Episode 2506

- [Voiceover] These young people are learning various aspects of sustainable farming at Trevecca Nazarene University's Summer Urban Farming Camp. Plus, we have a showcase of great garden ferns. Stay tuned! Worms, chickens, dirt, and a beekeeper suit. What fun!

- I can't tell you how excited I am because today I get to go back to camp. I'm out here at Trevecca University in the summer for Farm Camp where a variety of ages, from fifth grade and up, get to learn a whole host of techniques, from permaculture to beekeeping. And I'm along for the ride, and we're gonna see how much fun we can get into today. Well, Jason, what are we learning here today?

- Each day they learn how to take care of one particular animal or livestock that we have, so today we're doing bees. We're getting into the beehives. We get suited up. Each afternoon we watch a film about either food policy or nutrition. Yesterday we watched a film about bees, and so today we're gonna get into the hive and actually see it with our eyes.

- Fantastic!

- [Jason] We have a full-day camp. It's 7:30 to 3:30. And they learn a new skill every day: how to build a garden, how to plant a tree, how to build a compost pile. Today they're doing morning chores. We come out here every morning and take care of the greenhouse. We feed the fish in our aquaponic system.

- Inside here?

- Inside the greenhouse we have three aquaponics tanks. And so they feed the fish and make sure the water levels are good, they water the plants. And now they're doing a little bit of weeding out here in the gardens.

- [Matt] Tell me a little bit about the beginnings of farm camp and kinda how it operates.

- [Jason] Well, we started the farm camp because the farm has really started to help the community learn how to grow good food, and so we wanted to reach out to our neighborhood and the local schools and invite children, youth in during their summer times to learn how to do everything that we do here, which is everything from taking care of animals like pigs, chickens. We have livestock guardian dogs and goats.

- [Matt] Nice.

- Our fish, our worms, our bees. And then the permaculture gardens we have, the orchard, and the vegetable garden. So in a week we try to teach them as much of all of those techniques as we can.

- I'll wear this!

- [Boy] Let's do it! I cannot see anything up here.

- I feel like the monster under the bed.

- [Jason] Boys, come with me! OK, guys, if you'll look over here, I'm gonna start the smoker.

- [Boy] Start the smoker!

- We're not gonna be in there long, so we're just gonna put some pine needles and woodchips, and then we close it up. And then, smoke comes out of here. Another reason that this works is bees communicate, well, how do they communicate?

- Well, there's one reason, to make them calm sometimes.

- Makes them calm. One reason is they spread alarm bells by smell, not sound. So if they can't smell, if we're blocking their radar with the smoke, then they can't communicate alarm, they can't communicate distress. And so here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna open up the top of the hive, we're gonna drop a little smoke in there, and let them think about it. And they're gonna spread the word around: "Hey, there's something goin on." Bees build off of this pattern and make little pots to put their honey in. Then they cap them off, and that's called capped honey.

- [Boy] I think this is worth the sweat.

- [Boy] I know, this is really cool!

- [Matt] What are we doing here today?

- Well, right now we are doing what we call sifting. And what we're doing is we're taking this fantastic dirt down here that's just covered in mulch and is all clumped up; and it's essentially chicken manure because this is where our chickens usually do their business, it's where they are most of the time. And so we're shoveling it up. And what it does, it goes through this once. Spinning it breaks it down. And we have buckets and a wheelbarrow down here to collect it. And what we're gonna do with that is take it up and use it to make garden beds out of.

- [Matt] You get to do a little housekeeping as well as introduction of some good old-fashioned hen manure compost.

- Yes. Last year I did farm camp, and this is my second year interning. And really, Jason does most of the teaching, but I help like reinforce things; I help set things up; I help the kids; I teach them some things that I can.

- So we're learning so many good methodologies here at farm camp. How are you incorporating them in your own home or lifestyle?

