Jan 21 More update

Green Team update
          Jan 20

Folks
One of the things I forgot in the blog yesterday was us transforming old plastic barrels into rain barrels. These can be used if you have gutters to gather good rain water for your plants or just collect rain without gutters for the same purpose.  I have been to a Clemson ext course on building one and it was easy. If I get 10 people to come to a session, the Clemson person will come to our church and give us a hour's worth of in class learning and then we go outside and build our barrels.  She brings all the tools we need and parts for the barrels like faucets and drains. I think we paid her $10. each for the parts and class.  If we do not get 10 people, then I can do a much shorter version, but will probably need $10 each for the supplies and barrel.  I have found five of the barrels for $5. each and am looking for more. Below is what my barrel looks like.

 I installed a faucet below and it has a overflow near the top with the blue flat hose.  Mine is topless as I already have one at home for my gutter.  Let us see  if we can do this in February. It would be great to have them ready for March when all the rain comes. They can easily be painted, although not mine yet!

Greenhouse

       I did not mention in the last blog the nightmare I have been having bending the hoops for the greenhouse. I purchased a hoop bender from Johnny Seeds company.  I affixed it to a sturdy dining maple table that has been in my family for 62 years but has been a work table for last 10 years.  I pounded metal spikes into the ground for greater stability.   Well, it lasted three and a half poles to bend and broke.
So today, I purchased two heavy duty landscape logs and cut them into 4' lengths. I then used a post hole digger and dug 18" holes and dropped the four in and tamped the dirt down. I had an old piece of 1/2 plywood a 4'x8' piece and screwed them to the four logs.   This ain't going anywhere.  I would have worked on some more today but while getting up from securing the bending apparatus to the table I lost my balance and fell into some leaves.  240 pounds down on my sore arm ended my day.... tomorrow, Jon Stafford is coming to help me in the afternoon.  We hope to get all the hoops bent tomorrow and get them all secured.
Wednesday we may build the table for inside the total length of one side of the greenhouse.

      I often follow this guy from southern Virginia, maybe near VA Beach. He has tons of You Tubes up and I am learning much from him. Recently he has gone Hyroponic with great success. We should try some of this too.    http://www.youtube.com/user/mhpgardener?feature=watch

Green Team Update  
Jan 20, 2014

Many things are underway since we had our first organizational meeting. I think we should plan to have one every two months and perhaps one the first week of Feb. I will send out a schedule.

We have added Joyce Pundt to our team as I have learned that in 2011 she trained to become a Clemson Master Gardener.
 This is great for us. Her responsibility with her gardeners is to set up gardening presentations with  non profit groups like libraries, schools and churches. These are powerpoint programs with their gardeners offering their expertise.  We are trying to set up some for February and March for everyone at SMAA. We never know how many closet Green Folks are members of our church.

Last meeting and our blog, I forgot to mention that we now have some recycling bins for SMAA. Deacon Margaret arranged for Sonoco, who handles much of the recycling for schools and non profits, to provide us with three rolling bins that we are keeping next to our fenced in trash bin behind the kitchen.  This photo shows the three bins,

one for plastics and cans, one for office paper and one for magazines and newspaper.

We are building a bin for the front of Sturdevant Hall that will collect plastic bottles, cans office paper and maybe compost. We will have a small bin in the kitchen for compost, but most of this is collected from the cooking teams on Sunday and Wednesday. It is also available for any other eating event we have at church.

 We are going to model it after the one at Whole Foods that shows what an go in each bin. Their's is bigger than our will be. The container will be emptied weekly. We hope that folks will also put in their coffee grinds and filters.

While we are speaking of the kitchen, member Marion Salter really wants us to be green in our eating habits at SMAA. Already with her help and Deacon Margaret's we are using recyclable cups, plates and napkins. This is a great move as we used Styrofoam  for so long. We would like to make sure that all our cups and plates can be recycled.

They do this at Whole Foods.  Marion is also pushing cooking teams to use the flatware we have in our drawers instead of the plastic forks and spoons. They have to be washed, but it is not a big deal.  She is helping us figure out how to collect these after eating.

The Greenhouse is coming along and may be finished by the end of this week. Well, built but not finished in that we will not have any plants inside yet. Last week I cleared out the area by removing some trees and limbs. I have cut tons of Wisteria vines from the ground and raked barrels of leaves.
I pounded eight pipes about 2' into the ground for the hoops for the greenhouse. Below is what it looks like now.

This week I will bend the hoops and have the full frame up by Thursday.  Perhaps we will get the plastic up by the weekend.  I have been able to purchase some discard wood from Home Depot for 70% off that we can build a table on one side of the greenhouse that will be covered with chicken coop wire.  The other side will be reserved for some 4'x4' square foot gardens so we can try and grow veggies like this one here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9bKasAQQuk

This is what the company that we are following for our design came up with in Maine.  Looks great to me. I have bought seeds from this group and other greenhouse folks have recommended their product. By Thursday our greenhouse should look like this.

By Sunday, it should look like this, we hope.

     Here is where the Green Team is going to have to make some decisions on what to grow, how to staff it, how to plant, transplant and everything else.  Some of the presentation by Joyce will be helpful. Many of you are better gardeners that I am and have never had a chance to do gardening from a green house. There are tons of You Tubes on how to do all this... please look!

    We are still finding out ways to bring electricity and water to the greenhouse. Hugh Wilson and I have found a water supply about 15' from the greenhouse for our watering. We will run the line to the outside square foot gardens as well for drip lines. Electricity is harder. We think the best bet is to rent a trencher and run a line from the outdoor chapel,

which has 4 outlets.  It is about 130' from there. I will rent a trencher and will make a 8" trench. We will run cable in a plastic conduit from the chapel to the greenhouse. In the greenhouse we will have lights and some outlets for things like small heaters if needed.  This will be done by next week.

HELP
Up until this point I have been doing all the work by myself, I guess to prove it can be done. I am open to help to finish building the greenhouse.  Here are some Flicker photos of a church in Minnesota building a greenhouse.    I do not expect all of you to show up. But I am usually out there from noonish to 5 pm.

I have promised Joyce a comprehensive plan on how we are going to run the greenhouse and square foot gardens.  I will put something out tonight for us to discuss.  I am going to follow the Green Congregations plan for Richland Counties churches. Plus we will do our own as well.

Next post we will have more photos and will talk about a plan to plant some cherry laurel trees around the outdoor chapel to diminish the Trenholm Rd noise and give the chapel some privacy.
  Bob