Week 8 Update - Young Farmers
Hi Farm Families!
Much better weather this week. The big challenge today was to find the first flower of spring, and we actually found two: Agarita (which has a wonderful honey scent) and an unidentified purple flower - it looks like it could be in either the Geranium or Verbena family.
After warming up with a couple of games (Bizz Buzz & Metamorphosis) - I presented the “Wild Weed of the Week” Galium aparine, which has many descriptive common names such as Sticky Weed, Bedstraw and Cleavers. We did an observation exercise where each student spent a minute in silence(!) observing a cutting of the plant, then we went around in a circle and shared our observations, including: velcro-like hooks on the stem and leaves, the leaves form a whorled circle around the stem, it has no scent, and the stem is square. Cleavers is a useful spring tonic, full of vitamin C and (surprise!) it’s in the coffee family. We all tried a taste of cleavers tea, and we did notice an energizing effect which we definitely needed for our farm chores …
…where we were tasked with hand picking the dreaded Harlequin bugs off our kale. These are herbiphages which means they suck the juices from plants, eventually killing them. As organic farm, we can’t use chemicals for control, but because these are stink bugs, they repel most would-be predators. So we resort to hand picking and dropping them in a bucket of soapy water. Due to the high “ewww-factor”, most of the class had had enough after about 20 minutes, and moved on to potting up tomatoes, but LJ and Ethan persevered for the rest of the period, and even trained Mr Braden’s class on how to dispatch these beastly critters. When I checked the plants on Saturday, I only found a few bugs. Bravo, team!
Our snack time riddles are back! See if you can answer this one, which stumped all but one student:
A man stands on one side of a river, his dog on the other. The man calls his dog, who immediately crosses the river without getting wet and without using a bridge or a boat. How did the dog do it?
After lunch, we played a couple of rounds of Capture the Flag - which was halted momentarily when we discovered the aforementioned purple wildflower.
Though the weather wonks tell us we’re in “meteorological spring,” don’t be fooled. Real spring doesn’t start until March 21, and we’re in for another freeze or two this week. Friday looks to be wet and cold, so make sure they bundle up!!
Have a great rest of your week and don’t forget to sign up for spring semester. The semester will start on March 25th.
Ms. Bridget