Grant Type 2: Water-Conserving Garden Project

1. Summary

Our grant will continue the flower, herb and vegetable gardening we started two years ago in containers by transitioning to in-ground gardening utilizing drip irrigation. Students in our Enrichment Learning Program — grades three, four and five — will continue to maintain this project by preparing, planting, maintaining and harvesting produce. As part of the process students will prepare the ground, plan and setup a drip irrigation system that will follow Florida-friendly gardening practices through water conservation. Students will learn about the water cycle, why it’s important to conserve water and how to conserve water in the garden and at home. Students will create pamphlets and/or posters illustrating what they have learned to share with families and other classes in the school. Students will work together to compose a monthly newsletter — “What’s Up in the Garden?” — to inform parents, the school and the community about Florida-friendly gardening practices and ways to conserve water at home as well as update them about the status of the plants in the garden.

We will take a field trip to a local nursery, Rode Groundcovers. During this field trip we will learn more information regarding Florida-friendly growing practices including water conservation, using natural predators and limited chemical use. Rode Groundcovers use the natural resources available at their nursery as much as possible, limiting the use of pesticides and use no restricted-use pesticides. In addition, they make use of I.P.M and biocontrols such as dragonflies, wasps, lady bugs, frogs and predatory mites that congregate and multiply naturally due to many ponds on the property. The fertilizer used is custom controlled release for each crop to avoid contaminating local water sources. And any runoff is mitigated through a natural water system that runs throughout the nursery. Next, it is filtered by the diverse plant life ecosystem, thus resulting in little runoff to surrounding areas. An important conservation area at Rode Groundcovers is the pocosin. It is a 12-acre wetland area with a five foot deep layer of peat and a water depth of up to 42 feet deep. The water has a pH of 3.4, and the temperature is about 52 degrees year round. There are many varieties of plants growing in and on top of the water, including redroot, sphagnum moss, lyonia, red bay, sweet bay, loblolly bay, pond pine, smilax, osmunda fern, terrestrial orchids and water lilies. These plants attract an incredible array of insects, including dragonflies and butterflies, as both feeding and breeding grounds.

2. Activities

Students, teachers and community volunteers will work together to renew our ten EarthBox gardens by removing any remaining plant material and adding new fertilizer and minerals. The fall garden will be based on plant starts and will include vegetables and herbs. Rain barrels (purchased from previous Splash grants) will collect water from runoff convenient to the spot where the containers will be placed. Additionally, we will till a 14’ x 14’ area to complete in-ground gardening that will include a drip irrigation system. 

Students will participate in activities designed to teach them about the water cycle like “Water in Action: Capture the Water Cycle in a Bag.” Students will collect rain water in the barrels for the garden and cover the garden soil with mulch, a Florida-friendly gardening practice that conserves water. Students will use a rain gauge to collect rainfall data and keep records of the amount of water used to water the garden. 

Students will work together to plan, plant, maintain and harvest vegetables we eat as leaves, or roots, or flowers, or fruit. The garden will include herbs for students to smell and taste. Last year we discovered, to our surprise since we are a rural community, that over half the students in our classrooms had never seen broccoli and cauliflower growing, never grown a garden, never even tasted collards. (They liked them, by the way.) 

The spring garden will also include wildflowers native to Florida that are attractive to bees and butterflies. An experiment growing tomatoes from seeds that have been in space will be included in the spring. Students will gain experience plotting an area to be tilled and preparing the area to be planted.

Students will research, design and build a drip irrigation system. Students will gain experience growing plants from seeds, transplanting seedlings into a garden, mulching to conserve loss of moisture, watering to encourage healthy growth, observing changes that occur as plants grow, and identifying plant structures and their function. 

Students will use water testing kits to determine water quality. Students will visit a local nursery to observe water conservation best practices in the field.

Students will share ideas and facts about water conservation at home and in their garden with the school, parents and community through pamphlets, posters, newsletters, and on-site garden presentations.

3. Project Message

The project message will be shared through pamphlets and/or posters and student-written newsletters shared with parents, community members and other classrooms. Samples of these materials will be posted in the two classrooms and in areas accessible to all school visitors and other students. Because of its central location, the garden will be available for other classes to use as an outdoor classroom for making science observations, reading and writing. School visitors will pass the garden while touring the campus and if appropriate, students may be able to present information at the garden site. Students can use the garden as a backdrop for presentations in science, reading and writing classes.

4. Stem Connection

Scientists will explore questions like “How does the size of a seed affect its germination rate?,” “How does the weather affect the amount of water needed to supplement the plants in the garden?” and “How do seeds that have been in Space germinate as compared to seeds that have not?” Students will use technology like grow lights for starting plants, wireless rain gauge for measuring rainfall, moisture meter for checking soil, wireless forecast station for measuring temperature and computers for creating newsletters. Student engineers will connect two rain barrels and determine the most effective use of the irrigation components considering that the planters may need to be moved. Students will research and design a drip irrigation system that will be utilized for our in-ground garden. Mathematicians will measure rainfall, water use, and plant growth. They will also compute average amounts of rainfall for different months and compare growth rates of different plants.

Budget