Growing to learn
Madalyn Krill, a fourth-grader at Butler Catholic School, 515 E. Locust St., was pointing out the names of the school garden's new chickens.
“The two black ones are Olive and Rose, the copper one is Penny and the white one is Oreo,” Madalyn said.
Oreo and her friends are the latest additions to the school's garden, which has grown from a couple of raised garden plots put together by Eagle Scout Justin Higgins several years ago to today's vegetable gardens, compost bin, pollinator garden, fruit trees and strawberry and rhubarb patches.
But unlike the recently added peach, apple and pear trees, the chickens might not become permanent residents of the garden.
“They arrived the week of Easter on a two-month rental,” said Kathy Dudley, the school's director of development. The four birds are from Rent The Chicken, based in Sarver.
The chickens are on track to go back to Sarver during the second week in June. This year's flock is a tryout to see if chickens might be added on a permanent basis.
They may be at the school on a trial basis, but the Garden Club, whose student members maintain and oversee the garden, have already benefited from the chickens' presence.
Dudley said the Garden Club members have been treated to scrambled eggs and breakfast burritos made with eggs from Penny and her friends.
Whatever the outcome, Butler Catholic School's garden has come a long way from when it was merely unused space on the east side of the building.Higgins built some raised garden beds as part of his Eagle Scout project. The garden plots sprouted over the years to include a 160-foot-long pollinator garden filled with bee- and butterfly- attracting flowering plants, strawberries and rhubarb patches.The garden is overseen and maintained by the Garden Club, made up of students from the third, fourth and fifth grades who weed, prune and harvest after school and on weekends. Membership is open to any student interested in joining.The club is led by Justine Brown, a Penn State Master Gardener of Butler County.“I have the educational background to work with the kids,” Brown said.Because of pandemic restrictions, Brown has been unable to give the garden club members the training they need to become official Junior Master Gardeners through Texas A&M University as they have in the past.Brown has said working in the garden is combined with lesson plans to grow the students' interest in home gardening and eating healthy.“Things they would have turned their nose up at — asparagus, broccoli, kale and cauliflower — they actually get to see how they grow and get to taste them,” Brown said.Guerin Hammonds, a fourth-grader, was working in the garden recently.“I love digging out the weeds, but it is very hard, especially when you have to dig out the roots.“The dandelions and the worms we give to the chickens, the rest of the weeds we put in the compost bin,” Guerin said.
Other Butler Catholic teachers use the garden's space for outdoor classes or, in the case of Jennifer Friel, fifth-grade science teacher, to illustrate and bring to life science lessons.“We love it,” Friel said. “We're fortunate to have this lovely area.”She said her students make observations that they record in their science journals. Classmates germinate seeds and use their magnifying glasses.“We just did a unit on flowers and pollination,” Friel said.A fourth-grade unit on life cycles saw the class hatching caterpillar eggs, which will be passed onto another class to be nurtured into caterpillars and chrysalises.Dudley said as the vegetable garden begins to produce its bounty of carrots, lettuce, herbs and beets, the produce will be used in the school cafeteria's salad bar.Other produce will be given to the Society of St. Vincent de Paul food bank.“Every time you turn around, Kathy (Dudley) has something new here,” Brown said.She said that plans call for the construction of a small greenhouse on the garden at the end of the school year.
