Street School Garden

Street School Garden

School Garden Visioning & Strategic Planning

Christy Dancer Busch

Street School Mission

• Our comprehensive

and individualized

services enable

students to reach

their potential and

become responsible

and productive

adults.

• The Street School

program incorporates

teaching through real

life experiences

which reinforce key

learning outcomes.

The Purpose of

Street School Garden• The garden will support the following

graduation outcomes:

– Have the Desire to Create a Healthy Lifestyle

– Become a Life Long Learner and Visionary

– Laugh Often, Love Much and Enjoy Life to the

Fullest!

Mission & Vision

Mission

• Real life gardening

experiences will enable

students to reach their

potential and become

responsible and

productive adults.

Vision

• Students will graduate

with a strong connection

to nature and a desire to

continue producing their

own food.

Our Top 5 Priorities

• Nurture and cultivate current gardens (4)

in addition to fruit and nut trees, bushes,

shrubs and vines.

• Harvest produce and share with school:– Salads

– Smoothies

– Wraps

Our Goals

• Wildcrafting

• Outreach to other schools

– High School student gardeners will mentor

elementary school student gardeners.

– Develop Neighborhood Garden

• Expand Garden to include ALL

permaculture plants.

Plant Recommendations For E. Oklahoma

Apple

Apples and peaches are the best adapted to

Oklahoma conditions. Apples bloom later

and are less susceptible to spring frosts.

Autumn Olive

A large deciduous shrub that can grow to 20 feet -

can be somewhat invasive. Tart little red berries are

found on a shrubby tree that grows with some

profusion. Wildlife and human life can eat these

berries.

Blackberry

Blackberries grow in large tangled

mounds. Blackberries usually have twice the fruit

that a dewberry does as well as thorns.

Buffalo berry

This native shrub grows up to about 5ft tall here.

The flowers smell like cloves. The fruit goes from a

yellow to red then when ripe almost black.


Chokecherry

Large shrub or small tree to 10 m (30 ft) tall. The fruit is

used to make jellies and jams. Chokecherry provided a

staple for Native American tribes.

Chinese Chestnut

Chinese chestnuts are a favorite nut tree to plant in the

United States, because of the early production of nuts and

the cold hardiness of the chestnut plant. The Chinese

chestnut is an excellent flavored chestnut.

Currant

Currant canes lack spines or prickles and bear 8 to 30

smaller fruit in clusters (figure 1). A mature gooseberry or

currant shrub can produce up to four quarts of fruit

annually.

Sour Cherry

Sour cherries are generally better adapted to Oklahoma

than sweet cherries. ‘North Star’ sour cherry is an

exceptional dwarf tree.


Elderberry

Oklahoma is blessed with abundant elderberry bushes.

The elderberries are edible and make very good jelly, jam,

and juices. Native Americans used the berries for fever

and rheumatism.

Fig Tree

Fig trees such as the Brown turkey and the Tennessee

mountain fig trees are cold hardy. Fig tree/shrubs are

often 6’ in height. Well-drained fertile soil and full sunlight

and plenty of room to grow.

Ground Nut

Easy to start from a tuber. It reproduces quickly

underground. The tubers are edible and were a staple

food of the native Americans.

Gingko Tree

This ancient genus may date back to the dinosaurs. It is

listed with the Oklahoma forestry champion trees.


Gooseberry

The gooseberry bush has thorny, arching branches giving

the plant a height and breadth of three to five feet. Its berry

is one of the few fruits commonly picked full-size but

underripe, when it is used for cooking into jams, pies and

many varieties are excellent eaten fresh.

Goumi

Nitrogen-fixer. Fruit - raw or cooked. Pleasantly acid when

ripe, they make a very good dessert fruit though they are

usually made into pies, preserves etc. The fruit must be

fully ripe before it can be enjoyed raw.

Grape Vine

Muscadine grape vines grow well and seedless grape

vines, such as the Red Flame and Thompson are

productive. The Blue Concord, the White Niagara grapevine

and the Catawba bunch grape are also excellent.

Hawthorn

Parsley hawthorne is a small, deciduous tree or shrub with

both thorny or sometimes thornless branches. The dainty,

white, five-petaled blossoms are followed by bright-red,

persistent fruits which provides food for birds.


Hazelnut

A thicket forming spreading shrub 3 to 10 feet tall. Fruits

mature in July August in clusters of 2 to 6, seeds 3/8 to 5/8

inch diameter, light brown, sweet, edible. Seeds are

enjoyed by wildlife.

Jujube

The small fruit most closely resembles a date when dried.

Fresh jujube are crisp, with a sweet apple-like flavor. The

fruit can be enjoyed fresh, dried or candied. Jujubes are

best described as indestructible. They love hot dry areas

with poor soil. All jujubes are self pollinating.

Juniper

Resistant to most insects and diseases. The silvery blue

foliage is complemented with masses of purplish-blue

berries, a true treat for birds and other wildlife.

