The Dirt on Dirt

Organism of

the year: An insight into the life of the smallest, best diggers around!

MOLES

Letters from our

Editors

ONLY IN THIS

EDITION

Exclusive propaganda poster!

What you need to know about soil:

How it could change the way you think about

dirt

Soil themed art

Poems from our

subscribers

Themed Photo

Montage

Table of Contents

3. Organism of the Year: Moles, the

Soil underdogs.

4. It’s all About Soil

5-6. Photo Montage

7. Poppy Painting

8-10. Soil Poems

11-13. Letters from the Editors

14. Propaganda Poster

When someone mentions soil,

moles aren’t usually the first ani-

mal you think of. But they are

one of the, most important ani-

mals that use the soil as their

habitat. Not only do they eat

worms and tunnel through the

ground 24/7, but they have a ma-

jor role when it comes to improv-

ing the soil’s living conditions, by

improving the soil’s quality and

nutrients. So although this small

mammal may be considered a

pest by some gardeners, it has a

much bigger role in this

world’s soil health that's just

more important than one or

two angry gardeners.

Moles help the soil

by eating all the unwanted

pests in the garden. Some

people who have moles in

their garden say they do not

have to use poison to get rid

of the other unwanted pests.

eating those pests is not only

good for the moles, but also for

the environment. Moles aren’t

just Insectivora (reference para-

graph 4), they are decomposers.

A decomposer is an organism

that breaks down organic matter.

Moles decompose those unwant-

ed pests into humus, which is just

broken down organic matter. Hu-

mus makes up one of the four in-

gredients in soil, along

with broken down/eroded rocks

and minerals, air and water.

A moles diet consists earth-

worms and insects, but some-

times may include small mam-

mals like mice. The moles saliva

contains a toxic acid that will

paralyze earthworms, allowing

them to store their living prey

for later consumptions. Before a

mole eat an earthworm, they will

put the earthworm in their paws

and squeeze the collected earth

and dirt out of the worm’s gut.

Moles eat 70%-100% of their

body weight each day.

Many people assume many

things about moles that aren’t

true. For example, people as-

sume that moles are rodents.

But in fact, moles are not ro-

dents, they belong to a group

called Insectivore, making them

closely related to shrews. Are

moles blind? Many people ask

this question quite often. The

answer is no. Moles are not

blind. They have extreme-

ly bad eyesight. Even though

moles have terrible eyesight,

they have a great sense of

smell, which helps them find

food and there way through

the tunnels they make under-

ground. Even though moles

have extremely bad eyesight,

they can still they if it’s light

out or not. Their eyes are lo-

cated behind their

snouts. Moles are not noc-

turnal. Currently research

suggests that moles sleep and

work in a four hour shift.

Moles are more active dur-

ing quiet times, like early

morning or late evening.

When moles feel vibrations

in the ground, when hu-

mans and pets walk or run,

they cease their digging.

Moles don’t live together,

because they do not get

along. If another mole is

found on a different mole’ s

territory, they will fight to the

death. There are two excep-

tions, in which you find

moles together. One will hap-

pen during the Spring, when

the males go out to find ma-

tes. The other exception is,

some tunnels are sometimes

used like a highway. Re-

searches and scientists say

that “ the social system with

moles are more complex than

Moles: the soil underdogs

It’s All About Soil

A gardener’s guide to help improve your soil, and

grow the best plants.

By: Sophia R-B

Soil is a common thing found almost everywhere on and in the Earth. But, what most people don’t know is that there are different layers of soil, and different types of soil. There are certain types of plants that grow better with the different types, and some that die because they cannot get the correct nutrition. So, the main things to know when you’re starting a garden, is the type of soil you are using, and the types of plants that correspond with that specific type of soil.

There are three main types of soil. Sand, silt and clay. The order of the names is from the finest, granular sand to the much more firm, malleable clay. In between those two is silt, which is a blend of the two. Silt is usually the soil with the most high nutrition of the three. But the world isn’t made up of three types of soil. There are often blends of soils, like sandy-silty soil. There is also the fact that depending on where the soil is, like what climate, that climate will have something to offer to the soil. In the desert, the sand will usually be rocky, and coarse. But, beach sand will be more silky and salty. So though they may be the same types of soil, because they are in different climates, the soils are very different.

This is one thing to contemplate as you plot the aspect and places you want to plant your garden. One oth-er thing to keep in mind is the accessibility of the place. Will water be able to reach the garden when it rains? Will it be able to soak up the sun for as long as possible? And will pesky bugs and birds eat every-thing before it has a chance to grow? Birds and bugs will try to devour the seeds you plant. What can you do about it? Well, you can research ways to make seed balls, which protect the seeds with clay, or you can look up natural remedies to get rid of bugs. Pesticides may be effective, but they harm the soil, the organ-isms that thrive in the soil and make it nutritional, and you also harm the things you are growing in your gar-den. Natural remedies are much better for the soil, the organisms that are helping your soil, and the plants that are growing in your soil.

