Green Tip of the Week

This week's green tip of the week is focusing on garden trellises and different ideas for making them. The following are pictures of what can be done with a link for more information:

http://www.kvpermaculture.org/blog/permaculture/bike-wheel-trellis-hard-luffa/

*Bike-Wheel Trellis 

 



http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/935467 

*Gourd arch at entrance to walled kitchen garden

http://www.japangarden.co.uk/How-to-tie-Japanese-Knots-make-bamboo-fences-and-trellis-p-24.html

*Japanese Ibo Knot for trellis 



http://gardening4life.blogspot.com/2011/05/cinder-block-garden.html

*PVC Pipe and Ropes

http://www.overthebigmoon.com/gardening-basics-planters-beds-and-trellises/

*Basic Trellis 

http://lillbutton2.blogspot.com/2010/03/bean-teepees.html

*Bean Teepee

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/vertical/msg0622582022244.html?73

*More Trellis Ideas on Gardenweb Forum!

New Recycling Bins Comming Soon!

More coming soon!

I'm happy to announce that your Associated Student Government voted this week to fund the purchasing of 26 new recycling bins for the SCC campus! These 26 new recycling bins will more than double the number of bins at SCC! The new bins should be in for the Fall quarter!

Picture of the Week - May 23rd, 2014

Family of deer out on the Columbia

I spotted these three deer hanging out on the Columbia River. Looks like they are enjoying the water!

Green Tip of the Week

Watering system being put to use! The top covers of the two pipes are removable
We just remove the top covers and use a hose to fill the pipes with water

This week's green tip is focusing on how to build a water efficient raised garden bed. Raised beds can be a bit of a challenge in terms of keeping your plants watered. Raised beds tend to be warmer and drier than a garden bed that is not raised. The new student garden only uses raised beds. Because of this and our reliance on volunteers we decided to put in a system that would be as water efficient as possible.

Woody debris in the bottom of the garden bed

Our first step to make a water efficient raised bed was to put large woody debris in the bottom of the beds. These provide an increase in the organic material and essentially function as water sinks. The debris will absorb water when the beds are wet and slowly release it as the beds dry out.

Next we wanted to be able to reduce evaporation from watering. Traditional methods of watering from the surface result in water losses due to the sun's heat evaporating a portion of the exposed water. To avoid this we built pipes that run length wise along the beds and than turn upward at 90 degrees at one end making the whole setup look like a "L". The other end of the pipe is capped.

The bottom of the long part of the pipe has wholes drilled in the bottom. The long part was then covered by a permeable material to keep dirt out of the pipes. This will allow water to drain out along the bottom of the pipe.

Once the pipes were completed we then placed them two per bed about six inches or so below the surface. With the watering system in place and the woody debris in the bottom of each bed it is our hope that our garden beds will be far more water efficient than a standard raised garden bed. Future improvements could include a mulch over the surface of each bed to further retain moisture.

Pictures of us working on the watering system:

Drilling holes in the pipes

Wrapping the pipes in permeable cloth

Adding the system to a garden bed

Watering systems all installed!

Weekly BBQ - Garden Work Days

Picture of the Week - May 18th, 2014

Wildflowers and the sunset!

This picture was taken about a week ago up on the south hill from a great little trail that has some amazing views.

Green Tip of the Week

Finishing up the last couple tires!

Today we had an awesome event put on by Andrew! He got a bunch of tires donated that we then had a blast painting :) We used some cardboard stencils to get the designs. The only real prep work was to clean the tiers and put the tarp down.

All the tires are now at our garden site. We are filling them with soil and will be planting herbs and other plants in them over the next few days.

The green tip of the week this week is to do what we just did! Get any old tires, paint them and have fun planting your new colorful beds!

Picture of the week - May 9th, 2014

Beautiful Spokane Washington

It is always amazing to me that we have a major river and a great park right in the middle of our city. One of the great things about our city.

Green Tip of the Week

Garden Soil - The key to the successul garden

Here is another awesome green tip of the week from our student leader Andrew!

This week I wanted to focus on soil quality and tips gardeners can use to ensure their soil is nutrient rich to maximize the yield of their crops.

 

1.) Top soil does not always contain organic material. You will need to feed the dirt to get it to gardening standard. Otherwise the soil is just dirt and will be a poor medium for crops, or even weeds to grow in. Ask the seller about the origin of the soil to get more information on the organic material within the top soil.

2.) Even rich soil needs organic material replenished within a year. Within a season or two of gardening the nutrients have been consumed by our plants and thus the soil needs more nutrients added back into the medium. There are various ways this can be done such as a green manure crop cover.

3.) Soil should be light, crumbly and fluffy. If soil is dense and compact then the plant is using more energy on its roots than vegetative growth. Poke the soil to your third knuckle and if your soil fails this test add some peatmoss(which is acidic) to lighten it and add lime to make the pH less acidic.

 

4.) Compost is the best amendment you can give your soil. This adds organic nutrients to make a good soil for best gardening results. The author recommends waiting a few weeks before planting planting the next crop to ensure that none of the compost nutrients are flushed through the soil during rain.

 

5.) Use organic fertilizer over chemical fertilizer. Chemical-based fertilizers do not treat the soil unlike organic fertilizer. The author recommends Canola meal, a fine material which is easy to distribute over the soil and is relatively affordable. Make sure to store the bag well-sealed in a dry, safe place where mice can't get into it.

6.) Phosphate is essential for growth. After a couple years you will need to add a source of phosphorus to show steady, vigorous growth and earlier maturity. Rock phosphate is rich in boron, zinc, nickel and iodine.

These are some simple tips to help your soil be the best that it can be and cause you to spend more time harvesting than weeding or dealing with plant pests and diseases.

 

http://eartheasy.com/blog/2012/01/6-tips-for-building-soil-for-your-raised-garden-beds-and-planters/

NEW! Water bottle filling station in the Lair

 

Located outside the ASG Office next to the Food Bank

 I'm happy to announce that we now have the first of hopefully many water bottle filling stations in the Lair at SCC brought to you by your student government and facilities!

Picture of the week - May 2nd 2014

I see you!

A cute little gosling that I found the other day. Another fun part of spring!