinds. At home, students can decide if they want to plant their lemon seedlings into a pot or directly into the ground. They can also decide whether to plant the lemon into the soil or to remove the roots of their seedlings from the lemon pot and place them into the soil. As we learned last week, a little bit of acidity is good for most plants. We discovered new lavender blooms and two ripe red tomatoes!

Our gardeners: Will, Amelia, Faith, Kaydence, Erica, and Samuel

Will, Amelia, and Faith plant their seedlings

Amelia and Will label their seedlings: Greek oregano (origanum vulgare) and lemon thyme (thymus citriodorus)

In the butterfly garden, we spotted a loyal monarch perched and then in flight. 

Wake up with lemon, coffee, and . . . WORMS!

On Thursday, we spiced up our garden by adding some acidity in the form of lemon rinds and coffee grounds. The acidity is good for the health of the soil, and the lemon can help to keep pests out of our plants! We also aerated and watered our soil, and once it looked like it should after a decent rain, we dropped in some Canadian Nightcrawlers! They will help to further aerate the soil and allow water to refresh the roots of our plants. Next week, we might try making Lemon Rind Seedling Planters. 

Will, Amelia,  and Tony slip some worms into our terracotta pots. Tony's tried to wriggle away!

Faith gives our plants a little caffeinated pick-me-up as Braelynn searches for bugs

Braelynn caught another cricket in the butterfly garden! We saw another elusive Monarch and two Clouded Sulpher (one fuzzy one in the close-up) butterflies. The Heartleaf is starting to bear some beautiful orange flowers!

The hastas got a little more care and water. We are trying to figure out if the leaves are being nibbled on by rabbits, scorched by the sun, or a little bit of both. Either way, we are on the case! We left the garden with some banana peppers, bell peppers, basil, and lavender in hand. 

Hardy hastas and dazzling designs

As a gardening club, we nurture the plants in our garden, but we also want to spruce up, care for, and beautify the other plants on our campus! On Tuesday, we weeded and watered our hasta plants, hoping to make them bear more luscious green leaves and purple blossoms. 

Thank you for your hard work, hasta crew! (Faith, Amelia, Will, and Kaydence)

We noticed that fortifying our pepper plants with eggshells really did the trick! We should be able to harvest some later this week. Our latest additions to the garden are two purple Aster flowers, representing our school colors! You will also see a new design with the painted rocks spelling out our school name. 

Samuel plants our purple Aster flowers             Kaydence adds more eggshells to our pepper plants

It is a little hard to spot our green letters, but they are easier to see in person, we promise!

Thank you, Erica & Angelina, for painting the rocks!

We have new green bell peppers and banana peppers!

We plucked our basil flowers to keep the herbs fresh.

In the butterfly garden, we spotted a monarch (unfortunately, it was too busy to pose for a picture) and some new lilies. We also worked to rejuvenate our butterfly bush and wild roses. Finally, we decorated the windows with paper butterflies made from the colors that live butterflies are most attracted to! We also threw in a colorful butterfly mobile for good luck. 

Amelia displays her purple butterfly

The wild rose we hope to revive