Moving on to the main aspect of gardening, the plants. While some plants may grow well in sandy-silty soil, others may not be able to grow in that type. It also depends on what type of climate you live in. For exam-ple, a Mediterranean climate (like the one in Southern California, or Greece) will have hot weather and rocky, dry soil. This climate is great for growing grapes, avocados and olive trees. This climate can also be classified as temperate. Other examples of climates are cold, tropical, dry and polar. The best way to find out what grows best in what type of climate (aside from trial and error) is to look at the plants that grow in the continent related to that climate. For a polar climate, you’d look at Antarctica. For a tropical climate, you’d look at Brazil, or central Africa. For a dry climate, you’d look at the Sahara region or Australia. The plants that grow there are the plants that grow there and are accustomed to the climate are some of the healthiest plants around.

Gardening is the one activity that can bring us close to nature in ways we never thought possible. If you want to start gardening today, then you should, because the fruits of your labors are the most rewarding fruits. If you want to leave a legacy on the Earth, plant a garden. I hope this article has helped inform you, and encouraged you to make a change, and plant a garden.

Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden”

- Orson Scott Card

The Wonders of Nature

Isabelle

As I took these pictures of nature, I noticed how some colors on the petals

blended in. Pink and orange, yellow and orange, and pink and white. Leaves of

amazing shapes, sizes and colors, all fill my eyes with their beauty as they show

me, the real world.

Poppy painting Ellie W.

This painting was modeled off of a photograph I took while visiting Descanso garden during

the soil unit. Before I painted this, I had always thought that the California poppy was orange,

but once I painted them, I realized that they were Golden, just like the rest of this state and

everything that comes from it

Soil-related Poems

Sophia R-B

A New Look at a Garden

A step through open gates

to a woRld i have never known

with the wind whispering, Lingering

with the chIldren of the trees

daNcing

and the wind carryinG the sound

of peace

harmony

why do we

have To incorporate ourselves

intO every

crevice

she has

and why do we

have to make a terrible

mess

oNe that we hide

but never clean up

the twitterinG of a

robin

Awakens me to the sound of her

bReathing

Barbaric Yawp

By: Sophia R B

I walk with the soil under my

feet

Though there may man on top

Earth is the foundation

While it is ever changing,

I stay grounded

Touching is much more different than

feeling

and as i feel the soil fall through

the spaces in-between my fingers

i start to see

what i don’t want to see

The corpses of men

Have decomposed

Into the sand in my

Hands

And while I await my destiny

They have already gone

And helped rejuvenate

This

The flowers

Trees

Worms

All

I know this is my destiny

Whether I be cremated, buried, or stuffed in a

coffin

I belong here

This is where

I have come from

This is where

I must go.

Immortality (barbaric yawp)

Ellie W

Although you may not know it,

my blood courses through you.

My long forgotten energy is the

Very thing that fuels your mind.

My fingerprints which once held my identity,

now can be seen in the leaves of the great oak.

My feet, which had once run many miles,

now run through the sap in the veins of the

creeping vines.

After I am thought to be gone,

I will still be recreated by maggots and fungi,

until I am only part of the background.

But I am still there.

No matter how hard you try,

No matter how long you wait,

there is no escaping me.

I am the very ground you stand on.

How many have been through the process

before me?

“Living” is only a small fraction of LIFE.

We cloud ourselves with illusions.

Life? Death? These are only labels,

For the human mind cannot perceive immortality,

no matter how obvious the evidence is.

All matter on the earth cannot disappear or appear.

It can only change form.

As everything does.

Is there really so such thing as death?

A Poppy Oasis

Ellie W

Above me, there is nothing. Nothing but blue sky and the occasion-

al wisp of white cloud.

In the distance, there are telephone lines between suburban Cali-

fornia and this small sliver of the past.

I hear the sharp, staccato chirp of a bird nearby, and the rumbling

of car tires on asphalt in the distance.

I smell plant stems, which have been crushed between fingers,

cool shaded stones, and the faint but sure scent of poppies.

To my right, there is a bronze bouquet of watering spouts fanning

out in all directions.

The poppy is made of tangerine silk as the sun shines off it.

When the poppy’s petals overlap, they are parchment paper in

the sun.

How long will you forget this oasis?

A Wild and Precious Life to See

Isabelle P.

