Junior green thumbs bloom

With guidance from a local retiree, 10Arrowtown School students have been planting, tending and harvesting a prolificvege patch on the outskirts of the town.

Jill Egerton says the students, who undertake a weekly gardening session, have grown most of the veges from seed, "so it’s been an amazing learning experience for them".

She’s pictured with four of the green thumbs — from left, Isobel Eady, Rose Gallie, Frankie Sim and Levie Clark, who are all 12.

Once the produce — including pumpkins, which the kids all name, courgettes, sweet corn, leeks, onions and flowers — is ready, the students are then selling everything to raise funds for an upcoming camp in Bannockburn.

Egerton says she’s also indebted to locals who’ve donated the likes of rabbit-proof fencing, polythene and compost, along with landowner Roger Monk and the kids’ coordinator, Toni Monk.