A Busy Week

There are lots of us in the garden club here at Arataki, so we are divided up into groups of 10 or so. We named our groups after different plants we love to grow. We thought it might be interesting to show a snapshot of the kinds of thing our different groups get up to in a garden club session. We couldn’t do it without the help of our amazing volunteers and teachers!

Cosmos Group:

Whaea Clare was given some tulip bulbs so this week she asked the Cosmos group to come up with a design and then plant them into the bulb garden. The group decided to form the letters ‘ATK’ to represent the school’s initials. It’s hard to imagine these little brown bulbs could produce beautiful tulip flowers, but we’re crossing our fingers that that nature will work its magic.

Dahlia Group:

The Dahilas planted some sprouted potatoes that had been given to us. Whaea Clare talked about crop rotation and why we don’t plant the same crop in the same place twice in a row – doing this can mean pests and diseases specific to that crop can get established. Another reason is that each different crop needs to take its own particular blend of nutrients from the soil. Planting the same crop over and over means the soil can’t get itself back into balance between crops so there won’t be enough of the right kind of nutrients to grow strong plants.

Hebe Group:

The Hebes celebrated the shortest day by planting garlic. They learnt about companion planting and how broad beans and garlic work together and share nutition and fend off pests. 

Frangipani Group:

The Frangapanis are working hard to revamp the butterfly garden. They have been looking after their seeds and are so proud that they are coming up. The birds and bees garden is also being redesigned.