The Sun News
Houston boy grows award-winning cabbage
For two months, Justin Bridges watered his cabbage.
As part of a third-grade school project last year at Kings Chapel Elementary School, each student was given a seedling to plant at home.
Justin was the only student in his class whose cabbage survived.
It not only survived, but was the Georgia winner of the National Bonnie Plant Cabbage Program.
Justin, 9, was randomly selected in October by the Georgia Agriculture Department, according to a news release.
“I was shocked,” he said.
He said his dad, Matt Bridges, helped him get the plant growing with cow manure from his neighbors.
They also used a milk jug with holes as a watering device, filling it every 2-3 days.
Justin used no artificial growing supplement for his cabbage.
The plant, when it was done growing, weighed 22.6 pounds.
Justin, who weighs about 75 pounds, said “it was heavy.”
His mother, Christina Bridges, said the head of the cabbage was 12 pounds.
“We gave half of it away,” she said.
The family ate a lot of stewed cabbage, which Christina Bridges said she really enjoys.
Justin wanted to spend his $1,000 prize on Legos, but his mother is saving it for his education.
“The program not only encourages gardening and teaches kids where their food comes from, it also instills a sense of valuable life lessons in nurture, nature, responsibility, self-confidence and accomplishment,” said Joan Casanova of Green Earth Media Group.
The now fourth-grader wants to be a pilot in the U.S. Air Force when he grows up.
The program is free to any third-grade classroom in the U.S. Teachers can register at bonniecabbageprogram.com for the 2015 program.
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