Dixie Loop on the Bay-Friendly Garden Tour

On May 15th, 2010 the Dixie Loop was part of the Bay-Friendly Garden Tour. The Loop hosts were April Philips from April Philips Design Works and Jake Voit from Cagwin and Dorward. They were joined by Annie Spiegelman, the author of Talking Dirt: A new organic gardening how-to guide. Spiegelman also writes an organic gardening column entitled Dirt Diva in the Pacific Sun.

The Bay-Friendly garden tour celebrates the diverity of Bay-Friendly gardens. Urban farmers grow fruit and vegetabels and keep chicken and bees. Native plant enthusianst embrace the local flora while salvaged material aficionados blend recycled art into the landscape. These gardens offer something for everyone.
The Dixie Loop celebrated many of these aspects, including rainwater harvesting in its natural cistern, native plants providing habitat and food for wildlife, recycled materials such as the paver path, and community volunteering as well as educational resources.

Thanks to the Cagwin & Dorward and April Philips Design Works team for getting the loop ready the days before the tour.

Winter break clean-up & Bay-Friendly sign

The Dixie Loop earned a total of 121 points under the following 7 Bay-Friendly Landscape Principles:

21 pts Landscape Locally

17 pts Less to the Landfill

15 pts Nurture the Soil

26 pts Conserve Water

6 pts Conserve Energy

22 pts Protect Water & Air Quality

14 pts Create & Protect Wildlife Habitat

This means that the Dixie Loop has exceeded conventional landscape practices.

Thanks to Cagwin and Dorward (C&D) who relocated the baby oak tree from the Loop to the location of the previous oak tree that had died. We also planted two Arbutus unedo trees, also known as Strawberry Trees, to provide shade and protection for our baby oak until it grows big and strong. A crew from C&D also did a lot of winter weeding and clean-up during the ski-week winter break.

Additionally, we put up the Bay-friendly sign and planted California native poppies which will bloom in the coming months. So keep an eye open for these newcomers.

Bay-Friendly Certified!

In the spring of 2009, APDW submitted a folder to be reviewed for the Bay-Friendly Certificate. This award allows the participant to get a total of 186 points of which 60 are required to receive the certification. APDW submitted its project information with the goal to achieve 120 points. After the committee's review, APDW received its total 121 points for the Dixie Elementary School Loop and the project was Bay-Friendly Certified.

GO DIXIE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL!

What is Bay-Friendly Landscaping?

Bay-Friendly Ladscaping is a whole systems approach to the design, creation and maintenance of the landscape in order to support the integrity of one of California's most wonderful ecosystems, the San Francisco Bay watershed. A well-designed and maintained Bay-Friendly Landscape can cost less to maintain in the long run by consuming fewer resources. For the Dixie Loop, the Bay-Friendly Landscape symbolizes community values for health, wildlife and the environment. It also addresses issues such as lowering water use and garbage bills. Check out Stopwaste.org.

Next Steps:

APDW is currently working on identifying grant funding for future Educational Signage, which will explain the Bay-Friendly Landscape processes and goals at the Dixie Loop.

Summer Suprises at the Loop

Over the hot summer months, birds and squirrels were busy harvesting nuts and seeds. They carried acorns to the loop and buried them. With so many hiding places, the little critters could not remember that they had left two of them buried in the fertile soil at the Loop. Now that students have returned to school, you can see these little acorns have started to grow into little baby-oak trees. We welcome them and try to protect them.

On a sad note, our 6' foot tall oak tree we planted early spring does not look like it is doing well. We will watch it over the winter to see how it does but may eventually replace it with one of our new summer seedling gifts.

Mulching Day 2009

Weeding Day at the Loop

If you have seen the daffodils, sages and penstemons blooming at the Loop, you probably also saw the threatening amount of weeds taking over the rain-garden.
The old saying, "One year's seeding means seven years' weeding" holds true. And it adds up quickly. The more seeds fall onto the soil, the more weeds start to grow.
Weeds rob valuable nutrients from the soil and compete with herbs, flowers, shrubs and trees. It's important to eliminate weeds, yet, not all weeds are bad. Weeding might be considered a nasty chore, but it's a great way to really get to know what's going on in the garden. Plus, when it's done in the right frame of mind, weeding can be a pleasant, Zen-like, experience. It brings parents and student, teachers and community together. Thank you to all the helpers. The Loop was weeded more than 75% and another flyer will soon announce a future weeding day to finish up the Loop. So watch out that you do not miss the opportunity to be part of this experience.
Also, thank you to Jake and Lauren from Cagwin and Dorward, who helped out and applied a compost tea to the plants at the Loop. Compost Tea is a highly concentrated microbial solution produced by extracting beneficial microbes from compost. There are four essentials in creating the best possible compost tea situation for the microbes: Water, Air, Food and Comfort. With a strong foliar application the plant is occupied by beneficial microbes that will out-compete pests or diseases, leaving no room for infection.

