Welcome!

Welcome to Mount Intermediate’s Garden Club. Clare, our garden facilitator, and Mrs Taylor are going to help us grow, learn and explore this year, and maybe we’ll get to cook with some of what we grow too. Our students are running in two groups we call Block 1 and Block 2, which means we have lots of willing workers and will be able to get plenty done.

Today the Block 1 students started the day by putting compost on all the beds that we’d worked hard to clear out during the week. Clare gave us a talk about wearing masks and gloves when handling compost and potting mix. Clare and Mrs Taylor were amazed at how quickly we worked.

After spreading the compost it started to rain, so we went indoors and watched a video about how seeds germinate. We learned that the roots sprout first and get nourishment from the soil, which gives the plant the strength to put up a shoot, then the leaves appear and start growing.

Clare gave us a plastic cup, handy towels and four dried peas. We wet the paper towels so they were damp, put them into the cups and placed the peas into the damp towels. We need to water the cup every day and see what happens. Watch this space!

Mrs Taylor had bought some seedlings and thanks to the hard work of the Block 1 students spreading all the compost, Block 2 were able to start planting into the garden beds. It’s a big change for a tiny seedling to be uprooted from its tray and put into a whole new environment, with different soil, different temperatures and different surroundings, and sometimes they find it hard to recover and don’t grow strongly. This is known as ‘transplant shock’. However there are things we can do to help the plant at this time. Clare talked to us about dipping the roots of our seedlings into seaweed fertiliser before we put them into the ground. Giving them some instant nourishment like this means the roots won’t get as stressed while they settle into their new home.