Summertime Science in the Garden: Pollination

Bumblebee visiting gayfeather flowers in my dad's garden in Maine

Summer is a great season to spend time in a garden, and you often receive a little science lesson in the process. I enjoy watching various pollinators at work as they visit flowers. One of my favorites is the bumblebee, which is able to access pollen unavailable to other pollinators. Its secret is buzzing at a specific frequency that causes the flower's anthers to open and release pollen. (To learn more about buzz pollination, see the link at the end of this post to a Science Friday video on this topic.)

I learned about the importance of pollinators the hard way one year when my zucchini plants produced lots of flowers but no zucchini! I discovered that zucchini and other squash flowers are monoecious, meaning they have separate male and female flowers on the same plant. They can't self-pollinate, like some perfect flowers do, but instead rely on pollinators for the flowers to develop into fruits, the zucchini. Pollinators carry pollen from the anthers of a male flower to the stigma of a female flower. You can see these flower parts in the photos below, taken in my plot in the Juniper-Front Community Garden in San Diego.

Male squash flower with pollen-covered anther in the center

Female flower with stigma in the center

Fellow gardeners suggested that I plant some flowers to attract pollinators, and this has been very helpful. I learned that humans can serve as pollinators, too! This is a fun activity to do with kids. To hand pollinate a zucchini or other squash flower, remove the petals from a male squash blossom, and rub its anthers on the stigma of a female flower. One male flower can be used to pollinate multiple female flowers. 

Female blossom- note ovary below petals

Three days later: ovary developing into fruit

Male flower- note absence of ovary below petals

Once the flower has been pollinated, the pollen forms a tube that travels from the stigma down through the style to fertilize the ovules at the base of the pistil, triggering the development of the zucchini fruit. I now use this trick to pollinate my zucchini and spaghetti squash flowers with great success! 

If you enjoy watching pollinators and think you might be interested in helping collect data on pollinators in your area, you can learn about a citizen science project called The Great Sunflower Project in this blog post:

Get Outdoors with Citizen Science! The Great Sunflower Project

To learn more about buzz pollination, check out this Science Friday video:

Science Friday Video on Buzz Pollination

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Trashion Show: Weaving Art into Lessons on Human Impact and Sustainability

The most fun project that I do with my students is by far our annual Trashion Show, a project that compliments the NGSS standards related to human impact. As students learn about sustainability, they are challenged to repurpose landfill-bound textiles and other materials to create new outfits and costumes. We do this project at the end of the school year, and I’ve found that it’s a great way to keep students engaged and motivated even with summer vacation on the horizon. Students work with a purpose: to use their creativity to put on a great show! Guiding students in creating the Trashion Show keeps me motivated, too! As their teacher, I love seeing students' individuality on display in the outfits they create and the other work they do. 

Well before we begin working on the Trashion Show, I start soliciting donations of used textiles. Over spring break, I send out an email asking families to save items for us while doing their spring cleaning. This year my dad was the face of my donation campaign. I used a photo of him holding a very well-loved and worn t-shirt that he was donating to us with the subject line, “Do You Dress Like My Dad?” 

Once students begin working, they may have specific used materials that they are seeking, so I send additional emails with a list of their desired trash. My general rule for creating Trashion Show pieces is that we shouldn’t create more trash than we started with, so students need to design outfits that can be taken apart into recyclable pieces at the end of the show. (The exception is for used materials that can't be recycled.)

Not all students want to be designers and create outfits, but there are other important jobs that need to be done. A DJ is needed to work with designers and models to select songs to play. The marketing director works on advertising by drafting emails to send to teachers and families and fliers to post in the school. There are typically two MCs who introduce and close the Trashion Show and read descriptions of the outfits as they are being modeled. Speech writers work with MCs on the script and assist designers with descriptions when needed. 

The teacher acts as a project manager, keeping the work flow in motion by guiding students who finish their tasks to find work that needs to be done in another area. As students are in the midst of creating their outfits and costumes, I provide them with opportunities to showcase their works-in-progress and plans for the outfit. The goal of sharing their work helps students stay focused, and I can easily see the development of all of the pieces. 

Model and Designer of "Childhood Dreams"

My dad's old shirt made new again!

The Trashion Show is a project I lead with the 6th-grade class, but other members of the school community are drawn in as models and later as our audience. Involving kindergarteners and other younger children as models is always a crowd pleaser, and I often have my daughter model an outfit that I have made. The model who always got the most applause though was our former principal, Phil Beaumont, who is a natural (and professional) performer! 

Holding a Trashion Show is a nice way to bring the entire school community together and have some fun while weaving art into science lessons.

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