Winter has come to the Loop

Many have noticed the cold climate that has entered the Bay Area. It brings that Holiday feeling. The winter frost has also come to the loop. We'd like to thank Paramount Group/Morgan Stanley for donating plants from the One Market Roof Garden Renovation Project. Thanks also to April, Gary and Roy for planting and coordinating the new plantings.
We wish you Happy Holidays and a Great New Year.

November Rains

The rain might have made Halloween very uncomfortable but the Dixie Loop's plants enjoyed the first fall rains. These rains wash dust and dirt off the plants making them pretty and green. Almost immediately, the plants started to grow and green up. Keep an eye on the changes!

Fall is here!

Edwin Way Teale said: "For man, autumn is a time of harvest, of gathering together. For nature, it is a time of sowing, of scattering abroad."

On Monday, September 22, was the first day of Fall and the Dixie loop is starting to produce seeds. These seeds are a great source of food for small animals, like birds and rodents, to prepare for the winter. Soon the rains will start, so pay attention to the loop filling up with water.

National Park(ing) Day

PARK(ing) Day was Friday, September 19, 2008!
PARK(ing) Day is a one-day, global event, centered in San Francisco where artists, activists, and citizens team up to temporarily transform metered parking spots into temporary public parks and paved parking spaces into temporary green gardens. National Park(ing) Day is an opportunity to celebrate parks in cities and promote the need for more parks for pedestrians and more habitats for other creatures.
The event was started in 2005 by ReBar, an art collective based in San Francisco, and is meant to challenge urbanites to think about what our public spaces would be like if they were designed for the pedestrian, rather than the car.
Afterwards, donate the green materials used to create your temporary park.
For more information check out the website at http://www.parkingday.org/
April Philips Design Works also created a quick park in one of their parking lots. By creativly placing pavers, furniture and plants, the lot was transformed and the office members enjoyed it's one day presence.

WELCOME BACK!

We welcome back all the students, teachers, parents and staff to Dixie Elementary School. The summer was a great success for the Dixie Loop. Despite the dry summer, the loop only needed to be watered twice - the plants are blooming and growing. A few weeds snuck their feet into our beautiful, rich soil, but we are removing them.

Spaghetti in the soil?

Throughout the summer, the team has been observing the Loop with it's plants, soil, and other visiting creatures. One very interesting thing that has occured has been found around the grasses' roots and the surrounding soil. They are thin, long threads or strands like spaghetti, which push their way between soil particles, roots, and rocks. These strands are called hyphae and are microscopic cells of Fungi.
Fungi perform important services related to water dynamics, nutrient cycling, and disease suppression. Along with bacteria, fungi are important as decomposers in the soil food web. They convert hard-to-digest organic material into forms that other organisms can use.Fungal hyphae physically bind soil particles together, creating stable aggregates that help increase water infiltration and soil water holding capacity. The type found on the Dixie Loop's plants are mycorrhizal fungi, which colonize plant roots. In exchange for carbon from the plant, mycorrhizal fungi help solubolize phosphorus and bring soil nutrients (phosphorus, nitrogen, micronutrients, and perhaps water) to the plant.
So! The spaghetti looking web in the soil helps our plants and shows a healthy, living soil.

Mycorrhizal Fungal Hyphae on the roots of a young pine tree, which grew in a container.

Education and Application of the Compost Tea

Jake from Cagwin and Dorward introduced the idea of compost and the application of compost tea to the 3rd grade students. Afterwards, they jointly applied a serving of compost tea to the Dixie Loop. Thanks to the students, teachers and Jake.

The Loop before the Compost Tea application

The plants are blooming and providing habitat to wildlife such as bees, humming birds and other beneficial animals including those in the soil.

The Dixie Loop is growing happily

The plants at the Dixie Elementary School Loop are growing without any additional watering. By planting mostly California native plants, the need for a lot of additional care is eliminated.

Easter Sunday

The daffodils are blooming at the loop to welcome spring.

Our Oak Tree is Getting Bigger

Planting the Oak Trees

On the Novemeber 9th Volunteer Planting weekend, many of the kids asked "where is the tree?" since they had learned that trees help fight Global Warming. As a result, on February 20, 2008, our Coast Live Oaks arrived and we planted one 15 gallon tree and one supercell tree in the loop to study how they will respond.