Jerusalem Artichoke

Tuber bearing member of the sunflower family with lovely

yellow sunflowers. The Pawnee reportedly ate them only

raw, but the other tribes ate the tubers raw, boiled, or

roasted. (Tuber – edible root such as carrot or potato)


Kiwi Vine

Actinidia arguta is a hardy kiwi. Small fruit with smooth skin.

Keeps 2 to 3 months in storage. Produces for 60 years.

Bears in 3 to 4 years. Plant 6 to 8 females per male. No

disease or insect problems. It ripens in late summer.

Black Locust

Black locust is a legume with root nodes that, along with

bacteria, "fixes" atmospheric nitrogen into the soil. Its roots

spread rapidly and it is good for erosion control. It will reach 35’

tall and 20’ wide.

Lead Plant

A small, deciduous shrub, 1-3 ft. tall, with tiny, purple flowers

grouped together in colorful, terminal spikes. Compound leaves

are covered with short, dense hairs, giving the plant a grayish

appearance. It has very deep roots, 4 feet (1.2 m) or deeper.

Pea Shrub

This perennial tree or shrub has its most active growth period

from spring until fall. It has green foliage and inconspicuous

yellow flowers, with an abundance of conspicuous brown fruits or

seeds. It will reach up to 12 feet high.


PawPaw

A patch-forming understory tree (<35’) found in well-drained,

fertile bottom-land and hilly upland habitat. The pawpaw is

the largest edible fruit indigenous to the United States. The

fruit is creamy. They are used much like bananas.

American Persimmon

These trees often grow in clusters and can grow to 100’

tall You will want to wait for the first frost to forage this fruit.

When they fall from the tree and look past the ripe stage is

just when they are perfect. They can be used for pudding

and jam.

Peach

They grow well in Oklahoma and are easy to care for.

Choose cold-tolerant varieties. The 'Redhaven,' 'Lovell' and

'Halford' cultivars are recommended. Plant the peach tree in

the spring, as soon as the ground thaws.

American Plum

A perennial tree or shrub (up to 25’) that has its most active

growth period in the spring and summer. It has green foliage

and inconspicuous white flowers, with a moderate amount of

conspicuous red fruits or seeds.


Russian Mulberry

The trees grow over 50’ tall in Oklahoma. The preferred

way to pick these berries is to spread an old sheet below

the tree and shake the limbs. The ripe berries fall freely.

Strawberry

The most successful strawberry planting receives

full sun most of the day. Irrigation water should

be available to help the plants survive dry periods

throughout the year.

Saskatoon Berry (AKA Serviceberry)

This tree can grow to over thirty feet tall in Oklahoma. It has

oval leaves that are toothed. The bloom is what stands out

to me, five petals that are long and wispy. The green berries

will turn a dark purplish color when ripe. Often used by the

Creek. It is good for jam and jelly.


Sea Buckthorn

One of the most widely grown hardy fruiting plants in the

world. The large, ornamental shrubs grow 6 to 10 feet tall

with narrow silver leaves and abundant clusters of yellow-

orange 3/8 inch fruits in late summer and fall. The berries

persist well into winter for enjoyment by birds. The fruit is

very high in Vitamins C, A and E and makes a delicious

substitute for orange juice when sweetened, the flavor is

likened to a blend of orange and passion fruit.

Silverberry

An rounded, twiggy shrub, 1-12 ft. tall, with narrow, silvery-

scurfy leaves on grayish-red branches. Cone-shaped flowers

are spicily perfumed with a heavy, sweet scent. The fruit is a

dry, mealy, whitish berry. Fast-growing, long-lived and

resistant to disease and insect problems and drought.

Sumac

Fruit form in pyramidal clusters and are hairy red berry-like

drupes that persist into winter providing interest

and food for wildlife such as bluebirds. Flowers that bloom in

spring attract bees and butterflies. Heights vary from 6-10’.

Team Members

Current

• 1 Teacher

Potential

• 2 Teachers

• 13 Students with support

from Street School Key

Club members

• Cafeteria Manager

• Building & Grounds

Manager

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Permaculture is really about relationship, our relationship as humans to the world around us.

Will (do) we work with the natural abundance and flows

of our world and universe,

or, will (do) we ignore these?

Ethical Principles of Permaculture

Care of the Earth(Rebuild nature’s capital)

Care of the People (Nurture the self, kin and community)

Fair Share (Live simply so that others may

simply live)

BLEEP

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“The systems by which we live

today are simply,

non-sustainable.”

Bill Mollison

PermacultureA Designer’s Manual

Grow Your Own Food

Share With Others.

Participate in a Community

Market

Edmond Farmers Market First & Littler, Edmond, Mike Clark at

359.4629.

Learning about and collecting native

and edible wild plants.

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Entertainment & Humor

Street School Garden