Blog Post #8

Poly (culture) Pocket coming back at you with another blog post! 

Week 8 has brought the team both challenges and triumphs as we continue to nurture our garden.

First off, the most disappointing news: our bunching onions didn’t sprout. We suspect this might be due to old seeds, but regardless, we quickly got to work replanting. Fortunately, Dr. Merchant had some ready-to-go seedlings in the greenhouse, making the transplanting process smooth. This approach should yield quicker results—hopefully by the end of the semester we'll see growth! In addition to the onions, we also decided to experiment by planting spinach seeds at the front of the garden. We’re eager to see what happens and continue playing around with these new crops!

With the onion problem sorted, the team had to bulk up on fertilizer, especially for our tomatoes which are still looking kinda wimpy. We applied a slow-release fertilizer across most of the plot, excluding the newly transplanted onions and spinach. We’re optimistic this will give our crops the boost they need, especially our pumpkins, which seem to be struggling as they’re overshadowed by their neighbors. While we embraced the Three Sisters planting method, the close spacing might be hindering growth more than helping for some of our more sensitive crops.

On a brighter note, our crop cover (hay) has effectively kept the weeds under control! Although hand weeding has become a bit trickier due to the cover, we’re glad we laid it down when we did. Our trellis structure is also thriving; while the tomatoes aren’t producing an abundance of fruit just yet, they’re growing stronger and more upright. We’re hopeful that the slow-release fertilizer will help them flourish soon.

Insects are something we talked a lot about last week, these critters are still abundant, but they're still not causing too many problems besides a few bitten leaves. The team is overjoyed we didn't have to face any infestations. 

As the weather warms up and the rainfall from the recent hurricanes subsides, the Poly (culture) Pocket team is excited about what lies ahead for our plot. We can’t wait to see what next week brings and are thrilled to have you along for the journey!

Thanks for reading and see you next week!

Photo captions (left to right, down to up): 

1. In this photo, team member Daniel Ohana can be seen spreading fertilizer throughout the plot, specifically on the corn crops. During the week, we noticed our plants looking a bit weak, so we decided to give them a boost with some fertilizer. Fertilizer was applied most heavily on the corn and tomato crops in the hopes of giving them a head start so we could harvest sooner. 

2. A silly photo of team member Daniel Ohana leaving the plot after a long day of gardening and maintenance 

3. Developing squash foliage. So far, none of the squash has shown signs of fruiting but the leaves are looking healthy and lush with large green leaves spreading about and covering the bottom portion of our Three sisters section of the plot. The squash provides a significant amount of shade coverage for our plants, allowing for better water retention.

4. Team member Kensley Greene retying our trellis structure for the tomato crops. Since our last update, the tomatoes have fallen over slightly and in turn, have loosened the twine that kept them growing in the correct direction. We had to correct this multiple times and tie the twine tighter each time we saw the plants growing toward the ground. 

5. Similar to the last photo, this image demonstrates the issues we faced in regards to our trellis approach. This one features team members Phillip Shaske, Daniel Ohana, and Kensley Greene. There was not a specific way to tie the ties, meaning everyone had a different way of securing the rope which caused for a bit of difficulty when it came time to tighten the strings. 

6. and 7. A picture of two insects, one of them being a lady bug the other looking like some sort of weevil. Insects were abundant in the garden and this day was no exception. They roamed freely throughout the plot and only minimal damage was seen on the foliage of our crops with a majority of the damage being visible on the tomato and corn crops.