The COVID-19 pandemic this year altered plans for Benjamin Logan School’s Growing Gardens, Growing Minds cross-curricular program for grades K-12, but a group of dedicated volunteers and students are still participating this summer in efforts to maintain a wide variety of plant life and produce on the school grounds.
Monday, the volunteers worked throughout the morning during the warm and sunny conditions to pull a silage tarp over the market garden plot, and also to plant pumpkins in the garden located by the elementary school. In addition, the youths and adults spent time tending to the district’s permaculture spot off County Road 26, and developing the shiitake mushroom production project at the greenhouse by the high school.
The Growing Gardens, Growing Minds Toward a Healthy Future program began in the 2018-19 school year through the district’s receipt of a $10,000 Mary Rutan Foundation’s Community Health & Wellness Grant.
After a variety of initiatives that have taken shape at the school buildings, organizers were hoping this spring to plant a variety of produce at the market garden plot — from tomatoes to peppers, onions, radishes and more, along with flowers — to sell at the Mary Rutan Hospital Farmers’ Market each week of the growing season.
While those endeavors were curtailed because of the health crisis, incoming high school juniors Charlotte Graham and Olivia Hahn said that they are looking forward to the upcoming opportunities at the farmers’ market next year and beyond, and the chance to introduce younger students to a love of gardening and eating healthy foods.
“During the last two school years, it’s been so cool to see this all take off,” Olivia said while planting pumpkins. “I’ve learned so much, and we worked to plan out the market garden with computer software with the help of (second-grade teacher) Ryan Kerns. With the program, we can lay out what plants will be in each area.”
Benjamin Logan High School science teacher and fellow project volunteer Spencer Reames said next spring, students from all grade levels will potentially be involved with the market garden, from starting seeds and plants in the greenhouse, to planting and taking care of the garden. He said the high school pupils will take the lead with selling their bounty at the Mary Rutan Hospital Farmers’ Market.
“We’ll have items to sell, and we’ll also utilize the produce in the cafeterias in each of the schools, and the kids will have the chance to take home a share of the items, too.”
Also at the market garden pumpkin patch Monday, fellow gardener Cathy Harless assisted digging in the dirt alongside her son, fourth-grader Levi Johns.
“We are really enjoying working out here this summer,” she said. “We’re newer to the district and this has been a great way for Levi to meet new friends after the unusual end to this last school year.”
At the elementary school plot, the volunteers, including teachers Kerns, Reames, Bruce Smith and Shelly Lane, laid down the silage tarp to kill off weeds and create a stale seedbed, with the weeds providing nourishment for invertebrates present in the soil.
This makes it possible to have a no-till garden, Kerns said.
Recently, the volunteer advisers also completed maintenance on the wet wall (evaporation cooling system) in the district’s greenhouse. They said it appears that the system will be very effective and will make the greenhouse much more functional.
Vegetable plants started by students from seed in the greenhouse have also been moved to outdoor raised beds and new plants have been planted outside as well.
Nearby the greenhouse Monday, the students and adults worked together on the project to produce shiitake mushrooms by placing red oak logs that had previously been inoculated with mushroom spawn into a bath of water for 12 to 24 hours. Then the logs will be removed and placed inside the greenhouse to grow mushrooms in the controlled climate, Kerns explained.
In addition, Reames said the permaculture spot is one that is planted very intentionally, with plants that work together, some producing nitrogen and etc. The spot is one that the district wants to share unique edible items with the community, such as gooseberries, service berries, wild nut trees, and apple and pear trees and more.
“It takes less labor to maintain because you’re getting Mother Nature to help you,” Reames said. “We’re in the experimental stage right now after planting items just last fall, but we’re hoping it will be a place that families will enjoy visiting.”
Overall, the grant project has included learning in many content areas, from involving art students in decorating the raised beds to culinary arts pupils offering tastings with the produce, and English students and art students designing books and coloring books about gardening for younger pupils.
“This is a great project, and it really goes along well with a renewed interest in gardening that we are seeing in today’s culture,” Reames said. “It’s a great educational tool as well. You’d be surprised that even though we’re in a rural community, many of the kids at first can’t identify what a potato plant looks like.
“It’s teaching the kids a skill that they’ll have for all of their lives, and it’s introducing them to new, healthy foods that they can have the satisfaction of knowing that they helped to produce.”