Friend Can You Spare a Tomato

Field trip day!  The students were excited about their trip to a food bank at Metro Lutheran Ministry, where they learned about the needs in their community. The volunteers at MLM were happy to receive the several pounds of produce the young gardeners donated.  We learned that MLM does more than just distribute food.  They are currently putting together backpacks of school supplies.

Metro Lutheran Ministry

Here we're working in the gardens this morning.

Everybody working on the garden

We all pitch in to help each other.  Here Marina is helping out in Angelina's garden

Marina working on the garden

    

Bountiful Harvest

Yea - rain! We didn't have to water today since the gardens got about 1/2 of an inch of rain last night.  We harvested over 10 pounds of produce, most of it summer squash.  We lost another squash plant to bacterial wilt.  

Angelina found this worm in the garden this morning. We've sent this picture to Ms Chris, our bug expert, to find out what it is.

Today we learned about food storage and preservation. We sampled frozen and fresh fruits and canned pickles and beets.

We're having a 'Garden Party', and we made invitations for our families. Then we painted pictures frames. Maybe we'll frame some of the pictures that have appeared in this blog!

Extra Bug Pics

Ms Chris provided these extra pictures of bugs after the bug lesson.  Very cool!

aphid and lacewing larvae 

Look for the very present Lacewing eggs near the aphids.  just a bit bigger than the aphids are lacewing larva  also called "aphid lions".  Very tiny. 

bug frass

Japanese beetle

lady beetle eggs

lady beetle larvae 

lady beetle pupa

lady beetle

spotted cucumber beetle

What's Up Doc?

The gardens look really good in spite of the heat and drought. The young gardeners and the adult volunteers have been taking good care of them.

Gardens

Corn

Ms. Kirsten taught the class how to identify pest damage.  She brought in several plants with different types of disease and pest damage, and showed the young gardeners what to look for.  Ms Kirsten also brought two bags of ladybugs for the young gardeners to release into their gardens.  The ladybugs flew and crawled all over everyone and the plants!

Bag of Ladybugs

The zinnias we planted are really pretty and colorful.

Zinnias

Good, Bad, Beautiful Bugs

Today's lesson was all about bugs. Ms Chris Veach and the young gardeners inspected the plants and identified lots of bugs, both good and bad.

Ms Chris and gardeners looking for bugs

aphids and lady beetle pupa and larva on squash leaf

We've got lots of ladybugs, which are beneficial.  They are there because of the aphids.  We also found striped and spotted cucumber beetles and some squash bugs, both mature and immature.  We lost another squash plant to bacterial wilt, probably spread by the cucumber beetles.

In spite of the bugs and the heat and drought we harvested several pounds of produce - squash, zucchini and okra.  The young gardeners took some home, and the rest was donated to a local food bank.

It's a Plot

The gardens look really good.  We do have to be diligent about bug patrol.  We found this weird one today - don't know what it is.

We had the biggest produce harvest so far this year; zucchini, squash and okra.

Weighing our zucchini

Sunburst Squash

In today's lesson, Ms Cass taught us how to design a garden plot, making sure to consider spacing, specific needs of each plant, and zones.  We designed our own dream garden plot. Here is Ms.Cass's

Here is the recipe for the waffle gilletts from Duncan's mom.  Everyone loved these!

Gilletts

1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 1/2 cups white sugar
2 sticks butter/margerine
2 Tbs. crisco
6 eggs
4 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 Tbs. vanilla

Cream shortening, butter, and sugars together. Add eggs, vanilla, and salt. Add flour.
Bake on a waffle iron until brown.

Zoning Out

We found lots of spotted and striped cucumber beetles in the garden today. We also saw ladybugs and pollinator bees. The gardens look really good, considering the hot, dry weather we've had. Here is some of the produce we harvested today.

Megan's 8-ball zucchini

odd shaped okra

Today's lesson was about Cold Hardiness Zones. Mr. Lala Kumar, horticulture specialist, was our guest speaker. Mr. Kumar has lived and worked all over the world. He taught the young gardeners about zones, and what types of plants grow in the different climates.

After the lesson we made bird houses out of gourds. Here is Marina painting her bird house.

Marina's birdhouse

Fruit Or Veggie

 

Speaking of flowers we had a fun craft today. We made duct tape flowers they turned out amazing. 

Pistils, Petals and Other Parts

Today Ms. Linda taught us about the different parts of a flower and what they're for. She brought in a fun flower hat and Megan and Duncan tried it on.


Duncan in the flower hat

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Megan in the flower hat.

Today we harvested zucchini, okra and squash.


Mariah holding Angelina's 8-ball Zucchini.

Caleb's Zucchini

Josh's Squash

Russell's Okra

Post created by Mariah

Shine On

Today Ms. Linda tought about photosynthesis, which is how plants get their food.

We made paper rubbings of mint leaves.

Later on we had a craft. We made ladybug bean bags.

Then we tossed them in a sheet and made them fly!

Blog entry by Mariah