Weekly WISE #4
Another exciting week of SSEP 2023! Read all about what Ava T. and Carly C. did this week and so far as part of SSEP!
Ava T., Research Assistant in Boreal Forest Landscape Climate Change Research
This week I feel like I’ve really settled in. I know where to find things in the lab and I find myself asking less and less simple questions on how to do something or if I’m doing something right or not. At the beginning of the summer I had really bad computer skills. I had never used excel spreadsheets, graphs, or really anything science related on a computer. Most of what I have been doing this week has been tech related. At the beginning I was very confused on how to do pretty much everything, but now I know how to use the Ph Meter, Exel, and even the Spectrophotometer (fancy science machine). Overall I feel more confident that I’m able to do something even if it is techy.
Through the WISE program, we got a tour of the engineering building. I really liked the labs in the building. To me it was similar to the NRC tour that we did earlier in the summer. When I first walked into some of the labs I remember thinking that it was like a giant Kent. I love Kent. It’s like an arts and crafts store for adults. The labs were like Kents in that sense. They had tools, building supplies, and machines. But they were not just building tables or chairs, they were designing the things you need to make the tables and chairs. It’s like being in a real life “How it’s made”.
Carly C., Greenhouse Technician
My name is Carly Chubbs and I’m located in Port Hope Simpson, Labrador.
For my Weekly Wise, I’m going to talk about what I’ve done during the week of July 24th-28th 2023. I have been working at the Nunatukavut Community Greenhouse here in Port Hope Simpson. Because I am the only person working with Wise NL in my area, I’ve been partnered to work with some members of CCNL’s Green Team. My team consists of two people in my town, and two others about 45 minutes away in St. Lewis, Labrador. One of which is our team leader.
Every morning we start our day by watering the plants. Our greenhouse has a variety of different plants such as lettuce, turnip, cucumber, squash, peas, and many more.
Every week on Wednesday, we have an event that we call a “Kids Day”, where children from the community come to learn about gardening and do some fun activities. Our supervisor wanted us to paint a desk for the kids to write their names on, so I began doing a base coat on Monday. We also transplanted herbs into a bed and picked up some debris around the area.
On Tuesday, we identified and labelled plants inside of the greenhouse. We thought this would be efficient for anyone that wanted to come and check out what has been growing. We also prepared the hydroponics system inside of the greenhouse and planted some lettuce to go in there once they become seedlings. We had been researching this system for awhile, and hopefully we will get it running very soon. To finish off the day, we harvested and prepared greens and lettuce to deliver to the seniors here in town.
Wednesday morning, we planted more turnips and lettuce, and I finished painting the base coat on the desk. In the afternoon, we had “Kids Day” where we taught them about water conservation and composting. We did a scavenger hunt activity and rock painting, which I had made homemade paint for them to use. We decorated the greenhouse with the rocks they painted.
On Thursday, I just did some training with my team and researched about the hydroponics system and solar power. Friday morning, we cut some grass behind the greenhouse and put it in our composter. We set up a solar panel in the area and we’re hoping to be able to power the fans and possibly the hydroponics system.
I’m very passionate about this job, as I’ve wanted to learn more about gardening. I also love how this positively contributes to the people in our community. I’m really enjoying the summer so far and I’m pretty sad it has to end so soon.