Tahatai Kai Growers Term 3, 2024

Term 3 has been a very exciting one at Tahatai Coast! The school gardens have undergone a full makeover and, after a term in the orchard, we are finally back in the gardens. Lots of work has been going on behind the scenes and the old rotting garden beds have had a rebuild, the garden area has been levelled out, we have a new garden shed, with access to water and the lower garden area is now a usable space!

We have had amazing support from some very busy people – huge thanks to :

- Matt, of course, for giving it all the go-ahead and getting hands on with building beds

- Darren, for being Matt’s right hand man

- Tracey, for keeping everyone organised

- Michael, for building the shed

- Rachel, for organising liners for the garden beds

- LJ from Te Puke Landscape Supplies for his magic compost! and for being so accommodating with deliveries.

And of course, a big thank you to Greg, for putting lots of his other jobs on hold and working hard to make it all come together.

Thanks heaps everyone !

We still have a few bits to finish off, but we now have an amazing garden space to work in and hope to have a shade house and a rainwater harvesting system up and running before the end of the year.

The hard work was all worthwhile watching the kai growers' excitement exploring their new space. They have taken ownership of the area, and have been busy planting out a herb garden, berry patches, veggie beds, a potato patch and a sentinel garden… along with companion flowering plants. Our kai growers are also very artistic and have created beautiful hand painted signage for our gardens.

We took advantage of a wet week and used our herb garden and the school’s kawakawa to make some yummy herbal tea combinations, with mint, kawakawa, honey and lemons from the orchard.

Thanks to the Paper for Trees project, we have also received two new pear trees, which we have planted in the school orchard. We are looking forward to feasting on pears in the years to come!

Towards the end of the term we received a rather large delivery of our new rainwater harvesting tanks, which have been funded by Tauranga City Council. Over the holidays these will be plumbed in to collect water from the big sheds. This should be enough to provide watering for the lower garden area, reducing the need for bore irrigation. We will do some learning around rainwater harvesting and how it benefits us and the environment, in the term ahead.