PIUM, The garden-making club of the SNU College of Agriculture and Life Science

2024-07-02l Hit 290


 In the garden on the first floor of Seoul National University's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, there is a beautiful flower garden created by student garden managers. The garden managers on the first floor are students of college, who have been in charge of managing part of the garden on the first floor of the college since 2024. They are members of the garden-making club "PIUM" at Seoul National University, where they met Kim Tae-eun, president of Pium, and Kim Joo-ho, executive director of the Department of Plant Production Science.



Q. Please introduce yourself briefly.


A. Hello, I'm Kim Tae-eun and Kim Joo-ho, the executive, who are the president of the garden creation club Pium. We are all in the Department of Plant Production Science at the College of Agriculture and Life Science.


Q. What kind of organization is 'PIUM' that you all belong to as a student garden manager?

A. PIUM is a gardening club belonging to Seoul National University's central club that creates gardens by utilizing campus niches. PIUM was launched in 2017 as part of a class of global environmental management.
Starting with an activity that urged the use of niche spaces on campus, we are now growing edible vegetables and fruits in addition to flower crops. As part of our regular activities, we are creating gardens in building 220 and 200, and we are growing various kinds of plants such as vegetables, fruit trees, and flowers. In addition to garden management activities, which are regularly conducted by members, we are conducting various contents related to plants such as visiting garden fairs, making one-day classes on flower arrangements, and terrariums.


Q.What made you manage the garden on the first floor of the College?

A. With the help of Professor Lee Hyo-beom of the Flower and Landscape Botanical Research Institute majoring in horticultural biotechnology, I have taken charge of managing the garden on the first floor of the building 200. Thanks to the professor, we are trying to create a healing garden where students can rest comfortably.


Q. What kind of plants do you currently grow in the garden?

A. The garden currently has annual flowers such as pansies, violas, daisies, and shasta daisies, and hyacinth bulbs. A mixture of perennial flowers that can see flowers quickly and perennial bulbs that will bloom next year are planted. In the future, the garden grass will be planted to plant landscaping plants that can be seen for a long period of time until fall.


Q. What are some difficulties in managing your garden? I wonder how you are overcoming them.

A. Weeds and insect pests are the most difficult to manage. Also, due to geographical requirements, there is a space that does not require much sunlight, so I am most worried about how to grow and select crops.
Even if we miss the timing a little, it becomes difficult to manage the garden, so we set a weekly duty to control weeds and check the condition of crops, and we are steadily managing the garden with the members of the club.
In the case of insect damage, we are thinking with executives based on what we learned in our major class, or getting help from AI through an app called "Picture This".
To seek expert opinions, I used an online diagnostic service using the Gyeonggi-do Agricultural Research and Extension Services Cyber Botanical Hospital site, and I was able to solve it after learning that Rosemary had white powder disease.


Q. How is your major related to club management? Any related episodes?

A. I think I became interested in the reason I first joined the club because it was related to my major. In PIUM, I think I can do activities that give me an opportunity to apply the knowledge I learned in my major.
In fact, there was a question related to vinyl mulching when I took the floriculture test, and I remember that it helped me a lot because I had experience learning experience while using various mulching agents while performing. If you are a student at Nongsaeng University, it would be good in terms of major learning.


Q. Please let me know if you have any expected effects or desired results from garden management.

A. Above all, we hope that our garden will be used as a space where students can relax. In addition, there is a desire to create a garden that is ecologically stable and a good habitat for the creatures of the garden beyond the garden that gives visual pleasure.


Q. Based on the experience gained through garden management activities, what activities do you want to do in the future?

A. As I grew plants myself, I learned more about my major field, and I could feel the joy of growing plants with the people around me, so I thought it would be nice to expand my club activities in the future. In addition, I want to continue gardening activities to grow unmanaged land on campus by increasing opportunities to receive such niche spaces.