Carrots, Cucumbers, Dill and Chives

About a week ago, we planted bell pepper seeds in peat strip cups and left them to germinate on the classroom windowsill. The seedlings are just beginning to peek their little green heads out of the soil. With all that anticipation happening, we just couldn't help ourselves, so today, we put Red Cored Chantenay carrots, Spacemaster Bush Cucumbers, and Dill and Chives seeds in our newly dug garden outside the classroom door. 

Over the last week and a half, several students gladly "gave up" their thirty minute recess time to dig in the dirt, to hoe and rake out the clumps of grass and roots that lingered, and to help to work in the castings from the worm bin to enrich the soil.  It's been difficult work because the space we chose for its many hours of direct sunshine and proximity to the garden hose, was also filled with tough, rootsy grass!  I'm sure some arms and backs have been a little achy lately! 

Since our winter has been rather chilly, for typical zone 8 Florida that is, our outdoor composter has been working more slowly.  Once the temperature reaches 75 and up on a daily basis, the decomposition process will speed up.  We're grateful to some faithful students from our class and a neighboring classroom for donating their perishable scraps! 

We'll post photos as more sprouts begin to appear! 

Dirt!

It's been awhile since we've been involved with the garden for several reasons, not the least of which is the temperature! Even though we're in Florida, it's been unseasonably cold, and with all the freezes, it didn't seem sensible to be planting things when the plants all around us were dying. It has also been extremely dry.

The last few days have been sunnier, so we've been inspired to prepare the new garden plot and to get our pepper seedlings going.

Feelin' Wormy!

You have never seen a happier, more excited bunch of kids than when our school secretary showed up at our classroom door today holding a box of 500 red worms.  Who'd have ever thought?  The secretary was not as excited as the children were, but she did come in to watch us open the box...and then scurried away...Thanks Miss Patti!    We've decided to name all of them "Wormy." 

The second portion of our composting adventure began today in the form of classroom vermiculture, or worm composting.  The worm bin was another part of the generous donation through DonorsChoose dot org.  It consists of a large, recyclable, heavy duty plastic box, with a tight fitting lid, though it's also perforated so the worms stay ventilated.  We mixed "magic worm bedding," which looked a lot like peat moss, and some other organic matter, with several quarts of water, and then took turns dumping in the containers of little critters.  Earthworms, nightcrawlers and other worms create castings, or "worm poop," as the students like to call it.  Apparently, some of the best little poopers are our little wigglers: Eisenia fetida. 

After lunch in the cafeteria, we looked over the leftovers and made decisions about what items would go where:  lettuce, raw veggies, and an apple core landed in the hotbox composter outside, while two trays of spaghetti, a lump of mashed potatoes, some pasta with collards, and some bread crusts were buried in the worm bin, no doubt much to the delight of the red worms.

We'll host our worms throughout the year, and in return, they'll provide us with rich soil for our vegetable and herb garden. 

Breaking It Down

Let the breakdown of compostable materials begin!  We assembled our Garden Gourmet composter, which was provided for us by generous donations through DonorsChoose.org, and began to fill it today.  This excellent powerpoint presentation clearly shows what materials and what amounts are essential to efficient composting.  We viewed and discussed this presentation last week, and some of our students really took it to heart, because they arrived at school today with bags bulging with table scraps.

We learned that you really can't just throw a bunch of table scraps into the composter and expect it to create healthy soil.  To balance the "green" material--the fruit and vegetable peels and eggshells that the students brought in, we searched around campus for an equal amount of "brown" or dried material such as leaves, grass clippings and small branches.  In no time at all, we had a good mixture in the Garden Gourmet, and needed only two more essentials to get things cooking--and few handfuls of organic soil, and a sprinkling of water.  The soil contains microorganisms that will encourage decomposition.

We're in the ground, sort of!

Our Cherry Belles are growing!  Our radish seedlings grew rapidly over the Labor Day weekend, and I wanted to get them into the ground as soon as possible.  Unfortunately, the weather was quite rainy this weekend, and kept me from getting to school to build the bedframes.  We decided to plant the seedlings in some flat plastic tubs until we can get the garden area prepared as necessary to get the plants into the raised beds.  We used organic Miracle Grow garden soil. 

Our 1st grade buddy class walks past the garden area on the way to recess every day, so they'll be keeping a close eye on the plants' progress.  Our class decided to be sure we monitor the weather each day, so we'll know whether the plants will need water or to be shielded from the sun. 

Teeny little baby radishes!

Wow! That was fast!

Remember the other day when I said we'd have sprouts next week?  How about today?  Man, those little radish babies grew up quick!  The seeds in the soil and in the baggies sprouted pretty much at the same time.  The "plastic bag students" transferred their sprouts to little starter pots with soil today, so now we have 21 pots with about 5 seeds each working to become seedlings that can handle the outdoors.  I'm getting my salt shaker ready!  The kids asked if we could start the basil and rosemary soon, so I guess next week, probably Monday, we'll get those going as well. 

The composter arrived yesterday, in need of assembly of course.  We're all anxious to get the soil a cookin' in there, but I want to do it right, so we're going to take our time.  We'll probably get it set up next week, or the week after, depending on the schedule--you never know what might change in the first weeks of school.