Spring Break
Buds spring up
3,000 seedling plants growing in 'polyhouse'
Aaron Hummel
Issue date: 2/7/08 Section: News
Five weeks ago, sheltered from the snow and freezing cold, Hillsdale College Horticulturalist Angie Girdham began sowing the seeds that will make this year's May 10 commencement beautiful. She planted the first of what will eventually be more than 3,000 seedlings destined for planting around campus this spring. Governed by two of Girdham's sophisticated spreadsheets detailing everything from sowing dates to watering schedules, this methodical, 17-week process is a tradition that culminates in thousands of flowers that appear virtually overnight in the flower beds across campus every spring.
"We've planted hundreds of seeds so far," said senior Eric Hasso, who works for Girdham. "So right before graduation you'll see a bunch of stuff appear suddenly. It's all stuff we had growing in the greenhouse."
This year, the main flower colors will be blue and white - Charger colors, Girdham said, with pink and lavender accents.
"I usually start off by deciding which color scheme I'm going to use," Girdham said.
Already, thousands of her seedlings incubate in the humid tepidity of the greenhouse that sits behind the commuter parking lot on the southwest corner of Galloway and West streets. By the time she finishes sowing in two weeks, 3,328 plants will stretch their leaves toward automatic misters overhead.
After six or seven weeks of growth, the young plants will be moved to larger pots, where they'll remain until transplanted outdoors, Girdham said.
But not all of her plants will eventually bear lush flowers.
"These are foliage plants so they don't do a lot of flowering," she said, pointing at several leafy plants, clones cut from a deceased "mother" plant. "They just add context and texture to the containers."
The seven year old "polyhouse," as it's usually called its workers, is a 97 by 30.5 foot steel frame covered with a double layer of thick polyurethane plastic that enables plants to thrive even with frigid temperatures outside.
Numerous patches in the plastic attest to the difficulty of keeping such a fragile structure functional.
Inside the greenhouse, three house fans circulate air to prevent diseases caused by constantly wet leaves, and two large heaters keep the air temperature between 60 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit - well above the 50-degree minimum young plants need for adequate growth.
Just before she moves the mature plants outdoors in May, Girdham gradually lowers the building temperature to acclimate them to Michigan's cool spring weather. The greenhouseis not only useful for beautifying campus. It's also an educational place for students.
"We learn more about a lot in the greenhouse - soil types, alkalinity and adjusting, how to take care of plants," senior Elysia Berry said.
"The polyhouse is a really nice resource," Associate Professor of Biology Ranessa Cooper said. "It's been great for our students to be able to work in, and since Angie has been here it's been fitted with a nice watering system and automatic misters."
The most recent project involved hundreds of willow cuttings from the college's Rockwell Lake Biostation, Cooper said.
The cuttings were supposed to sprout roots of their own, but Hillsdale's city's basic water destroyed the experiment. Since then, the college installed a pH adjustment system that converts the incoming city water from an alkaline pH of 7.6 to the more acidic 5.56 pH plants prefer, Girdham said.
Students are not the only ones learning from Girdham and her greenhouse.
"Angie Girdham has been an invaluable resource," Cooper said. "She's also taught me a great deal. I wasn't trained in horticulture [but] I knew greenhouse practices from undergraduate and graduate work."
For all her work with plants, Girdham loves her job mostly because of the people it benefits.
"It's a job that brings a lot of joy to other people," she said. "It's hard not to love it."
Her job is not for everyone, she said.
"There's this gut instinct when you look at a plant, you know whether it needs nitrogen or something," she said. "Some people have it, and some people don't."
For more photos see the Collegian Flickr account
Hillsdale College Collegian
"We've planted hundreds of seeds so far," said senior Eric Hasso, who works for Girdham. "So right before graduation you'll see a bunch of stuff appear suddenly. It's all stuff we had growing in the greenhouse."
This year, the main flower colors will be blue and white - Charger colors, Girdham said, with pink and lavender accents.
"I usually start off by deciding which color scheme I'm going to use," Girdham said.
Already, thousands of her seedlings incubate in the humid tepidity of the greenhouse that sits behind the commuter parking lot on the southwest corner of Galloway and West streets. By the time she finishes sowing in two weeks, 3,328 plants will stretch their leaves toward automatic misters overhead.
After six or seven weeks of growth, the young plants will be moved to larger pots, where they'll remain until transplanted outdoors, Girdham said.
But not all of her plants will eventually bear lush flowers.
"These are foliage plants so they don't do a lot of flowering," she said, pointing at several leafy plants, clones cut from a deceased "mother" plant. "They just add context and texture to the containers."
The seven year old "polyhouse," as it's usually called its workers, is a 97 by 30.5 foot steel frame covered with a double layer of thick polyurethane plastic that enables plants to thrive even with frigid temperatures outside.
Numerous patches in the plastic attest to the difficulty of keeping such a fragile structure functional.
Inside the greenhouse, three house fans circulate air to prevent diseases caused by constantly wet leaves, and two large heaters keep the air temperature between 60 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit - well above the 50-degree minimum young plants need for adequate growth.
Just before she moves the mature plants outdoors in May, Girdham gradually lowers the building temperature to acclimate them to Michigan's cool spring weather. The greenhouseis not only useful for beautifying campus. It's also an educational place for students.
"We learn more about a lot in the greenhouse - soil types, alkalinity and adjusting, how to take care of plants," senior Elysia Berry said.
"The polyhouse is a really nice resource," Associate Professor of Biology Ranessa Cooper said. "It's been great for our students to be able to work in, and since Angie has been here it's been fitted with a nice watering system and automatic misters."
The most recent project involved hundreds of willow cuttings from the college's Rockwell Lake Biostation, Cooper said.
The cuttings were supposed to sprout roots of their own, but Hillsdale's city's basic water destroyed the experiment. Since then, the college installed a pH adjustment system that converts the incoming city water from an alkaline pH of 7.6 to the more acidic 5.56 pH plants prefer, Girdham said.
Students are not the only ones learning from Girdham and her greenhouse.
"Angie Girdham has been an invaluable resource," Cooper said. "She's also taught me a great deal. I wasn't trained in horticulture [but] I knew greenhouse practices from undergraduate and graduate work."
For all her work with plants, Girdham loves her job mostly because of the people it benefits.
"It's a job that brings a lot of joy to other people," she said. "It's hard not to love it."
Her job is not for everyone, she said.
"There's this gut instinct when you look at a plant, you know whether it needs nitrogen or something," she said. "Some people have it, and some people don't."
For more photos see the Collegian Flickr account
Hillsdale College Collegian
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