Bugs in the Garden!

This past week at the garden, volunteers led students on a bug hunt! The students were able to learn about bugs and their different roles in the garden and in the food web.  After searching the garden, we found a variety of different bugs including bees, grubs, ladybugs, spiders, rolly-pollys, and centipedes.  We captured as many as we could in containers and then talked about whether the bugs we found are beneficial or detrimental to the garden. We discussed the four common roles of bugs in the garden. These include decomposers, pollinators, garden helper's and garden pests. I was very impressed with the groups' knowledge of pollinators as well as the beneficial qualities of worms in the soil. Luckily, we found bugs from each of the four categories so the students were able to observe the bugs while learning about their role in the garden!  At the end of the lesson, the students determined which bugs should be placed back into the garden and which should be disposed of.  Not only were the students able to learn about bugs and the garden food web, but they assisted in eliminating pests from the garden. What an excellent method of natural pest control!


Andrea Jannotta

Edible Peace Patch Featured Plant No 4: Broccoli!

Welcome to the third posting in a series called the

Edible Peace Patch Featured Plant 

Broccoli (Brassica Oleracea)

Identification:  Found in many of our schoolyard gardens, broccoli is an edible plant in the cabbage family, whose large flowering head is used as a vegetable. Broccoli has large, dark green flower heads that are arranged in a tree-like structure on branches sprouting from a thick, edible stem. A mature plant grows to be about 24-30 inches tall and bears about 4-10 inches of flower head. The mass of flower heads is surrounded by leathery leaves, which are also edible!

Growing Conditions:  Broccoli is a cool-season crop and can germinate in soil with temperatures as low as 40ºF. It requires full sun as well as fertile, moist, and slightly acidic soil in order to flourish. The mostly sandy, basic soil found here in Pinellas County means that composting and adding organic material to the soil is essential for growing broccoli.  It is also important to provide consistent soil moisture with regular watering.  Plant them 1 or 2 feet apart, 1/8 inch deep in early spring, late summer, or early fall.

History: Native to the Medditeranean, broccoli was cultivated in Italy in ancient Roman times and was then introduced to England in the early 1700’s and then to America in colonial times.  However, it wasn’t until the past century that broccoli gained popularity in the United States.

What’s so special?

1. The stem, flower, and leaves are all edible.

2. Broccoli has a very low calorie level, providing just 34 calories per 100 g.

3. Fresh Broccoli is a storehouse of many phyto-nutrients such as thiocyanates, indoles, sulforaphane, isothiocyanates and flavonoids like beta-carotene cryptoxanthin, lutein, and zea-xanthin. Studies have shown that these compounds by modifying positive signaling at molecular receptor levels help protect from prostate, colon, urinary bladder, pancreatic, and breast cancers.

4. Broccoli is a good source of minerals like calcium, manganese, iron, magnesium, selenium, zinc, and phosphorus.

5. Broccoli contains large amounts of the anti-oxidant vitamin, vitamin-A. About 100 g of broccoli provides 21% of recommended daily levels. Vitamin A also helps maintain integrity of skin and mucus membranes and is essential for healthy eyesight. 

6. There is an enzyme in broccoli called myrosinase which can reduce the risk of developing cancer. The enzyme works by changing sulfur-based chemicals found in broccoli (called glucosinolates) into isothiocyanates (other sulfur-containing chemicals), which have anticancer properties.

Personal Note:
Though cooked broccoli is extra delicious, try just lightly steaming the broccoli to fully benefit from all its vitamins, minerals, and enzymes. Like many other vegetables, over-cooking broccoli is said to decrease the health benefits of this plant. 

Stay tuned for the next Edible Peace Patch Featured Plant!

Parts of the Plant!

Last week at Campbell Park, students and volunteers engaged in garden activities regarding parts of the plant! These parts included the roots, the stem, the leaf, and the flower. To better understand these parts, and their functions in the garden, we observed the various plants at Campbell. We observed their differences, their similarities, and the importance of their roots, stems, leaves, and flowers.

After observing the various plants and their parts, volunteers assisted students in harvesting some of these very plants to take home! Plants harvested include collard greens, broccoli, mustard greens, green onions, kale, arugula, and a couple strawberries! Volunteers and students alike were pleased with the knowledge acquired through this experiential learning process, and the opportunity to take home fresh organic produce for the students and their families! What a successful week.

We'll see you in the garden,

Kelli Harper

Join our Earth Day Workday

The Edible Peace Patch Project

invites you to join our

Earth Day Garden Workday

Saturday, April 19th

9 am - 1 pm

We'll be meeting at Campbell Park Elementary, 

1051 7^th Avenue South, St. Pete, 33705

Morning refreshments will be provided.

Bring along your family and your gardening tools!

RSVP by signing up at http://www.signupgenius.com/go/10C0C45ABAA23A0FE3-spring

See you there!

Photo of mushroom at Campbell Park Elementary Peace Patch by Noah Schlager

The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings. —Masanobu Fukuoka

Today was a quiet day, as we had only three kids join us, but we got a lot done since we could direct them and work with them more one on one. We go a bunch of cucumbers and lettuce planted, cut out some mistletoe, and are seeing much more diversity of crops growing in the garden. It was great to see the kids focusing and actually accomplishing tasks rather than just messing around. I really enjoyed that we could just have calm and thoughtful conversations while we worked, and it made me realize it is not only the garden that is becoming more mature. 

—Noah Schlager

Caring for Creation

Thank you Missio Dei!  On Sunday, a half dozen members of this local fellowship met at Campbell Park and put their hands to work.

They weeded and cleaned our beds, helping our tomatoes and eggplants and greens feel more spacious in the soil where they grow.

They blessed our garden with care and prayer and gave themselves the opportunity to perform the hope they feel.

From our very beginnings, Missio Dei has been there, supporting us with their mission, sending hands to our gardens, carrying in us in their thoughts.

The faith they placed in the Peace Patch mission at our outset made the many sacrifices that keep this organization afloat possible and willfully performed.  They have asked us to show the way and to provide the means, and we have daily delivered.

Thank you Missio Dei for your faith and for your hands.  Thank you for allowing us to serve.

Kip Curtis

Founder and Executive Director

What I stand for is what I stand on. —Wendell Berry

So often all we do it talk. We all know how we are going to change the world, yet it seems so few of us truly believe it enough to act. Talk is fun, talk engages the mind, and I am not above talk. I'll be the first to admit I'd rather grab a book or debate with my roommate then grab a shovel or put myself on the political stage. Yet if talk does not lead to picking up a shovel then all we've done is add more carbon to the air. Today I had little choice but to talk and think, as an out of season thunderstorm made its way through St. Petersburg. It kept me inside at my desk drinking homemade Moroccan mint tea and reading on soil amendments, with my window slightly cracked to hear the rain patter. I'm not going to lie, I was a bit relieved that I had a day by my desk rather than in the garden. As much as I love the boys we work with, working with them is one of the greatest challenges I've faced in my life. It is also one of the most rewarding, but that does not change the fact that it remains a challenge. Its kind of reminds me of myths I've encountered around working out or hard labor. There seems to be a myth that you eventually reach a point when the work out or labor comes to you so naturally that it no longer causes strain or resistance. I have never found this to be true, and certainly don't think good work is done without strain. Without strain you are just one of those people who strolls on the treadmill while salivating over the food network playing on the wall. You can get accustomed to it, but the strain and involved in good work never just disappears. Thus, while I am happy to have a rainy day, to support these boys and our garden we all need to remember the work we must put in. Then we wont need so much talk, as a garden full of strong minds and hardy plants says it all.

—Noah Schlager