Step 10: Corn and mungbean plantations

Breaking news: Join the natural farming group of the Philippines!

natural_farming_philippines@yahoogroups.com

Day by day, harvests of sugar cane set free new areas. Better planting any crop than leaving the soil going back to weeds!

Until 15th of December corn can be planted around Sagay. As we have not yet the equipment and the place to practice true natural farming, we decided to use only vermicompost (produced by the agriculturist of City Hall with the wastes of the market) as organic fertilizer and to plant white organic corn produced by the BPI in La Carlotta near Bacolod.

To improve the soil in the corn area (3700 m²) and the windbreak area recently planted, we decided to use mungbean as cover crop and green fertilizer.

But mungbean can be stronger and faster than the corn. To avoid any problem of competition, the mungbean (75x10 cm) will be planted between the row of corn (75x30 cm) and 40 days after sowing of corn. (Picture: sowing the corn in the rain) . If no mistake, the mungbean will provide on time nitrogen to the corn and can be harvested at the same time 80 days later. Then, all wastes will be incorporated in the soil for the next crop.

On the other hand, the mungbean between the trees of the windbreaks will not be harvested because incorporated to the soil just at the time of flowering. That's the price for a beginning of rehabilitation after years of sugar cane monocropping and chemical fertilizers.

Here under is what a french poet called " Le geste auguste du semeur..." ( "The noble gesture of the sower..."). And it is true the farmer's work is noble when it is practiced in respect of the nature. Always, the farmers must remember that before leaving the farm to go to the big town, attracted like a skylark by the mirror and get a worst life. Other solution exists.

Post-script: The first flower of Calliandra planted 2 months ago:

Step 9: New rows of windbreaks

Breaking news: Join the natural farming group of the Philippines!

natural_farming_philippines@yahoogroups.com

We saw at the step 3, the interest of making windbreaks. An interesting publication about windbreak can be found here. 

In September, we started the creation of the first row of windbreaks with the plantation of shrubs as living fence. We can now, in some place, plant the next rows. The sugar cane is far from fully harvested and we have to adapt to this situation.

A selection of 6 trees has been chosen for the second row, the medium size trees: 

-Azadirachta indica, the neem tree, a versatile multipurpose tree for urban regreening, agroforestry, fuelwood production, and for a variety of other products, including biopesticides. 

- Cassia fistula, the golden shower (picture), is an ornamental and shade leguminous tree used around houses, on the edges of roads, and in the streets, parks, and gardens of towns. 

- The malunggay or Moringa oleifera is a so useful tree that, one day, we will reserve a chapter only for it. The owner of the Moringa farm write: "You can pick its leaves and make it part of a delicious fresh salad, use it in one our many moringa recipes, (It goes especially well with 

chicken). Or you can dry the leaves to make a delicious green tea. You can also make tea with the leaf powder in a traditional coffee maker.  If you have enough leaf, you can dry it and make it into moringa powder, like we do, and use it ‘s concentrated nutrition to balance your diet for increased energy and sense of well being. The possibilities are endless."

- Sesbania grandiflora, known in the Philippines as katuray is also a member of the leguminous  family can be used as fodder for cattle and goats. 

- The banaba or Lagerstroemia speciosa is member of the family of Lythraceae and one of th few deciduous tree of the tropics. Banaba is a well known medicinal plant widely used in the Philippines to treat diabetes and urinary problems and even malaria.

- and the Kamatsile ( Pithecellobium dulce or Manila tamarind) another leguminous. Sometimes, from July to August, along the roads, kids sale the fruits containing an acid or sweet pulp. Many other uses are known for this tree coming from South America.

The next row is the one of tall trees. We selected:

- Artocarpus blancoi, the breadfruit easily recognised with its large leaves until 80cm long and 50 cm large and with fruits consumed as fruit, vegetable, fermented or dried.

- Artocarpus heterophyllus, the jackfruit, so economically important in South-East Asia. And so big fruits also: until 1m long, 50 cm diameter and 50kg!

-Sandoricum koetjape, the santol (see picture of santol growing under coconut) which can grow as high as 45m has been introduced in the Philippines.

- Swietenia macrophylla or mahogany of which everybody knows the high value wood.

- Shorea contorta or white lauan, endemic to the Philippines and depleted due to logging and kaingin-making.

 

The next row is the one of medium size fruit trees:

- Syzigium cuminii, locally named as duhat. The fruit can be eaten fresh or used for jam, juice and wine. It is also a great medicinal plant.

- Persea americana or avocado already cultivated by the Aztecs 7500 years BC.

