I've been gardening with children who are blind or visually impaired for several years, as I mentioned before, but I failed to mention where that was - and you and your child can join me there in June!
Camp Tuhsmeheta (short for touch, smell, hearing, taste) is a camp for blind or visually impaired children near Greenville, Michigan, just north east of Grand Rapids on the west side of the lower peninsula. On June 17-19, 2011, we will hold Family Camp, and this year is also the 30th Reunion Event. Gardening is just one of the many activities that take place there. All activities are designed to help you and your child learn the skills they will need to be as independent as possible. You can find out more about Camp Tuhsmeheta (Camp T) by going to www.campt.org. Come join us - you'll have a blast!
So you've got your box, your light soil mix, your grids and your templates. Now what?
It's easiest to put in plants that are already started for you from a garden center or "big box" store. This is a little more expensive, but easily more satisfying for those of us who have short attention spans and want instant results! Now! You can show your child how to carefully remove the plant from the plastic tray (usually this means tearing the tray down the sides), digging a hole the proper size within the hole defined by the template, and carefully placing the root ball in the hole, covering the roots with planting mix and watering. You AND your child will know what is the desired plant and what is a weed, because you know what the plant should feel like, and in some cases, smell like.
Sometimes the roots are really tangled and need gentle loosening. IT's OK if a few of the roots break. This is not like unraveling a knotted ball of yarn!
More and more plants that people want to grow are available in plant form, but it is a LOT more expensive than planting from seed, and sometimes those plants in the big box stores have lived a stress filled life - too little water, too much water, too little sun, too much sun, traveling by truck from who-knows-where, etc. Some plants, like carrots, just can't be successfully grown from plants anyway.
I like to plant most things from seed except what I call "tropicals". These are plants that most garden magazines and books will recommend that, at least in the north where we live, you put out fairly good sized plants - otherwise you have very little hope of a harvest of any size before frost in the fall. Included in this group are tomatoes, eggplant and peppers.
Right now, at least in the upper midwest where we are now, is the best time to plant lettuce, spinach, onions, and that favorite of all spring crops - peas. There are literally thousands of varieties to choose from if you get all the seed catalogs the world offers! I like to plant a variety of all these. I often have more than 6 varieties of lettuce and 3 of spinach, and 3 or 4 kinds of peas.
Lettuces come in many shapes and sizes - I love Four Seasons - a lovely red tipped soft butterhead lettuce, and Merlot - a dark red wine colored leaf lettuce. Forellenschluss, or Trout's Tongue (sounds better in German!) is a beautiful red spotted romaine style. Spinach comes in flat leaf or crinkled leaf types, and some comes with red stems.
A special tip! Harris Seed Company, and probably a few others I haven't discovered yet, sell "pelleted seeds". These are the tiniest of seeds - the carrots and lettuces - that are so small they are difficult to feel and very difficult for a blind or visually impaired person to manage. Enter the pelleted seed. Each seed is coated in a bit of clay, so that the seed is much bigger - and possible to feel - and easier to anyone to plant! Another tip - seed tapes? Don't bother. You can hardly get them to stay buried long enough to sprout.
Why would I plant stuff of odd colors with children who are blind or visually impaired? Not all blind children are totally blind, and most kids get a real kick out of stuff with unexpected colors - blind kids are not an exception! So purple "green" beans also get my vote, and white eggplant, and chocolate colored peppers!
Peas are fascinating - snow peas, the kind used in Chinese cooking, are usually the fastest to grow and first to be ready to pick - while the seeds inside the pod are barely there. The pods will just be flat or curved with hardly any bumps on them at all. Snap peas should be picked when the pods feel firm and juicy. The walls of the pea pods will be thick and, like snow peas, you eat the whole pea, pod and all. Shelling peas -also called English peas - the kind our grandmothers might have grown - are the only vegetable I have discovered yet, besides dry beans, that you can pick by sound. I'm serious. A mature, but not yet too mature, pod full of beautiful sweet ripe peas will sound hollow. A person who is blind or visually impaired can go up to the trellis the plants are growing on, rattle a few branches or stems of pea plants and hear where the pods are to pick them. These are the rewards the kids at camp most love - a sweet snap or shelling pea, right off the vine, standing there in the sunlight, eating peas out of your hand. The only thing better, maybe, is doing the same thing with strawberries or a warm, sundrenched peach!
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