Far in the distance, I see tall trees trying to reach towards the sky. Leaves of green and many different brown barks. Sunlight hits the leaves making it look Gold and Radiant. Sounds fill my ears all around me chatter of kids, chirps of birds calling to each oth-er. Bees, buzzing, and cars rushing by. I can hear the leaves rustling in the wind. The farthest sound I can hear is footsteps of peo-ple, running and walking. I can smell fresh nature, the bright, brilliant flowers. Fresh leaves and herbs fill my nose. I feel dirt underneath my shoes, every stick cracking. I step on hard stone, solid stone. Above me, I see two butterflies, wings of a pretty shade of orange, black, and white. They silently flap their wings, dancing around each other. I watch the butterflies leave my sight. I should have seen nature’s beauty before, how could I not? Why did I not open my eyes and see all of this? This is One Wild and Precious Life I will keep in my heart.

from My Mini Garden

Isabelle P.

The hot, burning sun tries to burn a hole in my back. I wipe the dreaded sweat from my face. I drag a long, wooden flower box to get start-ed. I grab a small hand shovel and start putting soil in the flower box. I had fill at least half of the long box. It was so hot. It really seemed like the sun is trying to burn me up, so I’d become part of nature. I had finally filled up the flower box with healthy soil. I walk over to my mother’s worm compost and opened it. The smell was overwhelming, so sickening, at least to me. I grabbed a small bucket and filled a little bit with compost. I spread out the compost along the soil. I was excited to start planting, gardening was fun. I walked inside expecting the nice air-conditioning house. I open a top drawer to get my seed packet. I walk outside and rip the packet open. I dug little holes

and put a seed in each hole and saved the rest. I buried every single hole. Almost done, I walked away, just to get a watering can full of rainwater, that I had gotten from our rain catcher. I had poured a nice amount of water in the flower box. I couldn’t wait, to see the blue bell flower to grow. A nice shade of violet blue, of a flourishing flower. I just couldn’t wait,

Dear Reader,

Thank you for choosing to read this edition of the Dirt on Dirt. We have worked very hard to give

you this. There is a certain pleasure in looking at the fruits of your labor. And, it was really rewarding to

see what we had accomplished in that short amount of time. At our school, we had to make this magazine

as a part of the Soil Unit. The soil unit was 7 days in which our school informed the seventh grade about

soil and the ways it is formed and how it helps the world. It actually was a really interesting experience,

and my group got to know each other really well. As we helped each other create the propaganda poster,

the articles in this magazine, and the cover of this magazine, I started to become even more curious and

interested about soil. How was it possible that hundreds of layers of tiny materials had piled up over thou-

sands of years, and not blown away into space? How was it possible that thousands- no millions- of organ-

isms could live under the ground I walk on, and yet I only ever saw a few organisms every day? It really

bugged me, and yet it made me want to learn more. And I definitely did. The first day, we learned about

victory gardens, and got assignments for the magazine. The second day, we went to Arlington Gardens,

and learned about labyrinths, flowers, bacterial colonies, and how to work with people you don’t know

very well. The next day, we started drawing our propaganda posters, in which we encouraged people to

plant a garden and make a difference. After that, we went to the Pasadena Community Garden, helped

weed, mix compost and soil, and learned about the different types of soil. Friday, the day after, we contin-

ued to make progress on our magazines. The next week, we started math. And we learned about the ex-

tremely confusing, yet quite interesting, Fibonacci ratio. Then we examined the bacterial colonies we had

collected samples for at Arlington Gardens, and recorded the observations we made considering the colo-

nies. On Tuesday, before the soil unit, for PE we went to Descanso Gardens for a hike, and then we split

into our soil unit groups and observed the wildlife that lived in the beautiful habitat. When we got back to

school for soil unit, we rotated around the campus to plant herbs and flowers, and make our school look

even more beautiful than it already does. The next day, we wrapped up the soil unit, and reflected upon

what we had learned. Which happened to be a lot. I want you to read and enjoy this magazine, not only

because it was an assignment for the soil unit, but also because it will inform you about things you per-

ceive to be as something it isn’t. “A garden requires patient labor and attention. Plants do

not grow merely to satisfy ambitions or to fulfill good intentions. They thrive because

someone expended effort on them.”

- Liberty Hyde Bailey

Thank you once again!

~Sophia R-B

My Letter to You

Isabelle P Dear Readers,

During these seven days of learning made me realize something, it made me realize the im-portance of soil. Soil helps us in so many ways that you don’t even know. Going to gardens, learning about trees, and native plants. Being in the wild nature is a great way to feel peaceful. A great way to keep a memory of a beautiful place isn’t always photos. It’s poems, poems describe what you feel, what you see, smell, feel, like you can picture yourself there yourself.

Our first day we learned about organisms in the soil and Victory Gardens. Victory Gardens started in 1940. The Great Depression had ended and America was starving. The created a Victory Garden in San Francisco which fed about 40% of America’s food. Victory Gardens is a garden that grows plants that produces food for the community. Today there is a Victory Garden that stands in front of the Civic Center. We also learned organisms is the soil: moles, ants, amoebas, nematodes, bacteria, mite, earth-worm, and fungus. We were broken up into groups of three or four and got an organism. An organism we would study, we were to make an online magazine for others to see. The magazine you are reading now. We had to make a cover, put poems in there, and have other subjects in it.

