June Garden Tips:
 Transplant tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, Brussels sprouts.
Direct seed beans, carrots.
Transplant or direct seed cukes, squash, melons and pumpkins.
Plant annual herbs and flowers.
Check your planting schedule for succession plantings.
Harvest hardneck garlic scapes to promote bulb growth. Make garlic scape pesto!
Planning summer care of school gardens now will save you effort over the summer. Enlist staff members, students, families, community members, and local businesses.
- Make a schedule or monthly calendar indicating who is responsible for caring for the garden each week. Provide contact information for each person. Distribute to volunteers.
- Host a training meeting so volunteers know your expectations, how to care for the garden, where supplies and tools are located, how to access water, and what to do with harvested produce.
- Keep a garden journal in a visible place to volunteers can leave notes about tasks accomplished, concerns, food harvested, etc.
- Post a clearly labelled garden map in a garden shed or hoophouse.
- Consider tackling summer projects with the help of volunteers such as building a compost system, a new raised bed, installing fencing.
- Plan a potluck celebration at the end of summer for all who volunteered.
Check out our SCHOOL GARDEN CALENDAR to learn more about what this month looks like in the garden! For more information, try out these awesome resources: MOFGA's Planting Calendar, Fedco's Veggie Chart, and Johnny's Planting Calculator and Succession Planting Template.
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We are excited to spread the word about this incredibly exciting new position at Walker School in Liberty! 
A great professional development opportunity to learn about the benefits of nature based education and how to incorporate the principles into your own classroom! Build 2×2 mini-gardens with our own Kevin Duplissie, and learn what is needed in the soil for your seeds to grow, for drainage and watering and actually plant seeds that will grow this summer in your classroom or home. June 23rd & 24th at University of Maine at Farmington. Learn more and register here.
In K-12 schools, leftover food can be recovered by setting up a Share Table and collecting for composting. For institutions and restaurants, cutting down on food waste helps to reduce their costs and is one of the practices that contributes to a sustainable brand. This workshop will look at how Maine schools, institutions and restaurants can set up and operate data driven food waste reduction and recovery programs and achieve economic and environmental benefits by keeping leftover food out of the dumpster. It will examine the links between food waste and gleaning networks, and food recovery and food insecurity, as well as the donation of leftover food. Guest speakers from schools, municipalities, businesses and the hospitality industry will share their perspective and practices. Earn CEUs at this workshop held on June 29th 9am - 3:30pm. 
The 2017 Maine Agriculture in the Classroom Summer Teachers Institute will be held at The University Maine, Farmington with 36 contact hours or 3.6 CEU's available for recertification. July 31st - Aug 4th, the week will start with curriculum sessions at the College focused on STEM, Nutrition and higher level thinking for students in regard to agriculture. The week-long workshop will include lessons, online resources and grant opportunities and a trip to Boothby's Orchard and Farm Winery. All participants will leave with armloads of materials and megabytes of technology integrating agriculture into your classes from Pre K – 12th grade. Get more details and register 
At the Ellsworth Elementary Middle School, we are very excited about our “growing” outdoor curriculum. Our vision is to create easily accessible outdoor spaces for students, staff and community members to engage together, in an active role, to establish, maintain and promote an appreciation for the natural environment. Our mission is to provide all students with opportunities to integrate learning into the outdoor classroom.
Why not check out some amazing gardens along your travels? 