- I think one of the things that we teach them the most is how to maintain garden beds and just things in general. One of the things I've learned how to do is take care of chickens. So after last year, I have four chickens at my house now, and I also have a humongous garden. And so one of my hopes is that these kids will go home and be like: "Hey, I can grow food by myself, "and I can maybe take care of a chicken "if my mom will let me." And that's a really important aspect in life to learn how to do those things because if you drive down Nolansville Road, the only thing you see is fast food and gas stations. How many farmers' markets do you see? So by teaching them how to build and maintain a garden, they can go home and get fresh food. And fresh food is fantastic. It's like my favorite thing to eat, honestly. I could live off of fruits and vegetables. And so a lot of what we teach them is how to do that and how to maintain a healthy diet and what they need not to be eating.

- [Matt] Fantastic. I can't tell ya how excited I am seeing you work around children, and someone like yourself with so much knowledge and so much personal experience from your home and getting to bring that over here and work with the kids like that, it's just a great inspiration to me, so thank you for you work.

- Yeah, thank you.

- Awesome. So we're standing in front of a beautiful bin of soil and worms. Can you tell me a little bit more about what's going on here?

- This is our vermicompost bin. Basically we just throw all our scraps in here; and we've got worms in here. Worms love coffee grounds. And when it's done, they just break it down, and they turn it into beautiful rich soil. Oh, there's a worm.

- [Matt] This is gorgeous.

- [Aiden] Yeah.

- [Matt] If anybody wants a little bit of water on them to cool 'em down--

- Can I have some water?

- Just a little. OK, just a little, not soaked; just a spritz.

- Would you mind going around and getting us a lot of coffee grounds? It's fine to get worms in there too. We're gonna actually come out here and build a lasagna bed, which we actually start just with the grass. We put down a layer of cardboard, and then we begin adding lasagna layers just like you'd add cheese, noodles, sauce, on up; we add straw, barn bedding, coffee grounds, leaves, and we're watering it the whole time, and so we frost it. The frost layer of cheese is, for us, enough compost to start a garden, so we plant it right there and we're basically building a garden on top of a compost pile. We throw worms in there, and it's fertile for five to seven years. We don't have to do anything to it; it just keeps going. And it tends to have very few weeds because we started with a clean plate with sheet mulching.

- [Boy] Right there?

- [Boy] Right here?

- Where it's kinda damp, where it looks damp and wet, just put a lot of--

- Well, I can't tell ya how much fun I've had spending my day out here at Farm Camp here in Trevecca University this summer. Learned so much from different farm stations, working with bees, sifting hen manure, working with this lasagna gardening project here. So that's all great fascinating things to learn. Another thing I had heard from Jason is that they have an environmental justice program here. And it's just really rewarding to see these interns and the students working with this program doing a community outreach and really just working hands-on with these children here.

- [Boy] Hey, guys, we're doing great.

- [Matt] Great job!

- There's a lot to learn about gardening at your public library. So we're at Bellview Branch Library with Katherine Bryant. And tell me all about this seed project.

- So this is the Nashville Public Library Seed Exchange. It started off from an article that I read about a library in Pima County, Arizona, starting a seed library. And the basic concept is that the library makes seed packets available to the public to check out using their library cards. And the hope is that people will bring seeds saved from their strongest best plants back to the library to make available for gardeners in the next season. So after reading this article, I gathered up a group of people at National Public Library who are interested in gardening and sustainable food systems, and we put together a proposal, and the Seed Exchange was born just this spring as a pilot project at four of our library branches.

- Well, at these libraries, when people come in and check out the seeds, where are the seeds coming from and how are we really sure we're getting what we're looking at?

- Right! So we started off with very generous donations from several area farms and gardeners. Our biggest donors were Bells Bend Farms, Delvin Farms, and the Hands-on Nashville Urban Farm. And they donated either seed packets that they had purchased in previous years and that they didn't need anymore, or they donated seeds that they had saved themselves from their own plants in their gardens and farms. And since then, we've actually had several individuals, who are experienced gardeners in the Nashville community, donate seeds to us from their own gardens. Basically, you just come in and browse through the collection at the library branch and see what's available, just take 'em up to the circulation desk and check them out using your library card.

