Butterfly Garden workday doubles pollinator plants
A group of second grade families completed work on the butterfly garden on Sunday, adding in $300 worth of native pollinator-friendly plants, thanks to a grant from the Native Plant Society of Texas.
The project also demonstrates the full circle of the compost process at Meridian. Five cubic yards of compost was donated by Organics By Gosh, the same organization that picks up and composts Meridian’s cafeteria food waste each week. The delivery fee was covered by the remainder of a $1,000 grant from Friends of Meridian, which will also include additional native plants in the nearby Rain Garden on a subsequent work day.
The butterfly garden includes signs that talk about the life cycle and the monarch migration, and it draws in students into creative play as they look for blooms, bugs, and seeds. The garden features several drought-tolerant native pollinator plants, including autumn sage, blue mistflower, and four nerve daisy, as well as larval host plant milkweed to support monarch and queen butterflies.
Special thank you to Michelle Braet-Alford and Ramsey Andrews for taking the lead on the project, with the support of Sarah Gardner, and to Jeff Alford, Vince Andrews, Brit Gardner, and Kristin Gebhart for joining in the workday. It was a multi-family project, with students assisting with planting and supervising the compost pile.
