Seedling Sale Emergency!

When we came back from the holidays we found that all our seedlings had died because there had been no rain. With only a week to go till our seedling sale it looked like we’d have nothing to sell! But hearing of our troubles, Good Neighbour came to our school with trays of seedlings to prick out. And the Mt College horticulture students gave us 150 swan plants! We are really back in action, thanks to these very generous people.

Kia Ora Arataki Gardeners!

Look at these beautiful thank you letters the Arataki School gardeners have written to PiPS and their helpers! Thank you, tamariki, for your lovely words and for all the effort you have put into these letters – and into your gardening mahi this term, too :)

Tulips and Corn

Look at how our tulips are growing – we planted them back in June. Can you see the ‘A’?

Meanwhile we were preparing the soil to plant corn – the corn won’t be for us, it’s for our feathered friends, our chickens!

And Ruma 11 were getting their pots ready for planting their tomatoes.

Spring Jobs

Here are the Sunflower group sowing flowers for the Birds & Bees garden for summer:

…and the Frangipani group cooking scones using vegetables from our garden:

We also pricked out some seedlings. ‘Pricking out’ is when you separate little seedlings into bigger pots so they can keep growing without crowding each other out. This tray wasn’t labelled so it’s going to be exciting to see what the plants turn out to be:

Chicken Time

After months and months of work and preparation, the big day finally arrived with the delivery of our four chickens. Leading up to this day we have done so much mahi and learning so we are able to provide our chickens with the best possible environment, nutrition and care.

One of them came with a fertilised egg, so who knows, we might even have a fifth member of the flock in future.

Our chickens will get their new names at the end of term hui. Thank you so much to Jane from Teacher in the Paddock for helping us get to the stage where we are confident in having our beautiful chooks at the school.

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. 

Chicken News

Today Jane and Yu from Teacher in the Paddock came and talked to Ruma 11, 18,  17 and 21 about how to take care of our chickens (who will be arriving in the second week of Term 3!).

We learnt a lot – here are just a few of the things:

That comfrey is good for our chickens

Which weeds from our garden they will eat

What sort of food scraps to give them

That adding crushed up eggshells to their food will give them calcium, which they need to produce strong new eggshells (how’s that for recycling!)

We also learnt about the different parts of a chicken’s body.

Thank you so much Teacher in the Paddock, for such an informative session. We can’t wait to start taking care of our own chickens. 

Matariki Plantings

This week is Matariki, traditionally a time for remembrance, celebration and fertility for Maori people. Among other things the appearance of the Matariki stars helped them decide when to plant their spring crops:

“The coming season’s crops were planted according to the portents read in the Matariki star cluster. If the stars were clear and bright, it was a sign that a favourable and productive season lay ahead, and planting would begin in September. If the stars appeared hazy and closely bunched together, a cold winter was in store and planting was put off until October.”

We celebrated Matariki here at Arataki School, too. Each gardening group planted a shrub:

The Sunflowers planted two pink manuka into the birds and bees garden, as the pink flower attracts bees.

The Cosmos group planted Larry the lime in the citrus garden.

The Dahiias planted a kawakawa.

The Frangapanis planted a dwarf grevillia that the butterflies will love.

The Zinnias continued planting the manuka hedge.

And the Hebe group planted three hebes (of course!) by the front office.

After the planting we all came to the community room. Our whaea explained how the garden club was started many years ago by Mrs Heath, with nine students after school, and over time has evolved to where we now have between 90 to 100 gardeners every Thursday after lunch. You can see it’s not just the plants that have been growing here at Arataki!

Then we shared kai that the volunteers bought. It was a great celebration.

Seedling House

Our new seedling house has arrived! The seedling house will allow us to grow our own seeds for the gardens and keep them safe from the wind. Later in the year we hope to turn it into a greenhouse using plastic bottles.

We got straight to work planting seeds to put into our house. We learned to sprinkle the seeds and spray the pots with water from the spray bottle. Why did we use the spray bottle instead of the hose? Well, the seeds are so small and delicate that if we used the hose it would probably wash them away. The spray bottle gives them a bit of moisture but not too much, and it makes a gentle mist that won’t dislodge the seeds.

We also learned that if we planted summer crops they may not survive the cold weather, so we’re planting autumn veges.

Today we also used spring onions and rosemary from our garden to make delicious herb and cheese scones, and cleaned out some of the garden beds. We couldn’t resist picking the carrots, even though it was a bit early. They were still good!

Finding and Growing Kai Everywhere

 Zinnia group were looking after the feijoa hedge today. We pruned it and put the worm castings from the worm farm around the roots. We also tried taking feijoa cuttings – if these grow we’ll have more fejoa plants and maybe more fejoas.

And we are growing lemons! What are we going to use them for – lemonade, lemon muffins or lemon cake?

While planting the broad beans today we found some pumpkin – Jaimee explained to us that when the ring around the stalk had shrunk down it is a sign that the pumpkin is ready to eat.

And Ruma 11 has been working hard digging up the kumara – some for Matariki and some for us to take home and eat with our whanau. We have got a great crop.

Meanwhile the Dahlia group spent the day planting rerengarerenga by the hall. It’s a shady area, perfect for rengarenga. And in summer their beautiful white flowers will brighten up the spot.