The school garden is soaking up all the TLC being given to it this summer by a corps of volunteers who eagerly signed up for one and two-week stints in the garden until the new fall school year in September. The veggies have never been so happy, you can almost hear them burp.

When the call was put out a couple of weeks ago, it wasn’t long before the schedule was filled.

“We even have substitutes willing to fill in if someone isn’t able to visit the garden one or two days during their scheduled weeks,” Bruce Orchid, coordinator of the “Keepers of the Garden” list, said.

A perk for the Keepers for visiting the garden daily to water, weed and make sure critters haven’t violated its borders is that they can also harvest the wonderful kale, red lettuce, edible flowers, squashes, strawberries, onions and a host of other healthy, organically grown items in the garden, and take them home or contribute them to the food bank, Orkila, the senior center or any place that will appreciate and make good use of them. Come the new school year, the garden will again become a “classroom” from which all students may learn lessons in the origin of foods, plant life cycles, science and math projects, nutrition, composting … the list is as endless as nature.

The school thanks the Keepers of the garden, saying “you are not only helping to keep our lovely little garden alive and well, but nurturing the healthy minds and bodies of our kids.”