NORTH DELTA SECONDARY’S RAIN
GARDEN
By: Bhavjot Kang and Brandon Johnson
WHY A RAIN GARDEN?
Whenever it rains,
runoff water
containing toxins,
road salt, grit, excess
fertilizers, pesticides,
cigarette butts, plastic
and paper enter our
local streams
 The polluted water
harms fish health and
is bad for the local
ecosystem

HOW DOES A RAIN GARDEN SOLVE THIS
PROBLEM?
A rain garden
naturally absorbs and
filters runoff water,
instead of allowing it
to flow into local
streams.
 This is accomplished
by redirecting the
runoff water. In our
case, we placed baffles
around a parking lot
storm drain and cut
slits in the curb.

OTHER BENEFITS OF A RAIN GARDEN: IT’S
A SIMPLE SOLUTION TO POLLUTION!
Our rain garden will filter hundreds of thousands
of liters of runoff water yearly
 Our rain garden creates a small ecosystem at our
school for insects and birds
 The garden also filter air pollutants
 It looks amazing
 We wanted to have visible results to show our
student body

GETTING STARTED




We applied and received a
$2000 dollar grant from the
Nature Trust of BC
We had to choose a suitable
spot, then measure the apprx
amount of runoff in our
parking lot
We had to get Administrative
and Municipal permission
Then we designed the rain
garden and chose suitable
plants (then went plant
shopping)
PLANTING THE GARDEN
We decided to plant the garden over spring break
 We had over 20+ volunteers come out to help
 It was a coordinated effort, with the City of Delta
doing the Ground work and heavy lifting, and ND
students doing the rest
 It took 4 days over spring break, with countless
hours spent by everybody to make the rain
garden a success. Each day we put in around 8
hours of work
 We had people from the community stop by and
ask about our work, and some actually brought
drinks for our work crew!

PLANTING THE GARDEN: MONDAY
The first day the City
of Delta did all the
ground work and
excavating for our
garden
 It was a huge help, as
they were able to
bring out the Backhoe,
and did all the work
for free

PLANTING THE GARDEN: TUESDAY
Members of ND’s
Energy Ambassadors
came out to help along
many others
 Our job was picking
rocks out of the piles
of excavated dirt. The
district did not want
large rocks sitting
around that could be
used as projectiles.

PLANTING THE GARDEN: WEDNESDAY
About 20 students
came out to help with
the work
 We had to put the
excavated dirt back
into the rain garden,
and then add and
spread fertilizer.
 It was physical work,
as we moved the dirt
around with shovels, a
single wheel barrow
and rakes!

PLANTING THE GARDEN: THURSDAY
The weather was nicer, and again we had around
20 volunteers. Many came and went through out
the day
 We had to finish off shaping our garden
 Around 2 in the afternoon we finally got to plant!
 Some of the plants include:

PLANTING THE GARDEN: THURSDAY
PLANTING THE GARDEN: THURSDAY
THE TEAM

Sadly, many volunteers had already gone home
when the photos were taken
THE COMPLETED GARDEN
BEFORE AND AFTER
ITS AN ON-GOING PROJECT
We are continuously working to improve our
garden
 We plan on adding logs to slow the water down
and give the water more time to soak into the soil
 We do maintenance weekly to make sure the
garden is litter free, and that the curb slits are
open
 We want to add more plants, as the rain garden
is bigger than we initially intended
 The initial curb slits are not big enough, and
need to be cut larger
 The greatest part about the garden is with only a
small amount of maintenance and care it will be

SPREADING THE WORD
We want to add a sign that summarizes the
environmental benefits of a rain garden
 We need to fundraise money for the sign
 We have done a presentation to the teachers and
our student body
 We continue to get and answer questions at
school about the garden
 We have done presentations at two community
events. One at a salmon release at watershed
park were we set up a booth, and one at Delta’s
first earth day were we did a 7 minute speech
about our project

THE COUGAR CREEK STREAMKEEPERS
The Cougar Creek
Streamkeepers, and in
particular Deborah
Jones were a key part
of this projects success
 Deborah helped us
throughout the
project, and has prior
experience with rain
gardens. She was the
perfect teacher.