The second day, we packed a zero waste lunch. We walked towards Arlington Gardens and did three different rotations. One was ways to do for being peaceful, getting dirt to study about bacteria, and wrote poems of the garden. We wrote about the place, what we saw, what we felt and smell, and what you could hear. It was peaceful writing a poem about the garden. A garden that held many wonders.

Thursday, April 4th was an interesting day, we started making Propaganda Posters that made a statement about Soil. In our groups we broke up and started thinking of a statement that would fit. At 10:10 we walked to PCG, Pasadena City Garden. It wasn’t really a garden yet. We, Westridge girls, were helping out to start one. We broke to two halves, one group helped take out the weeds while the other group started fill a bigger version of a flower box, with healthy soil. Healthy soil grows healthy gar-dens. There were many critters there, not rodents but bugs. They were everywhere! Spiders here, ear-wigs there, and so many more. It is a kind of place not many girls would want to go. When we left, the Garden barely started, one day, that place will be a beautiful garden.

The last day of the week, not the unit, we learned about Dirt Demystified during the first half of the afternoon. We learned ways that soil connected with us. We read poems that the writer wrote about con-necting with the soil. That was homework, to write a poem, a happy, joyful poem about your connection to soil. The other half of the afternoon was working with your groups about the magazine you are reading now.

The first day we came back to school in the new school week was Monday! We learned about mathematical ways Fibonacci number were used in earth, including certain numbers. We had read a book about a boy who loved numbers, the numbers always had something to do with Fibonacci numbers which no one could figure out. Then we all worked on our magazine’s again. Even though this magazine is only a few pages, it takes a long time to put together and write about all the stuff you want to include in there.

Tuesday, our last day of Soil Unit (well, the last day we will work with soil). In the morning we went on a small hike. It was beautiful sight to see. We also went to a garden where flowers were blossoming in many different forms, sizes, and the color. The color was probably the best part of the garden, the fasci-nating colors you can make out, two colors mixing in on the same petal of a flower. We headed back to Westridge and had 5 different rotations. A tree walk, learning it’s history and names. A Worm Compost, where we made our own worm compost. A herb garden where we planted many different herbs. A rain garden, planting plants that doesn’t use so much rain. A sort of craft area, where we made seed balls and planted strawberries that we got to take home. Each rotation was something different, but it was all related somehow. All had something to do with soil. Everything we learned is so fascinating, so beautiful. Seeing gardens, reading poems that were heart

touching, it’s wonderful. It’s wonderful to have a great opportunity to have, to do such great things and

learn in a fun way. After this unit, soil is much more than something dirty to all of us, it something that

helps us in a way that nothing else can help at all like soil can.

Letter from the editor- Ellie W.

At my school, we had a 7-day period of time called the soil unit, in which we

learned about, well, soil. At first, I thought to myself, “What could be so inter-

esting about soil that we would need 7 days to learn about it?” But dang, was I

surprised to find out. THERE WAS SO MUCH TO LEARN!!! I had never known just

how many organisms were hidden inside the soil, and how big of an impact the

soil really made.

During the soil unit, I learned so many different things about our soil and what

lives in it. For instance, if it wasn’t for soil, there would be no live on earth. There

would be no plants, so there would be no organism to regulate the amount of

carbon dioxide and oxygen in the air, and there would be no food. Think about it.

If you ate a salad, all the greens would be from the soil, and if it had cheese or

meat on it, the cheese would be from the milk of an animal who had consumed

greens that had grown from the soil. I learned at the Pasadena community gar-

den that the perfect plant-growing soil is an even mixture of compost, fertilizer

with bat guano, and the original soil. Unfortunately, the bat guano part I learned

from experience. (I had to mix it up with my bare hands.)I also learned there just

how many organisms must live in the mulch and soil in order for it to thrive. At

Arlington garden, I got to see a real Mediterranean climate garden and discover

what kinds of bacteria and fungi are in different parts of the soil. I loved making

the propaganda poster because I love art, and the poster was a way to express

the soil unit’s ideas through art. I learned a lot from the magazine, because our

topic was moles, which is an animal I didn’t know much about. I learned lots of

things about moles. Their significance to the soil that they are not, in fact, ro-

dents, but they are a type of insectivorous mammal, etc, etc.

Throughout the soil unit, all in all, I learned much more about soil than I

thought I didn’t know (if that makes sense). I realize now why there is such a fuss

about topsoil loss. It is because soil is one of the most precious, respect-

deserving things on our planet that takes a very long time to “grow” back, and

we’re treating it like trash. I leave this unit with much more respect for the soil,

and knowledge about its importance.