OUR GARDEN
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Ms. Solomon, our school’s science lead, let us use a raised bed in the school garden for a xeriscape garden. We will use it as a means of teaching that drought tolerant plants can be beautiful and full of color! There are LOTS of beautiful plants that are drought tolerant (needing little water to survive) that fit in a xeriscaped garden.
<<<--------- THIS IS A XERISCAPED GARDEN!
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<<<--------- THIS IS A XERISCAPED GARDEN!
Xeriscaping is when you design your garden to reduce the needs of water from irrigation. It is water wise landscaping!
Specific plants depend upon the micro-climate (sunny or shady). These Hydrozones define where you cluster plants that have the same needs together.
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<<<---------- A drought tolerant landscape doesn’t need to be brown dirt with a cactus or two planted in the middle!
<<<---------- A drought tolerant landscape doesn’t need to be brown dirt with a cactus or two planted in the middle!
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<<<----------There are LOTS of beautiful plants that are drought tolerant (needing little water to survive) that fit in a xeriscaped garden. Click here to visit our Reference Page. Discover many drought tolerant plants that grow well in Menlo Park, CA.
<<<----------There are LOTS of beautiful plants that are drought tolerant (needing little water to survive) that fit in a xeriscaped garden. Click here to visit our Reference Page. Discover many drought tolerant plants that grow well in Menlo Park, CA.
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Step 1: Pulling out all the garden bullies (weeds)
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Step 2: Planning out our Microzones for our garden.
One area is for succulents that need really porous soil (we mixed in sand for this area).
The other zones are simply planted by "type of plant" because the hydrozone was the same in our small planter box.
Types of plants for our sections are succulents, annuals, perennials, & grasses.
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Step 3: Doing some Math to decide how much soil we need to purchase (to fill the planter box up to the top) |
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Step 4: Amending our soil to match the needs of the plant (adding sand to certain areas for better drainage) Please look at our moisture test for this area after a rain. The sandy soil was much drier and healthier for the succulents. Click here for a science experiment, where we prove that sand helped drainage in the succulent side of the garden--tested after a rainstorm.
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Step 5: Planting our Garden.
Sections were marked off with white flour by Mrs. Colby, who had come to help us plant our garden. Click here for pictures of our garden from start to finish.
Sections were marked off with white flour by Mrs. Colby, who had come to help us plant our garden. Click here for pictures of our garden from start to finish.
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Step 6: Checking the level of moisture a week later, after a rain storm.
It's looking good because the area that we added sand to (for the succulents) is much less moist than the rest of the garden.
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Step 7: Maintain our garden, and wait for it to fully grow into a beautiful mini-landscape!