- Antidesma bunius or bignay (picture of the fruits) commercially used now to produce wine in the Philippines.

- Artocarpus odoratissimus or marang not exported because of the low yields and conservation.

Neem tree, mahogani, white lauan, duhat, avocado and bignay were bought to Negros forest and ecological foundation, Inc. and the other seedlings from our nursery.

300 hundred trees and 700 hundreds shrubs are now planted as windbreaks. By the way, this banaba is the 1000 th plant planted in the school farm!

Step 8: The rice - part 1: from land preparation to transplantation

Rice is the staple food in the Philippines. In a few months, when will arrive the staff and the first students of the school, around 30 hungry filipino stomachs will ask after their daily portions of rice! Even if we wish to diversify and equilibrate the diet with vegetables and fruits, we have to produce our rice and, of course, it will be organic rice. Following the advices of the Department of Agriculture of the City of Sagay, we choose to use for this first non chemical production in that place, the AG-5 variety of MASIPAG rice. MASIPAG means: Magsasaka at Siyentipiko Para sa Pag-unlad Agrikultura we can translate by: Farmer-Scientist Partnership for Development.

Why this choice? Because now, more than ever, high yielding varieties of rice have also high needs of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, high production costs and are not well adapted to 

small filipino farmers. The MASIPAG technology is an alternative solution for farmers who choose the 

organic way of farming, with a choice of dozens of traditional varieties of rice. These rices grow with organic fertilizers and are less sensitive to pests and diseases, especially because of rotation between the different varieties of rice.

Note: as we have not yet any building built, it is difficult to prepare the concoction and to apply the natural farming technique for rice.  We consider this first production as a non-chemical step and we will measure the difference of yield when NF technique will be fully applied later.

Preparing the rice field is the first step and means harrowing, leveling and planing, repairing 

the dykes, cleaning the canal, etc. :

Harrowing of the rice field mixes the rice straw with the mud. It will be rapidly transformed in organic matter. The carabao is the faithful friend of the farmer during this hard work. 

The cleaning of the canal helps to evacuate the excess of water after a big rain. Anyway, in case of big flood the crick becomes a river and 

there is no large enough canal to evacuate the excess of water and the young plantations can be rooted up.

The palay is first soaked inside bags submerged in the river during 48 hours, the time to start germination.

At the same time, in a quiet place, a bed is prepared with soil to elevate the bed over the level of the water and covered with old bags before sowing the  germinated palay. The seedlings are covered with rice straw and coconut leaves during a few days. 

The control of the level of water is essential to not flood the seedlings. A simple half bamboo regulates the level, evacuating the excess of water to the canal.

At day 3, the rice becomes a little green and the cover of rice hull and coconut leaves will be soon taken off for hardening.

At day 8 after sowing, the rice gets his typical luminous green color. A first spraying of an extraction of Makabuhay (Tinospora rumphii) acts as excellent organic insecticide and repellent for snails. 

Note: Soon, we will talk about the organic products which replace pesticides.

It is time to level the rice field with the suyod, sort of big rake to push the excess of mud (the suyod is down) in one place to a place where the mud is missing (the suyod is up).  One more time man and carabao are working together. This step requires practice and skills from the couple of workers.

Another tool, the planer, sort of suyod without teeth, allows the farmer to finish the planing of the rice field. At the end of this step the level must be the same everywhere and the mixing mud and water homogeneous.

As basal fertilizer, we use temporarily vermicompost made with the organic waste of the market of Sagay City and prepared by the EEMO (Economic Enterprise Management Office) under supervising of Engr. Manuel A. Lopez.

Last step of this episode is the transplanting of the seedlings. Some blades of rice are rapidly planted every 20-25cm. Here at day 21 after sowing.

Step 7: Some news from our recent residents

A short pause to see how are our few plantations. Along the fence, the Calliandra begin to acclimate (picture: 16 days after transplanting) but we can observe they really don't like excess of water. We needed to improvise a drainage before replacing dead plants. In other places, the recovery of the seedlings is near 100% showing the good quality of the production of the Negros Forests and Ecological Foundation, Inc. of Bacolod.

The Kadyos also thrive on the bank of the rice field. 26 days after transplanting many leaves appeared and the fight against weeds is won ... for today only!

Life is more difficult for the Madre de Cacao, but even after flood in the rice field, some of them resist and show the opening of new buds, here 29 days after planting of the cutting. 

And the great surprise is the bamboo: after only 13 days, buds have grown and even small leaves appeared.