Beatrice High School’s science club is hosting its annual spring sale this week in the school’s greenhouse. Initiated several years ago as a grant project by Dr. Joan Christen, the greenhouse has been managed by BHS teacher Paula Heinz for the past five years. She expressed her desire for her students to gain essential plant knowledge through this project, and her dual-credit botany class plays a crucial role in its success.
Paula Heinz emphasizes that students are taught about plant structures and processes such as cells, transpiration, nutrients, and water requirements for photosynthesis. The plants sold at the sale are ordered from plugs from commercial greenhouses since BHS holds a distributor’s license and does not develop its own plant varieties. The selection of plants is based on new and interesting varieties that are easy to care for.
Heinz hopes that students will learn about plant care, greenhouse maintenance, and skills that could lead to careers in landscaping, plant science, genetics, gardening or lawn care. The sale primarily features annual bedding plants with a few perennials included, which are suitable for pots and landscaped beds.
Interested individuals are advised to park in the high school parking lot and enter through the front doors, proceeding past the main staircase to the back of the school where the greenhouse is located. The sale hours are Wednesday to Friday from 3:45-5 p.m., and Saturday from 9 a.m., to noon.