SPEC School Gardens Program

After a great summer break, Catriona and the kids at QE were back at it this week planting crops to overwinter for harvesting in the spring. Kale, chard, winter lettuce and peas, as well as some cover crops went into the garden boxes, which had been cleaned up, and topped off with fresh sea soil. Planted box ready for winter What is a cover crop? Cover crops are planted in the fall to protect the valuable soil from the elements over the winter. They also provide a green manure, enriching the soil in the spring when they are cut down, and either dug into the soil, or added to the compost pile to provide valuable nutrients. The can also be aesthetically pleasing - nicer to look at something green and growing, than bare black soil. Cover crops used a lot on the coast include: Fall Rye, Buckwheat, Red Clover, Winter Peas, and Broad Beans - try one this year.  Cover Crops   

Caution: Kids eating Veggies! I've spent the summer working with kids in the garden, and here are some of the reasons why it's been so awesome. 1. They're super cute. 2. They just get it! When I was talking to them about why people grow their own food, they immediately understood why it made sense to harvest fresh organic veggies from your own garden vs. flying them halfway around the world, spraying them with pesticides, and paying a lot for them in the supermarket. It's much harder trying to get some adults to understand this. 3. I have been witness to them loving & eating veggies! As my co-worker says, if they grow the veggies themselves, they're much more likely to eat them. Mmm.. freshly picked peas. Wrestling over some peas... Nasturtium flowers: sweet and spicy!  I'm sure there are 1 million more reasons, but I'll stop there for now. - Razan

Garlic Harvest and Sprouting Seeds at Brock! Today at Brock, we harvested some garlic. Just like at Ecole Bilingue, some of the kids needed to play tug-o-rope with their garlic before it finally agreed to come out of the dirt. Some of the heads were huge! Take a look... Garlic right out of the ground... And all cleaned up! One head of garlic accidentally got speared by a trowel. I tasted it and it was already super garlicky! That garlic is going to be so strong when it’s cured. It’ll probably cure colds on contact. Some of the seeds that the kids planted are already sprouting! There were already little carrots, beets, and beans sticking their heads out. The kids were ecstatic to see that something they planted was actually growing. They even started calling themselves farmers! This is why I love this job. - Razan

Grenfell potatoes! We harvested 115 yellow, red, and fingerling potatoes from Grenfell last Tuesday from only a few plants! It's amazing how abundant nature can be even in a small school garden.   - Razan

Garlic and Potato Harvest! Although the weather wasn’t the greatest, some kids and parents braved that looming rain clouds and came out to attend the garlic and potato harvest at one of our schools! First, we harvested the potatoes. It was like a treasure hunt for the kids. The kids and parents dug the soil a foot and a half deep in order to harvest the deepest and largest potatoes. The kids had a great time getting their hands dirty, and got excited when they found even the tiniest (bread crumb sized!) potatoes. We harvested 25 pounds of potatoes from just one container! Dig, dig, dig! Pull out the crop! Let's find some more!  The harvest! (25 pounds!) And finally, the triumph of finding the biggest potato! Next, we harvested the garlic. The kids dug around the garlic, and then pulled it up from the bottom of the stem. I forgot to specify that we should only pull out garlic plants, so we had a few sunflowers pulled out as well. Whoops! I ...

SPEC Receives Coveted Golden Shovel Award! At the Thunderbird Elementary's end of year Harvest Festival, SPEC was awarded a Golden Shovel Award for the creation of the school's very own garden. This is Thunderbird School's first year in our school gardens program, but the garden has already inspired a wonderful and passionate community of teachers, students and parents who care for it. SPEC has now created seven school gardens across Vancouver which teach children how to grow their own fresh, organic veggies!

The school year wrapped up at QE Elementary with a fantastic harvest festival.  Parent volunteers, classes and teachers baked bread, roasted potatoes, harvested greens, prepared salad, two types of hummus, blueberry muffins, and apple cobbler, and gathered in the courtyard to celebrate the years harvest.