- OK, well that sounds like a great way to start.

- Yes!

- And what if we need a little help trying to figure out what to do with the seeds once we have them and what we're growing.

- So if you're like me, you've never really planted anything from seed before. And so the library is also offering a variety of workshops this summer. Many of them are led by the master gardeners. Everything from seed starting to seed saving, fall vegetable gardening, container gardening. We're doing a diagnosing plant diseases program soon at the Engelwood Branch Library. So there's a whole variety of workshops and programs you can come to to learn more about gardening. The library also has a number of books available on gardening that you are welcome to check out and use as a reference while you're working in your garden.

- [Julie] Well, books, I know you have magazines on gardening.

- [Katherine] Yes.

- You have all kinds of wonderful resources in terms of these workshops that you're doing. Now what about when I'm ready to give back? Are you going to be able to help out with that whole mystery of what do we collect, what do we save, and how?

- Yeah, so my recommendation is that you attend one of our seed-saving workshops held this month and next month at the participating Seed Exchange branches; which are, by the way, Bellview, Bordeau, Engelwood, and Edmonson Pike Branches. And there you will learn everything you need to know to get started with seed saving. And the great thing is it's not like returning a library book. We're not going to penalize you or give you a fine if you don't return your seeds. Sometimes gardens fail; sometimes you just weren't sure if you did something right with the seed saving. So it's really more of a chance for people to explore gardening, try it out, save some seeds and bring 'em back if they can, but no big deal if you can't. There's always next year.

- Whew, good! Well, what a great way to interact with the library in doing all of this. So, I'm curious, is there any particular seed that's been more popular than others?

- Flowers. We cannot keep our flower seeds in stock. Additionally, tomatoes and radishes have been very popular this year. So seed saving and seed sharing is really a time-honored tradition. It's how the human race has grown food for the last several thousand years. And the library is just really a way, it's a place where the public is already coming to, and it's a way to make those things available to a wide array of people. But absolutely, if you have friends who are gardeners, you can save seeds from your plants and share with one another. And yeah, your local library, go and talk to them about it.

- Well, thank you so much. I can't wait to take a look at some of the seed offerings here and pull out my library card today. So thank you so much, Katherine.

- Thank you, Julie.

