Ark Valley News - How does your garden grow?

Brett and Fran Black say they avoid using chemicals on their vegetable and flower gardens at their home near Fourth and Ash in Valley Center.

How does your garden grow?
By Matt Heilman
Last Updated: September 18, 2014

High school stats class testing old wives tales

With a greenhouse available at Valley Center High School, math teacher Kristen Joyal is again taking the opportunity to incorporate her love for gardening into lessons for her AP statistics classes. In the process, Joyal strives to spur interest in a subject that may otherwise seem dull if the curriculum sticks to a textbook and lectures.

Last year in the greenhouse at VCHS, Joyal's students tested the effects of mechanical stimulation on the growth of tomato plants. Some of the plants were touched every day, some had fans blowing on them and some had pompoms waved at them each day. There was also a control group that didn't receive any stimulation.

This year, Joyal and the 20 seniors in AP statistics are expanding the parameters of their experiment by seeking feedback from the community. Joyal is encouraging News readers to share old gardening wives tales and whether or not following the alternative advice has lead to successful plant growth.

Joyal said the plan is to replicate experiments to confirm their validity, like on the popular Discovery Channel show, "Mythbusters." Plans call for students to test the old wives tales with planting this fall and to report results in the spring.

Joyal said the basic objective is for her students to understand experimental design and to have some fun with the lessons they'll learn along the way.

Every year, Joyal tries to organize experiments that show her students how lessons they learn can be put to practical use.

"We want them to see how it's applicable for their lives," she said.

Joyal said she has heard a couple old wives tales that can be tested with planting in the greenhouse and she's seeking more input. Among what she's heard so far is the belief that watering plants with water that has been boiled will kill the plants, or that placing a nail in the soil beneath a plant will help the plant's growth.

"One my grandma always told me was, if you beat tomato plants with a broom, they'll set in tomatoes," Joyal said.

For Valley Center residents Brett and Fran Black, there's not much trickery involved with yielding successful tomato and flower growth in their front and backyard gardens at their home at Fourth and Ash.

The Blacks, who started their gardens about 10 years ago, say they avoid using chemicals, including weed- and bug-killing spray. They also don't use fertilizer.

Accompanying the tomatoes in the Blacks' spacious front-yard garden are zinnias, colorful flowers that started growing from seedlings of flowers planted at the Valley Center Library.

If there is a secret to the Blacks' green-thumbed success over the years, Fran said the use of fallen leaves as compost makes a difference. Also benefiting Brett and Fran's garden in the front yard is an irrigation system that was installed by their two grown sons.

Master gardener and fellow Valley Center resident Cheryl Nordstedt also said her horticulture skills don't come with many tricks or secrets. She said her grandmother swore by the Native American practice of yielding a successful corn crop by burying fish at the bottom of the mounds of corn stocks, but for her home garden, the key to success is to keep it simple.

"It takes lots of time and loving it," she said. "You have to enjoy getting in the dirt."

Have wives tale?

To share ideas or testable old wives tales for the experiment conducted by Kristen Joyal and her class, email Joyal at kristen.joyal@usd262.net or submit a letter to Valley Center High School, 9600 N. Meridian, Valley Center, KS, 67147.