Apparently, not much, apart from maybe a sore back and blistered fingers. With the tiny stones in place and more improvements made, the garden and greenhouse at the Gwinn Clubhouse at the Forsyth Senior Center continues to grow, both physically and botanically.

Center Director Brian Veale, with the help of community members and local schoolchildren, has been working on completing on what is literally the garden spot of the center, which in its second growing season after having been started in the fall of 2015.

“It’s been changed and improved,” Veale said. “We put it three new raised boxes, one 4-by-12, one 4-by-10 and then one 4-by-6, and then I dug up and put in PEX water lines to each of the boxes.”

According to pexinfo.com, PEX, or crosslinked polyethylene, is part of a water supply system that’s flexible and resistant to scale and chlorine, among other benefits.

Vegetables are getting their start in the greenhouse at the Forsyth Senior Center. Fruits and vegetables are being raised outside and in a greenhouse. (Journal photo by Christie Bleck)

Veale then automated it and put in drip lines to each of the boxes.

“It’s really kind of neat,” Veale said.

It might seem like Veale’s a technical marvel, but he insisted he isn’t one.

“Actually, I’ve never done any of this,” Veale said. “This is the fun stuff. I’m learning how to do it at the same time.”

Age was not a barrier in helping the senior center garden. In the spring, Deb Goldsworthy’s fifth-grade class from Gilbert Elementary School in Gwinn helped with the second phase of the project when they took part in the actual planting.

This pumpkin is off to a good start t the Forsyth Senior Center. Fruits and vegetables are being raised outside and in a greenhouse. (Journal photo by Christie Bleck)

Credit also was given for the project to helpers Lenny Fowler, Luke Sinnaeve, Brett Ketola, Brad Veale, Joyce Styer, Linda Peterson, Larry Willette and Abbey Palmer.

As is typical with projects of this sort, a little money comes in handy.

This year, Forsyth Township and the Local Commission On Aging gave permission for $300 of the center budget and $1,000 of the memorial fund to be directed toward completing the second phase.

Then there was the pea gravel, which was needed outside for safety and weed control. Veale said he installed it mostly by himself.

The rewards probably will be worth all those efforts.

Community Action Alger-Marquette, whose goal is to help low-income people with their daily lives, will be the recipients of the season’s bounty, he said.

“We’ll supplement their meals,” Veale said.

There’s also an educational component to the garden.

Beth Waitrovich, a Michigan State University Extension educator based in Norway, will lead a workshop at 1 p.m. Aug. 17 at the senior center, working with the gardeners to help them learn how to safely preserve the harvest from the gardens.

“This is important because it will allow them to enjoy their produce throughout the upcoming fall and winter,” Waitrovich said in an email. “The workshop will include safe methods for freezing and canning vegetables depending on their choice of preservation method. The goal is to have safe high-quality results from all of their hard work.”

The senior center garden now has two types of cucumbers, pole beans, bush beans, carrots, lettuce, Swiss chard, peas, squash, strawberries, beets, onions, dill, cilantro and basil.

Some plants are growing outside while others are nurtured in the greenhouse.

Some are growing in both spots.

“I’m experimenting with the pumpkin too,” Veale said while walking through the greenhouse on Tuesday. “I have one pumpkin here. I have two pumpkins outside, and I took one to my garden at home to see how they grow, just to experiment.”

The idea is to see how the pumpkins grow in different temperatures and soils.

“So far, this one is winning,” Veale said of the pumpkin in the greenhouse, with 81 degrees being the Tuesday temperature in the structure. “That’s because it’s been so crappy outside, so watery. We’ve had so much rain, it’s slowing everything down.”

Rain is fine, he said, but there needs to be heat to go along with it.

To deal with moisture, a raised garden box has sand-fill, pea gravel for drainage and topsoil, he said.

Of course, anyone tending the garden still has other challenges beyond weather, with one of those challenges coming in the form of a rabbit — or several.

“Here I have the beans, but the rabbits got to it,” Veale said, referring to one garden section.

Recently, a small fence surrounded that spot, but someone in the community knocked it over, giving the bean-eating rabbits a free salad.

“That’s the first time I had any vandalism,” Veale said.

To ward off the rabbits, he put a mixture of cayenne pepper, chili powder, garlic, oil and tabasco sauce around the side so the smell would be a deterrent.

It appears to be working.

“Haven’t come back since Friday,” Veale said of the rabbits. “The plants will come back. They’re starting to get little leaves.”

However, many other plants are thriving, although Veale said the basil isn’t growing as well as it did last year.

“That’s the thing about gardening,” Veale said. “Each year is different. It truly is.”

Christie Bleck can be reached at 906-228-2500, ext. 250. Her email address is cbleck@miningjournal.net.