Every Thursday this quarter, Bellevue College’s Bite Me Garden Club has been adamant about meeting up and working towards a more agricultural and environmental campus. Alex Clark, president of the Bite Me Garden Club, said that the club currently has their hands full working towards future projects. “We are currently planting a variety of crops, mainly focusing on keeping the garden tidy and beautiful until spring comes around and we can really get busy with crop succession and harvesting food.” Another goal of the Garden Club is to bring vermiculture bins to campus, and they are currently working with the Bite Me interdisciplinary class to do so. “Vermiculture is the growing of worms and using them to produce compost and worm castings. We are working with food services to ensure all the scraps of food in preparation end up fed to our worms so we can turn it into delicious food,” said Clark. In addition to the vermiculture bins, the club would also try and bring a bee hive to campus as well.
In the future, the club would like to establish a Campus Supported Agriculture, selling boxes of produce to faculty and students to raise money for the club and for charity. Bringing it a little bit closer to all the students, the Garden Club also aims to provide for the students as well. “We also hope to eventually provide food for the salad bar in the cafeteria. Our garden has turned out to be highly productive, so providing for the cafeteria is looking more and more feasible,” said Clark.
While the club may be small, the Bite Me Garden Club has already brought plenty of benefits to the campus. “We have brought to BC the drive and knowledge to teach our peers about growing food. Not all of us can be farmers, but if even 10% of us started growing our own food, we could have a much smaller impact on the planet and its resources. Food is the most basic of human needs, and we want to empower people to be able to provide that for themselves,” said Clark.
If you are at all interested in helping out or being involved with the Bite Me Garden Club, contact Karrin Peterson at k.peterson@bellevuecollege.edu, or just stop by the garden behind the greenhouse Thursday at 3:30 p.m.