Fall harvest teaches horticulture for a cause for Fairbanks students

From The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Wednesday, September 8, 2010:

The entrance of the garden at the Tanana Valley fairgrounds smelled like a minty fusion as about a dozen students harvested crops Tuesday afternoon.

“The spearmint needs to be weighed. The kale needs to be weighed,” said Sheryl Meirerotto, who teaches the eighth-grade class from Effie Kokrine that was busy digging, plucking and weighing vegetables.

The class will prepare a portion of the produce for a potlatch dinner during the Alaska Federation of Natives Convention in October.

The garden, which has existed for many years and has been managed by the University of Alaska Fairbanks for the last two years, demonstrates how much can be grown in the Interior.

“The purpose of the garden is to represent the crops grown in the Tanana Valley. People don’t know we can grow things like corn,” said Jeff Werner, a UAF researcher and Alaska Future Farmers of America adviser.