Clinch Community School begins annual plant sale

April 3, 2024 by G. Chambers Williams III

Just in time for spring planting to begin, the annual plant sale began Tuesday morning at the Clinch River Community School and the Anderson County Career and Technical Center.

Both schools are on the campus of Anderson County High School.

Held as a benefit to aid the agriculture programs at the schools, the sale is open now and runs through the month or until the stock of plants is sold out, school officials announced.

Kendra McCoig, agriculture teacher at the Clinch River Community School, said her school’s greenhouse, next to the school on a hill just behind the high school, had a line of people already when she opened the doors at 8 a.m.

“We had about 40 people waiting to get in,” she said.

The school’s assistant principal, Nate Stecker, was also on hand, and said the greenhouse had $2,000 in sales in the first hour.

“This is always the big fundraiser for our agriculture program,” he said. “We raised $15,000 from it last year.”

He said the school has been holding the sale since it opened, and has been at the current location since the 2012-13 school year.

Angela Taylor of Andersonville bought two big flats of vegetable plants, which she said were for some of her older neighbors.

“They can’t get out here, so I came to get them so plants so they can have a garden this year,” she said.

Sales hours are 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays, and the school accepts cash and checks, but no debit or credit cards.

McCoig said the plans are to keep the sale going until May 3, or whenever the stock of plants runs out, if that’s sooner.

“We usually sell out of flowers in the first week,” she said.

Among the items for sale in the Clinch River school’s greenhouse, all created by the students, are:

• Hanging baskets, $10-$20.

• Vegetables, $2.50 for a pack of four plants.

Available are tomato plants (13 varieties), peppers (eight varieties), cucumbers (three varieties), cabbage, cantaloupe, watermelon, okra, squash, zucchini, walking onions, and a variety of herbs.

• Flowers, $2.50 for a pack of four plants.

Offered are begonias, celosía, coleus, dianthus, French marigolds, hypoestes, impatiens, lobelia, pansies, petunias, portulaca, verbena, vinca and zinnia.

• Six-inch pots of flowers, $4 each.

Among them are black-eyed Susan, citronella, columbine, common periwinkle, coneflower, creeping phlox, forget-me-nots, Gerber daisy, lamb’s ear, lantana, lavender, Shasta daisy, sunflowers, and yarrow.

Full flats, $18.

Clinch River Community School has students from kindergarten through 12th-grade, and is part of Anderson County Schools.