Adaptive Gardens of the Lowcountry has been approved by the IRS for tax exempt status and has been named a public charity!

Coastal Community Foundation has been AGL’s fiscal sponsor since it’s inception in 2009.  We send many thanks to Coastal Community Foundation for guiding us down the right paths over the last two years.  Angel, our mentor at CCF,  has been exactly that, an ANGEL!  Thank you all for everything you have done in helping the mission of Adaptive Gardens continue to succeed.

The expertise of Patricia Scarborough of Evans, Carter, Kunes & Bennett, P.A. has been a true gift.  Patty has worked diligently in the entire application process, and now all of her hard work is evident!

Thank you to everyone who has helped us get this far; including all of our wonderful volunteers and donors who have believed so fully in the Adaptive Gardens’ programming!

The new chicken tractor pre-chickens

We are well on our way into the start of what looks like a great year for learning and getting our hands dirty!  Before “digging” into the new year, Adaptive Gardens would like to thank everyone who has helped us along the way in 2010.  To all of our generous donors, thank you for keeping us going.  To our volunteers: your interaction with the participants of the program, is immeasurable, so thank you.  Special thanks to Nancy Marshall, Bill Brabsen and Lee Leland for teaching the students new skills.  We had so many generous contributors and wonderful volunteers to our Local Music on the Farm fundraiser in November and we send our greatest appreciation to all of them.  Thank you to Our Local Foods for sharing your seeds of knowledge and actual seeds.

Into 2011 we go…

Participants from Georgetown High School, Lincoln High School, Wando High School, Georgetown Board of Disabilities and Special Needs and Windwood Farm students have been seeding, seeding and more seeding!  Getting ready for the Spring plant sale is no easy task.  We will post soon the where and when of the plant sales.

Jodie is a master craftsman when it comes to Gourd art!  He has been showing the participants how to make gourd jewelry from the gourds they grew, harvested and cured in the fall.  It is an obvious hit as one of the boys from a class stated, “This bracelet is really looking good on my arm, I might just accidentally forget to take it off and then might accidentally sleep with it on tonight”.

An anonymous donor has built and donated a wonderful chicken tractor–thank you!  As the students learn more about composting, the care of chickens fits right in.  They will see the full cycle of a living animal producing manure, the composting of the manure, the benefits of the manure in the soil and then into the growth of plants.

With all of the activities going on at the farm, Adaptive Gardens is seeking an intern to work from six to 15 hours per week with the participants of the program.  Please, email us at info@adaptivegardens.org if interested.

Again, many thanks to everyone who has allowed Adaptive Gardens to flourish this past year and continuing into the New Year!  You are quite literally the seeds of change!

Welcome Back to the Farm!  After a busy summer working with Georgetown Disabilities Board, Old Santee Canal Park, Charleston County Alternative Recreation and Windwood Farm, Adaptive Gardens is starting school programming again for the fall.

We began by going to Windwood Farm & introducing our new Activities Director, Jodie Thomas, to the boys.  They seeded lettuces & beets, which have begun to sprout!  Georgetown High School came out on Monday & got more seeds started, washed lots of pots, weeded & harvested Luffa Sponge.  Wando High School will be seeding and collecting seeds from flower heads & the Luffa sponges.  Programs with Georgetown Disabilities Board, Old Santee Canal Park and Lincoln High School will begin in the next couple of weeks.

This fall participants will continue to develop their seeding, transplanting, watering, weeding, soil mixing and composting skills, but will learn a multitude of other things.  We will begin focusing on landscaping skills, worm composting, animal care and further development of cottage industry products!

We are all enthusiastic about the upcoming programming  & would love to hear from you anytime or have you visit the farm!

Georgetown High School Students Harvesting Luffa Sponge

PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES WILL BENEFIT FROM HORTICULTURE PROGRAM FUNDED BY WHOLE FOODS MARKET 5% DAY

Adaptive Gardens of the Lowcountry, a non-profit assisting people with disabilities through horticulture, will be the recipient of Whole Foods Market 5% Day on June 22, 2010

Mount Pleasant, South Carolina (Tuesday, June 22, 2010) Shopping at Whole Foods Market in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina on June 22, 2010 will help fund a horticulture program working with people with disabilities.  Whole Foods Market will donate 5% of the net sales for the day to Adaptive Gardens of the Lowcountry.  Funds raised will allow individuals with special needs to participate in the horticulture program offered and develop lifelong skills.

Adaptive Gardens of the Lowcountry is a non-profit, on Thornhill Farm, teaching persons with disabilities practical skills related to: healthy living, social bonding, vocational and recreational pursuits through horticultural activities.  Through activities such as: making soil, seeding, potting plants, tending the garden & making seed paper, the participants are able to focus on social skills and fine and gross motor skill development.  Catherine McGuinn, Program Director for Adaptive Gardens says, “When walking down the rows we do a lot of side-stepping.  They (program participants) have to move their feet apart and back together…that’s a great way to work on balance and coordination and gross motor skills”.  This is just one example of the therapeutic methods used to work with individuals with special needs when they come to the farm.

For more information regarding the programs offered by Adaptive Gardens of the Lowcountry, please contact us at: info@adaptivegardens.org.

-Courtesy Art Liberman

After a wonderfully successful year, it has come to an end.  We have been doing lots of weeding in the last week, but it didn’t go without a reward!  As a special treat the kids learned how to make dirt.  No, not making soil (they have been doing that all year), but “dirt”.  They mixed chocolate pudding, chocolate ginger snaps & gummy worms to make “dirt” they were allowed to eat.  It was a fun, end-of-year activity for everyone!

As the students weeded in their last week before the summer, they were able to see the progress of of all the plants they started from seed.  Tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, squash, zucchini, rainbow chard, broccoli, kale and luffa in the vegetable garden.  The poppies and chamomile were in full bloom for them to see.

We will miss everyone during the summer, but hope everyone has lots of fun.  Although we won’t be seeing our normal classes, Catherine has set up horticultural therapy outreach programs with Windwood Farm, Georgetown Disabilities and City of Charleston’s Alternative Recreation Department.  For those that can’t make it to the farm, we will go to them!

There will be lots of new faces & new gardens & lots of room to grow!