Thirteen green thumbs up for the Urban Gardening class at Hilltop High School

 

A small group of students from Hilltop High School have shown just how green their thumbs can be after growing around 400 vegetable and flower plants since February. The Urban Gardening class, led by science teacher Mrs. Long, has been working very hard and grade 10 student Luke Mitchell said he enjoyed learning as much as he did.

“We learned so many things about all the different kinds of tomatoes like how to prune them. Some of them you have to take off the little sucker so that the fruit will grow and then you have to take a paintbrush and brush the flowers to pollinate them.” He said he wants to have his own big garden with flowers, cucumbers, tomatoes, and peppers.

Altogether, 13 students took part in the class and each one grew several different varieties. “I grew two different types of tomatoes: Tiny Tim and Yellow Pear, and then I grew a few flowers. The Tiny Tim’s were my favourite because I actually just ate a tomato off it yesterday and it was really good,” smiled Trystan Gunsch in grade 10. “It’s really rewarding because you grew it and you started it from a seed so that’s all on you to take care of it. This class was really cool.”

Just before Mother’s Day, the students held a plant sale, and student Scott Jorgensen said people from all over Whitecourt came in and bought plants from them. Money raised from the sale will be used for several different things such as soil and pots for next year, including a trip. “These students are actually taking a fully paid trip to Edmonton to see a nursery and two other greenhouses. They are also making their last two projects which will be a large container of flowers and an indoor terrarium,” explained Mrs. Long.

“It’s been a lot of growing and a lot of learning on everybody’s part just on how to grow them better. We had Cathy from McLeod Valley Greenhouses (retired) come up and give us some expert advice which we will be able to use next year, too,” she added.

Two students, Lisa Coffee and Catelynn Lewis also donated 10 plants to the Wellspring Family Resource & Crisis Centre and even personally planted them in the backyard garden at the centre. Lisa said seeing the process of the plants growing from tiny seeds was very fulfilling. She said that prior to the class she hadn’t done a lot of gardening but that she plans on doing more. “I’ve done quite a lot of it now and I would definitely keep it up.”

With the first semester of Urban Gardening coming to a close, Mrs. Long is happy to report that interest in it has skyrocketed throughout the school. In fact, almost 100 students have put their names in to take part next year. That’s almost a quarter of the school! “We’re hoping that we can get a greenhouse either on school property or on a different site that we can go to.” She said being contained in the school for growing purposes isn’t the greatest environment and that she is looking forward to seeing the program grow, just like the plants.

As of this paper’s printing there are still a few plants left for purchase. Call Hilltop High School to purchase any of the remaining plants.