Olivia Leos
March 20, 2016
It was a beautiful day, the sun rose at 7 in the morning and I rose along with it. This was my last day as a leadership apprentice at the Green Corn Project, before I become a site leader. Needless to say I was excited. I arrived at the Green Corn Project at around 8 am. By the time we collected all of the compost, tools, and volunteers we headed out to our sites, arriving at around 9 am.
On the agenda we were set to clear three garden beds that had already been build (by the Green Corn Project I was informed), plant more cucumbers than anything else, along with the crops that are set to grow well for the spring season. The community insisted on cucumbers. The place we were helping garden was an organization called Posada Esperanza, a branch of the organization of Casa Marienella. 
This is a safe house for women and children escaping cultural and domestic violence. “They provide the basic needs for homeless immigrants in Austin, and in the one are that we visited house 14 mothers and 30 children” (Posada Esperanza- Casa Marienella). One of the most amazing things about serving other organizations is that you get to connect with the people that live and go to these communities. While we were building the first little garden, a little boy came running towards us exclaiming why we wanted to remove his plants (the first process of building a new garden is weeding). We quickly explained that we were building a new garden. With that information he left to his house only to come back with a friend. They both wanted to help! We taught them how to weed, double dig, use compost, and how to plants the actual plants. By the end of the day, they were quite the little gardeners.
Before leaving the site I took a stroll around the area to see if the little gardens we planted could be affected by the wildlife around its surround area. For being in the middle of East Austin, this area had quite a number of plant diversity. There were Texas Ashes, shrubs, cypresses, succulents, and hollies all around the area as described in the article Landscaped Plants. Many of them seemed to be planted by man, but also many seemed to be native Texas plants. The area around the beds was cleared of trees. Except for a tree that was giving too much shade to one of the beds, the wildlife did not seem to affect the garden beds.
March 26, 2016
Easter Break. Yes, my friends and I decided to go to South Padre for Easter Break. I did not know this was an extremely cliché thing until I arrived there and saw the countless number of college students running through the beach. Apparently many of them were from Mexico, celebrating Semana Santa.
Of course the first thing I looked for was garbage around the area and the beach. To my surprise the area we were staying near was not as polluted as the news set it out to be. Again, to my surprise, there had been a beach clean up a couple of days ago, after the destruction that was Spring Break. There are programs in which you adopt beaches, and clean them. A variety of groups adopt these beaches, from high schools to non-profits, as the Texas Adopt a Beach website stated. I must say, it was a breath of fresh air to arrive at a clean beach, after the commotion had been built up of South Padre being of the dirties beaches after the spring break commotion.
When spending my hour outside in nature, I decided to sit on the beach. It was after 5 o’ clock, the time when everyone decides to leave the beach.
There were a small variety of salt tolerant shrubs around the area, but the most predominant plants were the palm trees. According to Salt Tolerant Plants, there are only a handful of plants that can be by the beach.
One thing that really surprised me was that there were remains of oil around the beach. Just stepping on the sand for a while left your feet black from the remains of the oil spill that happened in 2014 according to the South Padre Island website. This might have affected the amount of animals and plants that were in the area. This shows the long lasting effects of oil spills, even if it is just aesthetics.
In comparison to the gardening area at East Austin, the beach was a whole new world unable to be compared. In terms of my attitude though, I have to say that I was more excited for the beach but the fact that I was in vacation may have to do with that. There was more biodiversity in East Austin. More than the salt and geology of the soil, the amount of people, oil spill, and urbanization are the result of the lack of biodiversity in this area.
“Posada Esperanza – Casa Marianella.” Casa Marianella. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2016.
Landscape Plants. Austin: Watershed Protection, n.d. Native Adapted. 2009. Web. 31 Mar. 2016.
“Texas Adopt-A-Beach Winter Beach Cleanup – South Padre Island.”Eventbrite. Eventbrite, n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2016.
“Salt Tolerant Plants.” Gardening in the Coastal Southeast. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2016.
“South Padre Island Remains Clear of Impact from Texas City Oil Spill.”South Padre Island. N.p., 08 Apr. 2014. Web. 31 Mar. 2016.