Bulb Planting Begins!

Hello All! Today we began planting bulbs on campus! We had been waiting for the daytime tempuratures to consistently be around 65 or slightly below, and those days have finally come! The first to go into the ground are the Dutch Master Tulips and the Giant Crocus.
Please enjoy the Bulb Demonstration Video.

Next week we learn how to use the bulb auger! (We learn everything by hand first!)

Fall Business Council Meeting

On Friday October 17 CATEC's Director, Darah Bonham, and myself, Mrs. Greenberg, met with our Business Council. This is a group of business leaders in the Green Industry from our local community. These invaluable people give us valuable feedback on our course structure and offer advice on how to improve. This most recent meeting included representatives from Waynesboro Nurseries, PVCC, Ian Robertson Ltd., Snow's Nurseries, and JW Townsend. Links to all of our Business Council members can be found on our blog.
THANK YOU TO ALL WHO ATTENDED!

Planet Earth

Yesterday, Wednesday October 15, began our classroom viewing of the "Planet Earth" series created by the BBC and viewed here in the states on the Discovery Channel. We began with the episode entitled "Pole to Pole". The episode showed the earth from top to bottom, focusing mainly on the sun's influence on the earth. As the year progresses we will view the entire 12 part series.
As an instructor I feel that in order to truly convey the importance of environmental stewardship my students need to be aware of a world beyond their front door. This series provides us with an opportunity to view parts of the world we will never visit, and allows for open dialogue on a wide range of topics, in an informative and entertaining manner.
As we view more episodes we will add our thoughts and learning moments here on our blog!

STUDENTS AND BLOG VISITORS- After viewing the first episode of the series, what were three things that you found really cool or interesting? Of those three, which would you like to learn more about?

Compost put to work!

As some of you may know we have created a Composting Program with our Culinary Arts students. They bring us vegetable and fruit scraps from the kitchen and we add them to leaves, pine needles, pruning scraps, and grass clippings that we collect; all of it goes into the composter!

This program has yielded some beautiful product which we added to a raised bed that we have been working on since last year. The bed runs alongside a portion of our school building. The first layer of material put down included clumps of sod that we had after several of our edging and planting projects. We turned the sod clumps upside-down to smother the grass. Upon that layer we added leaf compost, generously donated by UVA Grounds management. Upon that layer was added our very on compost. To finish off the look the students mulched with a layer of pine needles gathered from out own campus. We hope to create a drought resistant annual and perennial flower garden this spring!

STUDENTS and BLOG VISITORS - To create this bed we used materials found here on campus, and donated materials, making this a "free" landscaping project. With this in mind, how might you approach new projects assigned at school, or new projects that come up at home? Please answer using the "comments" option.