While enjoying various small-scale activities and creating interesting indoor environments, children can see how plants know what to do and how they 'work'.
PLANTS NEED LIGHT
- - Making a potato maze is a long-term project but the results can be very entertaining. Cut a hole, about 2cm square, at the base end of a shoe box. Put a potato at the opposite end with the buds pointing towards the hole and put on the lid.
From time to time lift the lid and see how the potato sprouts are growing towards the light. In time they'll poke out of the hole! Also see how soft the potato becomes after putting its strength (and water) into growing its sprouts. To make a maze, put a cardboard barrier across the box with an archway at one side, and notice how the shoots find their way through, seeking the light. Or make two barriers with archways on opposite sides. The shoots can still find the light!
- - Notice how pelargonium leaves turn their faces to the light. Notice how the leaves of indoor bulbs lean towards the light - so much so that the pots need rotating regularly.
- - Sprout some onions on jars (see NW 20 January, p14) or carrot tops in good light and some in a dark cupboard.
Compare them after they've grown. Then put the cupboard ones in the light. What gradually happens and why? Sunshine has created chlorophyll in the leaves which turns them green.
PLANTS NEED WATER
- - Observe how plants 'drink' water. Trim the end of a stick of celery and stand it in a jar of water containing food colouring. Next day see what has happened! Then cut through the celery in several places to see how it has sucked the water all the way up to its leaves.
- - Cut the ends off some parsley stalks and divide them between two jars of water. After a while pour off the water from one jar and see what happens. Then trim the ends of the drooping stalks and refill their jar with water. What happens now?
- - When you sprout seeds, omit the water in one sample - or stop watering one sample- and see what happens.
PLANTS NEED WARMTH
- - Make a display of winter twigs in pots of water - chestnut, hazel, sycamore, forsythia. Notice how their buds, tightly-closed against the cold, gradually open up in the warmth. Horse chestnut is the most spectacular with its 'sticky buds' and will provide interest for weeks. Compare them from time to time with those outside.
- - Grow mint and chives outdoors then bring some indoors in pots. See how the sleeping (dormant) plants begin to wake up and start sprouting in the warmth.
MAKING NEW PLANTS
Cuttings
As well as growing plants from seed, sometimes a new plant can be grown from a piece of another one. See how small branches (cuttings) of shrubs and trees can grow roots in water. Include some rosemary, willow or forsythia in your winter displays, keep the water topped up and you may well find that they root. You could then carefully plant them in soil in pots and perhaps plant them outdoors in spring.
- - Take cuttings from your pelargoniums by slicing a piece off just below a leaf joint. To conserve the plant's energy, remove all the leaves except one or two at the top then root in water. You can also root them in compost, dipping the cuttings' tips in a tiny speck of hormone rooting powder first. Remember ivy-leaved pelargoniums won't root in water. Save all the plants for growing outside in June.
- - Try cuttings of other plants - tradescantia, busy lizzies, ivy, mint - and see which ones work. Water-loving plants often work best.
Root division
Simply dig up a root of a perennial plant, place it on to a tough surface indoors, break it apart and plant the pieces in pots of soil.
Big roots such as perennial sunflowers, Michaelmas daisies, loosestrife or lemon balm may need chopping with a spade, but smaller plants such as cranesbill, creeping Jenny, woodruff, marjoram, mint or chives can usually be pulled apart, perhaps with the aid of a small fork.
Children could certainly help to gently pull apart and untangle the roots of small plants and replant them in pots to be kept outside. Perhaps keep some inside for comparison.
CREATING ENVIRONMENTS
Making a wormery
Children can be fascinated by creatures that live in the soil and enjoy learning about what they do. For example, worms 'dig' (aerate) the soil by making tunnels; they also mix dead leaves and such into the soil that feeds it. Wormeries are available from catalogues but can be improvised:
- - Take a sizeable plastic box, the taller the better. Cut out a long vertical panel from one side and cover this with a piece of thick, clear plastic, stuck on firmly with gaffer tape. Put a layer of gravel into the container, then make several 2-4cm even layers of moist soil, sand and plenty of compost. Make sure the soil is crumbled finely. Top with a thin layer of dead leaves. The layers must be visible through the panel. Now, carefully fork over some soil to find a few large worms. They may be rather deep down in winter. Lift them out gently with your fingers and lay them on the leaves in your wormery.
This is mostly adult activity with children watching. Put the wormery in your coolest place with the panel covered so the interior is dark and leave undisturbed. Just make sure it doesn't dry out. Check it week by week and hope to see how the worms have tunnelled through the layers, mixing them up.
Making a snailery
Not all garden creatures help us. Put some salad or cabbage leaves into a covered plastic box. Children can help find snails hibernating under cover in the nursery garden and put them in the box. Show how the snails have made themselves a hard 'front door' to their shells to keep out the cold, leaving a tiny air-hole in it. In the warmth indoors, the snails will wake up, dissolve their front doors and start eating the leaves. After their eating ability has been observed, they can be disposed of.
Making a bottle garden
Any clean, wide-necked glass container will do for a bottle garden, although the bigger the easier. A goldfish bowl works well. You'll need grit for drainage, some horticultural charcoal to aerate, potting compost no1 and for tools, a fork and a spoon, each tied to the end of a cane.
- - From garden centres or florists buy small plants such as ferns, mind-your-own-business/babies' tears (Solierolia solierolii) club moss, cryptanthus and the aluminium plant. Avoid bigger plants such as tradescantia which will soon take over. Line the base of your bottle with grit, cover that with charcoal, then 5-7cm of potting compost. With your tools make planting hollows, then have fun planting.
Later, adults will need to check that everything is planted firmly. Add a top layer of grit, water just a little then cork the bottle or cover with clingfilm to create a complete environment - just like our own planet. Discuss why the plants don't need watering (watch for condensation appearing) and how they breathe.
If there is too much condensation, remove the cork until it's gone. If you never see any condensation, add a little water. If you find the right spot for it, the bottle will be self-maintaining.
Bottle gardens need good but not direct sunlight, or algae will soon coat the glass. As an experiment, leave a bottle of water in your sunniest spot and see algae gradually appear. Discuss how it could happen: the effect of sunlight on water. Have another bottle in the shade; does algae grow in that one?
THINKING AHEAD
- - Buy some seed potatoes and start sprouting (chitting) them: Put the potatoes into egg boxes, buds uppermost. Keep cool but in good light, and see them gradually sprout chunky green tops. In spring plant them outdoors. Remember all green parts are poisonous.
- - Keep saving raw fruit and vegetable scraps for the compost heap.
- - In a very sunny place, start off some tomato and chilli plants from seed in small pots of compost. Perhaps try a few easy bedding plants - lobelia, white alyssum, candytuft - and have an indoor nursery garden.
