Lately many of the folks I follow online have been bragging about their failures. You have to be part of the education community for this to make sense. Often, a description of a recent setback brings up a reference to Thomas Edison who supposedly described unsuccessful attempts to develop the light bulb as learning one more thing that would not work. See these were not failures, but learning successes. I typically have few such learning experiences, but a recent effort might qualify.
I have been taken in by the educators who argue we and our students should become makers. The traditional project would involve coding, or building a robot, 3D printing, or something like that. This type of thing is pretty much what I am good at so there would be little opportunity for personal growth. Gardening, the type of activity in which you get your hands dirty and have to bend over, sounded like a more significant challenge. I thought I would make a garden.
So, I was once a farm boy, but that was a long time ago and I could use a little refresher when it comes to all things agricultural. Just to make the task a little more challenging, I decided I would grow vegetables in straw. This is the newest thing. You may have heard of turning straw into gold. I decided I would take my shot at turning straw into tomatoes. It turns out that finding straw was tougher than finding dirt. Cost more too – $4.50 a bale. You can buy a lot of stuff at the grocery for $4.50.
It turns out growing stuff in straw is a multi-stage process. First, you need to turn the straw into dirt and then you grow stuff in the dirt. It is reported that if you dump a little organic fertilizer on straw and water the straw for two weeks it kind of turns into dirt. Compost is what the accomplished gardeners call it. You know what we used to call organic fertilizer back on the farm? Anyway, the inside of the straw is supposed to heat up and this is how you know the conversion process is working. I watched a YouTube online and the lady said you should not do this on your deck because it might start a fire. I think this is one of those things you sometimes find on the Internet that is not exactly true, but I put my bales of straw down by the lake just to be safe. No fires were encountered.
By the way, a couple of geese and their off-spring like to hang out by my bales down by the lake. They leave a great deal of organic fertilizer behind. I already bought my supply in a plastic bag and my supply must have come from a different animal because it smelled a lot better. Who knew? Thing one learned – use the organic fertilizer that comes in a bag.
It was a cold Spring. Thinking back the cold may have prevented the bales from heating up and turning into dirt. Edison would likely have called this learning and made certain his next effort was conducted in a warmer year.
Here is what my bale (compost) garden looks like. The plants just sit there. Since, the plants should be much bigger by now I think I can count this as a failure. The broccoli created a head prematurely instead of waiting for later in the summer and making the kind of head you buy in the store. I am counting this as failure number two.
I guess you could say that things have been going very well. I will offer more insights later.
The curmudgeon
Learning lots