- You know, ferns are one of the most ancient families of plants, but they remain one of the most popular in modern gardens; and there's wonderful reasons why. Today I'm gonna talk to ya a little bit about great ferns for Tennessee gardens. And some of these you may recognize. I'm gonna show you a few cool new ones. First off, everybody knows Japanese Painted Fern. This fern's been around for a long time. It does great here. It's got that silvery foliage; often has reddish stems in the middle. Does wonderfully well. Plant breeders have been busy, and there are quite a few named varieties of this around, some of which are distinctly different from the original species. This is one called Pewter Lace. You can see they've really emphasized the grey-green color of the leaves here. Very dark. Very striking. This one is called Regal Red; and you can see why. It's got this bergundy color that really comes out. As the plant ages, it gets redder and redder, particularly along the veins; not only the main vein but each one going out into the leaflets. Really gets striking. This whole species does terrifically well here in Tennessee. I just can't say enough about it. It spreads to form a nice clump out of itself. Not invasive. Does really great. It is what's called a deciduous fern, which dies back. It disappears over the winter and then sprouts again from the roots in the spring. There's a closely-related fern, which is native. This is Lady Fern. And this particular one is called Lady in Red; and you can see why. The ruby-red stems of this are really quite striking, really beautiful. Bright ferny green. Of course it's ferny green; it's a fern; but it has this beautiful vibrant green foliage. This is a very upright fern, and you can tell. This one grows wild around here. What's cool about that, this is a worthy garden plant on its own, but, because this plant and this plant are so closely related: the Japanese Painted and the American Lady Fern, they crossed 'em, and they came up with a couple of really, actually more than a couple but I'm gonna show you a couple today, really cool crosses. This is called Branford Beauty. This is one that spreads some. Gets this silvery-green foliage. It has basically the low habit of a Japanese Painted Fern and some of the silvery foliage with the vigor and more upright nature, rather than low-mounding, it's a little more upright-mounding nature of a Lady Fern. One of the most vigorous and striking of the new hybrids is this fern. This is called Ghost. Another cross between Japanese Painted Fern and the American Lady Fern. This fern gets tall upright: two to three feet; silvery foliage, as the older it gets the more silver it gets. Really an incredible accent in the garden. Wonderful in the shade garden. It's called Ghost. You can't miss it. Well-named. That silvery color is really striking. Everything I just talked about are deciduous, meaning they die back to the ground, they completely disappear over the winter, and then the sprout up again from the roots in the spring. Next, though, I'm gonna talk to you about evergreen ferns that dont' disappear over the winter. And a lot of people love having these in their garden. Start off right now with this one, which is the ever-popular Autumn Fern. This is a great fern, and a lot of people know it. It is evergreen, gets 30 inches tall. The reason it's called Autumn Fern has nothing to do with autumn other than the fact that the new growth has the color of autumn leaves. It's this beautiful coral and orange, and that's why it got its name. This is an Asian fern of the Dryopteris Family. And the Dryopteris Genus, actually, is a big genus full of really cool evergreen ferns; this is only one. Another one, this is a native. This is called Marginal Wood Fern; and this is a youngster. They get quite big. Well, they get much bigger than this. This one does stay kind of low. It'll get maybe 18 inches tall. This one is often used in florist displays. Some people call it Leather Wood Fern. It's not the true leather leaf, but it is a good substitute for that. Completely evergreen. This is another wood fern from Asia called Thick-Stemmed. This one has really intricate fronds of this bright, almost celery green. It's really a cool plant. And kind of fuzzy down at the bottom of the plant. You can see it's got this almost fuzzy down here. Very distinctive and cool-looking plant. This one gets bigger. This'll get three feet tall, so it makes a real impact in your garden. What evergreen ferns tend to do is they'll stay up until maybe January, they'll be upright and look good, then the fronds tend to lay flat on the ground as the winter rains and stuff beat them down, or they lay lower, not necessarily flat along the ground. So they don't stay upright all winter but they do stay green. And then the new growth of course comes out of the middle and it's upright again. Very familiar evergreen fern, native here, is Christmas Fern. This is a fabulous fern, but pretty drought-tolerant, actually, when it's established. You see it on rocky slopes here about two-thirds of the way down above a stream. This is a terrific fern, gets really deep deep deep green by late fall. Really beautiful. So called Christmas Fern because people used to use the fronds for Christmas decoration back in the day. Another great member of that Dryopterus Family I was telling you about is this guy. This is Dixie Wood Fern. And this is a naturally-occurring hybrid. And you can tell just by looking at it, it gets big. This guy will get four feet tall. Really really huge fern, evergreen, really beautiful. Last, I wanna talk to you about this great fern. This is a Holly Fern. This is called Fortune's Holly Fern. The one that you often see is one called Cyrtomium Falcatum. And it's got really shiny leaves. It looks like it's got lacquer on the leaflets. This one has a duller matter form and it's a smaller shorter plant. Grows more densely, but the main thing is it's hardier. This one is quite hardy here, whereas Falcatum, eh, not so much. This is a really beautiful plant with a very different look and it gives kind of a tropical aspect to your garden. And they're all worth trying and give that wonderful kind of lush cooling, specially on a hot summer day and a shady garden fern's just cool you off just by looking at 'em. Give 'em a try.

