The Learning Garden is planning a Holiday Native Tree Sale with edible ornaments for the birds! 

If you have extra clean dry pine cones laying around, bring them by and leave them inside the greenhouse located in the Learning Garden, just outside of the dining hall.

American Goldfinch

The Learning Garden Expansion Continues!

Spring has been absolutely splendid the first two weeks of May very warm and sunny. Everything has grown well, including the weeds! They sprang up all around the potted native trees we have left over from the plant sales.

 

I moved the trees and removed the weeds. 

 

I raked the area flat and laid down some recycled plastic. I used landscape fabric staples to keep the plastic in place. This will provide a weed barrier for the rest of the growing season. 

 

We need more planting beds to accommodate all the vegetable starts we are raising in the greenhouse. The easiest way to go was to try out a simple raised bed kit made out of Cedar boards. The boards are cut to dovetail together. I started by stapling down some weed  barrier cloth that still allows the water to flow through the bottom of the bed, important in these beds in the winter.

 

The kit slipped together nice and easy I did use a hammer a little bit. 

 

The second tier of slats went on and I filled it with soil.

There is plenty of work to be done in the Learning Garden please join me Wednesdays from 11:00 to Noon.

 

Native Tree Nursery Grows

We now have an inventory of 35 plus potted native trees. Student volunteers working on their service learning commitments potted up another 20 plus trees today.  Four evergreen coniferous species Grand Fir Abies grandis, Douglas Fir Pseudotsuga menzeisii, Western Red Cedar Thuja plicata, Western Hemlock Tsuga heterophylla, and one deciduous species Vine Maple  Acer circinatum. This is a fine collection of trees that will grow well in this climate. These tree species have shaped the history of the Pacific Northwest. They have provided habitat, medicine and a livelihood to many who have lived here. It is good to know them and to grow them.

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See those green sprouts on the left that is Garlic! 

 

What a happy bunch of people and trees!

Thank You! 

 We hope to sell these trees and to use them to do Bonsaii anyone interested in establishing a Bonsai collection for SMU or learning, creating and having your own Bonsaii should contact me at lynn.villella@stmartin.edu . Keep posted to learn the date of our next plant sale we are hoping to have it the 1st Friday in April. Anyone with plants or bulbs to donate are encouraged to drop them off at the Learning Garden.

Native Tree Nursery at SMU

At our Plant Sale on March 1st we had 4 species of native trees that were available bare root. To keep them healthy we have begun to pot them up into 2 gallon buckets. The buckets are half the price of nursery pots the same size. To make sure the buckets drain as well as pots we drilled holes in the bottom of the buckets.

A well planted Vine Maple Acer circinatum

 

 

The students mixed up soil for the trees and filled the buckets.

Some of the trees required the roots to be trimmed. The planting went well. We will be planting the remaining trees tomorrow March 7th. If you would like to plant some nice trees stop by at 10:00 A.M. The species we will be working with are Vine Maple, Grand Fir, Western Red Cedar, Douglas Firs.  

This amazing crew also removed the rest of the remaining Ivy roots

that we were trying to eradicate and then transplanted seedlings in the greenhouse. I somehow managed to not get a single photo of that work we were so busy 

Holding our flowering Tat soi from the greenhouse

Thank You to all the volunteers!