Shopping Expedition 12/02/11!

Our garden warriors headed to Sloat off of Clement Street with intention of replenishing their community of worms. The heat in September had a very negative effect on the worm bin. It was a fun and productive journey. We found a number of plants we will now grow from seed in our deck garden. We also brought back some ladybugs to set free in our garden. They will help with our aphid infestation.

PHS' Garden Founding Class Returns To Work In Thier Garden!

Our third graders were among the many students that started our deck garden. It was wonderful having them up here working in the garden again. They worked on creating potato towers from plastic containers that were on their way to landfill, or worse to the Pacific Gyre! Visit the trash vortex in the Pacific to learn more about that nightmare! Our potato towers have been very productive in past seasons. We're looking forward to even bigger harvests and bigger portions of yummy mashed potatoes! Visit the Chronicle's roof garden to gain insight as to how to grow your own! Students drilled and sawed the bottoms out of old trashcans and filled them with compost and seed potatoes. They'll observe their plants' growth and soon enough harvest their crop and prepare a feast to share with everyone at PHS.

PHS' Garden Founding Class Returns To Work In Thier Garden!

A Productive Day With First Grade

Plastic covering and basil planting

Today we planted Basil. We started by taking the plants out of the container. Then we separated the roots (kind of) so that the roots were not too crowded. Then we covered the soil around the plants with awesome black plastic bags so the soil stayed covered and won't become too dry. This helps us save precious water!

last of the year! =(

Hi everyone!
Today is the last post that I'll be doing in garden. so for our last club meeting of the year, we are going to eat our potatoes! it will be a great feast for all of the eighth graders, like me, (Ashley, Joanie, Katrien, and Pearl.) It will be a great last project for us, and we are very sad that we are leaving PHS. =( but we will be making new discoveries for ourselves in high school. Well keep in touch with the blog to hear from the next blogger and photographer that will take over my position.
Happy LAST gardening!
    -Joanie

long time no see and The awesome KATRIEN!!!

Well, there isn't much to say, because the eighth graders weren't here last week, due to a field trip at great America. Unfortunatly, the first graders are not with us today, from an at-school sleepover. Otherwise, Katrien is now an awesome aphid destroyer. They keep returning but with Katrien, they will hopefully not return.

Pajama Planting Day! With our new POTATOS!!

Today, it was pajama day for the lower school, and the first graders planted in their PJ's! It was very entertaining, as well as educational. We planted new tomato plants, Lettuce, and Basil. A big highlight of our day was picking our great potatoes! All of our helpers were ecstatic about our harvest today, (especially Todd's screaming,) and Felix joined us today as well. Next week, we hope to cook them and have a nice feast. An additional factor was that we found a bunch of bugs. Happy gardening!
-Joanie and Katrien

New Family Joiners!!

Today, we had all of the first graders come up to plant with us, in three different shifts. It was so fun to watch them be so proud of themselves when they either planted a tomato in the Topsy Turvy planters, or if they planted the new chard or lettuce. Unfortunately, the aphids haven't completely left us in peace. There are still some pests that are staying, trying to devour our precious garden! Other than anything else new, everything is just fine. Our first graders are having a blast in our rooftop garden, and so are we.

 Happy gardening!

       -Joanie

Epic return!

The  fist graders are back again, ready to do more work with the rest of the crew. Today, we will be preparing a salad, as well as weeding and drawing their favorite plants with someone. We will also be putting fun ideas on our new bulletin board spot in our school. Lastly, we will be caring for the worms that we are raising for the soil and regular sweeping and cleaning to make the garden look really pretty. That's it for today. 
       Happy Gardening!!!
           -Joanie

Salad!

today, we have now planted two new artichoke plants! Also, we have made salad, for the second week. The first graders won't be joining us for a while, due to a new schedule for them. Also, happy lunar new year! it is now year of the hare, or rabbit. I hope people get at least some red envelopes. Happy gardening!

-Joanie

Worm Bin Construction

LEAF participants, PHS garden club and first graders welcomed new inhabitants to the deck garden. Our garden is now home to 8500 red wiggler worms. Club members and the first grade set up a worm bin in our deck garden! We selected a cool dry space for them to live in. We added volcanic stones and mulch and gave our thirsty friends a little drink of water. Now each week we will feed them chopped up table scraps and we should see them reproducing and producing lots of worm tea!