Extreme Makeover:  Lady Garden Edition

Campus Trash Clean-up

The class “policed” the back end of campus with pick-up sticks (which they made themselves) and trash bags. Working in small groups, they gathered more trash than they thought possible.  This activity was repeated weekly by small groups throughout the spring and will begin again in the fall.  A proposed clean campus awareness campaign will make the task of trash pick-up less burdensome by then.

Pictured below: Sean Carney and Erik Wielechowski, student project leader; Caitlin Doherty; John Entwhistle, Caitlin, Sean, Erik and Paris Adolphus.

Visitation Greenhouse

In collaboration with Mercy Works, the greenhouse at Visitation House is being refurbished to full function to grow vegetables for Manna on Main Street, which provides a soup kitchen and food cupboard to individuals in need. Students participated in the clean-up of the greenhouse and planting of vegetables. Currently, funding is being sought for a new, larger green house which will make it better suited for growth and upkeep on a larger scale.

Pictured below:  John, Caitlin, and Paris; Erik and Sean.

Lady Garden

Students pulled weeds and moved some plants during the first Lady Garden assessment/clean up.  A large and surprisingly healthy growth of daffodils greeted workers alerting them to the stamina of some kinds of perennial plants, including a pack of wild mint, which had smothered most other vegetation and will remain a nuisance for at least the rest of this year. During later sessions, students planted perennials and then annuals to start the growth of this season’s bounty.  Some space in the Lady Garden was devoted to beans and herbs to augment the vegetables grown in the green house for donation to Manna. 

Pictured below:  Chelsea Wilson and Stacey Westerfer; Caitlin and Erik

Pictured below:  Jessica Rufe; Amy Hellman; Sister Anne Donigan, Mary Ballinger and John

Pictured below:  Mary and John; Laura Howell

The future

Weeding and watering in summer on an irregular schedule will keep the Garden and greenhouse in good shape.  In fall, students will reassess, re-plan, and plant some bulbs and shrubs before winter.  Harvests of vegetables in the Garden and in the greenhouse will proceed until frost. 

In spring, members of the class of 2011 who inaugurated the projects will train the members of the class of 2012 who will assume their roles in clean up, gardening, and green house planting.  And the Lady Garden will blossom with the many perennials planted so tenderly by the class of 2011 in time for their graduation in May.