What I have Learnt...Shane

Shane Vincent - Room 4

• Worms produce worm juice and it has to be the right strength before it gets put on the garden otherwise the plants will be harmed and the leaves will fall off
• worm poo is called CASTINGS.
• I learnt a lot about hydroponics - First we got some bottles and drilled some holes in them and cut some holes for the seedlings. These plants live off the nutrients from the worm juice. Worm juice seems to be better than sheep pellets for our hydroponic system
• Watercress is edible!
• Hot houses makes plants grow better
• Herbs grow very well inside a plastic bottle.
• I have really enjoyed coming to school to do the gardening roster

What I have Learnt...Ohara

Ohara Benseman - Room 4

• I have learnt that there are lots of different garden mixes available in the shops and they are good for all different things.
• Worm juice is very good for the plants
• When a plant dies all the nutrients break down into compost
• All plants need light to grow
• Organic compost is good for the veges and worm juice is good for the hydroponics.
• Or sprout man grows very fast and seeds will grow through a wide weave
• The garden vege mix is the best for veges only
• Plants grow faster in the hot house and the hot-house needs to be a constant temperature.
• I learnt so much that I went home and made a self raising garden and I planted a lot of strawberries.     (15 out of 25 pupils from Room 4 created their own gardens because of all they have learnt!!)

sprout man!

We have a new addition to our garden. He is Sprout Man!
Mr and Mrs Young helped the children make this wonderful creation. We used onion bags, material a pot planter, and sacks filled with dirt, compost and potting mix. Mr Young helped form the 'human shape' and then he was liberally sprinkled with salad sprouts, cress etc.

What I have Learnt ...Riley

Riley McMurtry - Room 4

What I have learnt in the 2012 Tui Garden Competition

• If you plant plants in winter and put them in a hot-house they will be ready for summer.
• Potting mix is very good for punnets
• I never knew that even a drop of worm juice touches a plant's leaf it will burn the leaf
• We have found that worm juice works better in the hydroponic system than water and sheep-poo.
• When the sun shines the hot-house stores the heat, but only enough to make the seedlings comfy. Too hot and they would DIE

What I have Learnt...Ting

Ting Kwok, Room 4
What I have learnt is a mouthful to say about gardening!

• Worm juice and poo (castings) can help a garden grow because of all the nutrients in it.
• All plants need the right amount of sun and water - otherwise they will die.
• We can recycle and or dispose of lots of things to prevent them causing harm to wild life - such as plastic bottles, bottle caps/lids, tyres, rope, plastic bags, polystyrene, fishing line and fishing nets.
• I also learnt that a hot house is useful to baby plants (seedlings) because it is just the right temperature for themso they won't die of heat or be drowned.
• We all agreed that the Tui Seed Raising Mix is better than potting mix.
• We have a wall of hydroponic lettuces. We pour diluted worm castings into the plastic bottles and they seem to be thriving. We have learnt that the worm juice is very powerful and if it comes into contact with the leaves it can burn them!
• Last year I knew nothing about soil NOW I know that there are different types of soils and different types can do funny things to plants, like change their colour.