Science in Grandma's Garden

One of the fifth grade Garden Leaders wanted something special to do.  She's usually content to spray herself and her friends with the garden's hose, but I forgot to bring the handle to turn it on.

No, I don't leave it available for any miscreant to reach over and turn it on to douse one and all without supervision or permission. The handle comes and goes with me, in the bag I left in my trunk.

She was mildly disappointed, but willing to try the secateurs (The WHAT?? They are scissors.)  I didn't have gloves to protect her hands, but she figured out how to grab the end of the desiccated aloe vera and reach into the depths of the plant to cut.  

I watched for a while, making sure she was safe.  That gave me time to notice the only other scholar in the garden.

A trowel is a feeble weapon when faced with the hard pack that is the ground beneath our feet.  Yet he persisted.  This was no random flinging of soil, he obviously had a purpose, even if it wasn't obvious to me.  My usual rule is No Digging except in the 1st raised bed, but there was something that made me ask why before reminding him that he was old enough to remember the rules.

I walked over.  With a big smile, he informed me that the river and bridge and pool he'd created the day before seemed to have survived the evening.  Even without water, he could tell that the path would still be functional when you remember to bring what we need to test it out.

Who knew that picking up the wrong bag would have such consequences.  A budding civil engineer had to use his imagination.  He wanted to demonstrate in real time that deep water takes a while to evaporate, and it can even move soil on its own, creating its own path, like it did the last time, when I had the water going through the hose.  

The hole he's excavating is not in the main walkway.  Soon, a tree will occupy that space, in a hole dug much deeper than his trowel could manage.  So, for now, I'll let it be.  

The garden always manages to amaze me.  It offers so much to so many in so many different ways.