Lakeview’s garden continues to expand, features exotic vegetables and fruit trees

Students at Lakeview Elementary School have been increasingly participating in the school’s garden. Several classes planted seeds in January, and have watched the growth of rare plants, including popcorn corn, purple and gold beans, marbled and cherry tomatoes, cucumber apples, and watermelon radishes. The Preppy K class was able to harvest from the first planting in the fall, and helped make Chinese chicken salad with Napa cabbage, green onions and carrots. The children loved tasting the salad, with one child exclaiming, “I really like this!” Recently, the students harvested and tasted broccoli from the second grade raised bed. They were excited to eat it raw, with a large handful of students stating it was the best broccoli they ever tasted!

Several dedicated parents, teachers and children in both childcare and special education have been meticulously caring for the garden, watering and weeding it on a near daily basis. Parents have also helped set up a butterfly garden.

In April, the first shipment of fruit and vegetable trees arrived, and the district grounds supervisor, Bradd Runge, and his staff worked quickly to dig holes in the hard clay and provide a drip irrigation system for the large variety of plants. One tangerine tree bore about 30 fruits, and some of the younger students were able to pick from the tree and bring home a sample. They were delicious, sweet and juicy!

The huge orchard in the back of the school includes Malaysian red guava, white and pink tropical guava, kaffir lime, Mexican lime, Meyer lemon, eureka lemon, pink lemonade lemon, red baron peach, royal apricot, fuyu persimmon, moringa (a medicinal tree), dragon fruit, passion fruit, Red Bartlett pear, Bing cherry, and mulberry. Smaller berry plants also include gogi and golden berry (both high in antioxidants), everbearing strawberries, three varieties of blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries. The next shipment will include three varieties of avocados, mango and ice cream banana trees.

As if that wasn’t exciting enough, Lakeview now has five composting worm bins on campus. They are located in Mrs. Thompson’s class, in Mrs Goyette’s class and in childcare. They have been set up with one pound of red wigglers each, but will grow to about 10 pounds of worms over the next few months. Students will feed the worms about 10 pounds of recycled cardboard, paper scraps and veggie scraps every other day. All finished vermicompost will go into the garden. Special thanks to parent volunteer Mr. Gray who will be building the outside worm bins for the lunch and snack vegetable and fruit scraps.

Orchard Supply Hardware and Home Depot in Brea have continued to be supportive of Lakeview’s endeavors. Orchard’s neighbor-to-neighbor program is planning to help weed and mulch the approximately 5,000-square-foot garden, and one employee has volunteered to make a wooden carved welcome sign. Chipotle will be sponsoring a work day where all garden volunteers will receive a free entree.

If you are interested in helping, contact parent coordinator Vivian Chern at 714-501-0156.

Click here for our Facebook album of the “Lakeview Garden Expansion.”