- Brussels sprouts are sometimes underutilized but boy are they handy in the kitchen; especially if you're going to make a lettuce-less salad. So that's what we're gonna make today with Brussels sprouts. Now we're gonna start with some dried fruit that we're going to rehydrate. So I like to use dried cranberries for this. But if you don't have those, you can use golden raisins or regular raisins for this recipe. Any of these will be just fine. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna add the dried fruit to a jar with a nice tight-fitting lid and has some olive oil in it. And basically what this is going to do is macerate the fruit. We don't say marinate when we're talking about fruit, we say macerate. We're gonna add a little bit of lemon juice to this. And then we're going to add the lid, and we're gonna allow this to just sit, shake it up just a little bit and let it sit so that we are rehydrating those dried fruits. Now while that's going on, just set that aside at room temperature, we're gonna prepare our Brussels sprouts. So Brussels sprouts are wonderful. They're like little baby cabbages. They're very easy to grow. They're a member of the thistle family. And basically once you harvest them, all you gotta do is remove this kind of rough woody tough endd to it that's right there, and then you're just gonna cut these in half. And you can see that it is designed just like a cabbage. So we're just gonna cut 'em in half, and we're gonna add these to our food processor so that we can kind of grind these up and add these to our salad. So, how quick is that? So we've just basically shredded the Brussels sprouts. And what we're going to do now is we're going to add those to our salad. Now lemme kinda show you what I've done here because I've left a few of our Brussels sprouts sliced just to add a little interest and texture to the salad, and we've added some kale and radicchio for color. So I'm gonna take these Brussels sprouts that we've shredded and add that to it so you've got a nice little mixture there. And I'm gonna toss that just with my hands really quickly. And then look at what time will do. Here is our cranberries, and you can see how they have plumped up so nicely with that oil in there. So that's gonna make them nice and wonderful to add to our salad. And that olive oil and lemon juice mixture is basically your dressing. So we're gonna add these to our salad, everything, all of the cranberries and all of the liquid that's in that jar. And then I've toasted some walnuts that we're gonna add to it. You can use pecans if you want to, or you can use slivered almonds if you want to. So all of that goes in there for just a little bit of crunch. And give that a toss, and you've got a lovely lettuce-less salad. And don't forget to add your salt and pepper to the seasoning, and then you can make this ahead of time. So the lovely part of this is that unlike lettuce, that turns brown if you use it and make it ahead of time, you can make this ahead of time, put it in the refrigerator, and you've got a great salad for lunch the next day.

- It's vacation time. You wanna go; boy, do you wanna go. But what do you do with your houseplants or even the plants under your back porch in the summertime or even in the winter in the house? I've got a solution for you. It's easy to do. You can do multitude of plants. What you would do is you'd want a bucket. And if you had a higher thing than this, obviously you're gonna want the bucket when you set it up to be higher than the plant's pots that your'e gonna be watering. But this is just to show you, give you an idea. You wanna take a nylon clothesline cord and soak it for about 30 minutes. You want it to get really saturated with water, is the idea. You put the cord into the water, and you want your bucket full! Then you're gonna take and make a nice deep hole with your finger. Try to go about two-thirds down. If your finger isn't long enough or if the pot's really deep use a tool of some kind to dig your hole. You're gonna shove your cord down in there. Again, remember that you want your plant to have been watered and drained nicely. You wanna start with a wet plant. Now, in the perfect world this would be higher than this pot so I'm just gonna show you. You'd want it up about this high so that you can get the siphonage going. Now, if you had more than one plant, you could do more than one cord out of the same bucket. If they were big pots, you could do a huge huge bucket or even a small kids' wading pool in the summertime I've did on the back porch, and that works really really great. So, keep in mind, vacations are important. Go away, and don't worry about your houseplants.

- [Voiceover] For inspiring garden tours, growing tips, and garden projects, visit our website at VolunteerGardener.org, or on YouTube at the Volunteer Gardener Channel, and like us on Facebook.