Seed sale will benefit community garden

Local students are excited about the prospect of cultivating another Community Garden this summer. They’re getting a head start by conducting a seed sale.

Seeds being sold include beans, beets, carrots, corn, cucumber, eggplant, lettuce, peppers, radishes, spinach, squash, zucchini, watermelon and dill. There are also seeds for flowers. Seed packets sell for 89 cents each.

“The program receives all the profits, which is the nice thing about it,” said Carrie Bowman, Extension youth educator. “Whatever we make goes into the garden.”

She noted that the seeds selected for sale are those which can be easily grown in northcentral Pennsylvania.

Last summer, the 4-H Science of Gardening program engaged children in grades four through in basic botany and horticulture. They planted, fertilized, weeded, harvested, sold their produce in the local farm market, and contributed shares to a senior care facility. Crops were grown without the use of pesticides. Crop rotations, composting, and cover crops are being used to move the garden toward organic certification in the next three years.

A weather station was installed to relate growing degree-days, insect degree-days, and disease occurrences to crop phenology. The students experienced “hands-on” the timing of insect arrivals, fungal diseases, pollination processes, cover crops, and the role of crop rotations in soil health and quality.

The students also began a pollinator garden; aisles between the grapes in the main garden feature cover crops that are attractive to honeybees. Location of the garden provides lessons on growing crops in “frost-pockets,” cold climates and the techniques to extend the growing season.

The garden was developed on a site where the former Maple View county home burned in 1992, and demonstrates the concept of reclaiming human-disturbed soils.

For more information, to receive a catalog or order seeds, email cbb136@psu.edu or call 274-8540.