By Susan Lesh
This fall our Sunday School, the Family & Friends Circle, is tending its flourishing pollinator garden.
Last spring the Family & Friends Circle helped to create a teaching garden as a living laboratory in the long planter box in our playground. First, they cleaned out the box, raking and removing many leaves, stones, and tired soil, and used trowels to dig down and make some room for fresh new topsoil. Their gardening supplies and native plants were purchased with a $743 grant, secured by Leader Curt Collier, from the Hardy Plant Society/Mid-Atlantic Group.
The Family & Friends Circle learned that native plants are important for several reasons: They help sustain biodiversity and resilient landscapes, they require less water, and they provide a vital habitat for birds and other wildlife, including pollinators. They also help reduce air pollution by absorbing carbon dioxide and producing oxygen, they promote healthy soil, and require no additional fertilization. On top of all that, they bring beauty and joy to our grounds!
In May, we planted grey goldenrod, purple coneflower, rudbeckia, blazing star, swamp milkweed, and common milkweed. Our community enjoyed the beautiful colors as these plants flourished throughout the summer.
Seeds will be saved and replanted
As a next step in sustaining our garden, today the Family & Friends Circle began to gather the seeds from the plants that have reached their peak bloom. They secured them in labeled envelopes and will save them for replanting next spring.
We were in the garden early and some groups found a couple of sleeping bees nestled in the plant heads. Yay! Pollinators are using our garden and our effort to help make a more sustainable, biodiverse world is yielding wonderful results.
Susan Lesh is a longtime member of the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County.