Straw or Hay?

I notice that many folks use the terms "straw" and "hay" interchangeably.

One way to remember the difference is to recall that parental reprimand: "Hey is for horses". Hay is an animal feed. It usually refers to grass family plants: ryegrass, timothy, or fescue. However, it can also include legumes such as alfalfa or clover. Hay is cut and stored by farmers to feed their animals when grazing on pasture is limited or unavailable.

Straw, on the other hand, is made up of only the stalks of grain plants, typically wheat, oat or barley. These stalks are what's left once the seed head is removed for consumption. Straw is used for animal bedding, and in our case, for mulching our garden beds and adding to the compost pile. Our compost is largely made up of horse manure and straw.

As you can see in the photo, we're using straw bale raised beds. These beds seem to last about two years before the bales sag too much to provide stability. Straw bale beds are cheap to make (straw bales cost $7-$9 each at feed supply stores, or, can often be found for free around town - especially after Halloween).

We use six bales tied together to make a rectangular shaped bed. The straw does a nice job holding and imparting moisture to the bed as well. Once the straw bales are too saggy to support the dirt, we take apart the structure, use the straw in our compost, and save the soil for the next straw bale bed.

The funny thing about this photo is that clearly this bale wasn't 100% straw. There were seed heads left behind on the field and then baled in with the straw. Once the rain came, those seed heads sprouted. I notice the same phenomenon when I lay down fresh straw for our chickens at home. They scratch through it looking for those furtive, nutritious kernels.

What's new in the raised beds?

Over the past couple weeks the students have planted some new vegetables in the raised beds at the Tower Garden.

To the right are the lettuce plants that have been growing throughout this blog. Here they are interspersed with full grown heads. Lettuce is a good plant to keep growing at varied stages - that way you'll always have enough for a salad, whether you want full grown leaves or a spring mix that you make by harvesting one or two small leaves from many plants.

We've also put in cabbages, both green and purple.

Our celery is doing really well. The students planted these last spring. They've grown beautifully if a little slowly! We harvest the celery by the stalk and sometimes by the whole plant.

Transplanted Lettuce, February 3rd, 2012

Ahhh, now the lettuce can stretch its arms!

After we discussed the accidentally crowded conditions, some of the K2 children worked to transplant the crowded lettuces. Transplanting is another job that challenges the fine motor skills of the children. Often, over-eager fingers push and pull the small plants, causing the stems to break. Planting extra seeds compensates for these losses. Also, I find it works better for the adult helpers to prick out the seedlings from their original home, and lay them out on a damp paper towel in the shade where the children can pick them up one at a time.

Before they choose their seedling, however, the children take a slender stick and poke a hole in the soil deep enough for the root to slide right down. Then, with their slender stick, the children gently poke the soil around the plant to firmly support the seeding.

You can see that our lettuce seeds now have plenty of room to grow. If we only wanted to harvest young leaves for a lettuce mix, we could allow the plants to grow in these conditions, but, if we're looking to grow a full lettuce head, they'll need to be transplanted once again and given even more room to themselves.

I have wanted wooden seed start boxes for many years to enable us to move away from the brittle and disposable plastic cell packs. This year, the 3rd grade children are making me lots of boxes from an old fence one of the woodworking parents lives near. The boxes are roomy and just right to grow lots of seeds in a roomy manner.

Also, you can see our cold frame that we built two summers ago. It is made of untreated redwood and a sheet of plastic to create a hinged top. It gets quite warm in there so I always leave it open for ventilation (usually about 4 inches). However, this invites the slugs, too. Everyday I have to look in there to make sure I don't see any telltale slime trails.

Too Crowded! February 2nd, 2012

Take a look at the overcrowded cells here.

Planting precise quantities of small seeds is a good exercise in small motor skills and counting for the children. As you can see, it's a challenge! I find the most successful cell pack planting comes with larger seeds like peas or beans, ones the children can carefully keep track of as they lay them in the soil.

However, our garden grows all kinds of plants, so I challenge the children to try planting "just a few" when it comes to tiny seeds like lettuce.

When the seeds are too crowded I liken it to sharing a chair with a dozen other children. There would just be too many children to get any drawing, eating, or chopping done. Bodies would be this way and that, all struggling to find support from that one chair.

This is similar to how the lettuce plants must scratch it out if they are planted too closely. Their roots get tangled, there is competition for food and water, and plants that can't stretch and grow end up stunted.

I showed K2 this cell pack when they came back to the garden today. The children remembered planting the lettuce seeds in January and were surprised to see just how many seeds fell into one hole and none into another! Looking at a lopsided cell pack like this is a great way for the kids to remember how to spread the seeds out better the next time. When we plant small seeds again, I can refer to the crowded cell where the lettuce plants were fighting to share just one seat at the table.