Rains are the time when we, those who dirty our hands with soil and plants, are the busiest people around. For there is so much to do as the earth’s bosom receives the showers and responds by transforming its surroundings—from brown to green. Rains are exciting times for the farmer. Just four months and you need to make plans for next nine months. It’s like having your beloved for such a short duration, before she rushes back home. Just come and gone. The time you spent with her feels too short and you pine for more.
Sourcing the seeds, acquiring the saplings, preparing the bunds, readying the soil for the new inhabitants can really keep you busy before you find that Varsha ritu is over and gone.
Things I did during this monsoon.
• Two years back I had planted a Gliricidia cutting which has grown tall and branched. I made several cuttings of the plants and ringed the edges of the farm. As they grow and the leaves appear they are likely to serve my plants needs for Nitrogen.
• Planted Laxmitaru saplings on the outer periphery of the farm. Laxmitaru is untouched by cattle and am going to benefit by the leaf litter and its seeds which contain oil.
• Planted lot of flower bearing plants to attract butterflies, bees and bumblebees.
• Broadcasted seeds of cowpea, sunhemp in places where nothing grows and in between the plants. Also sown sesame and groundnut.
Tag: Sunhemp
Green Manure
Briefly: Giripushpa, Sunhemp, Dhaincha and Cowpea can be used for green manuring
There is so less I know of the natural world I realized when Arun Shivkar handed me two cuttings of Giripushpa from his small nursery he has put up at Baradewdai in Pabal Valley in Pen. Arun runs Kasav, a NGO active among adivasi and landless for the last two decades in Pen and its neighbouring area.
Arun present dream is to encourage adivasi to grow vegetables and fruits on farm plots which is sold to the passerby on the Goa National Highway. He distributes free cuttings of Giripushpa ( also called Glyricidia) to adivasi farmers.
“The poor adivasis can’t afford to buy Nitrogen fertilizer, though it’s subsidised by the government,” says Arun. “Giripushpa comes very handy to these farmers.”
Kasav encourages farmers, mostly small plot holders, to grow Giripushpa on the edges of the plot. The leaves and the stem of Giripushpa are rich in nitrogen and are being increasingly used for nitrogen fixation of the soil.
The two cuttings Arun gave me have found place in my farm plot in Chon village, eight kilometers from Badlapur (west) station. The Giripushpa plants are already one feet high and I hope they will grow vigorously after the rains.
Like Giripushpa crops namely Sunhemp, Dhaincha and Cowpea are also used for green manuring as well as for soil conservation. These crops are grown for about 40-50 days (up to flowering) and then buried in the soil. Others like Subabhul and Karanj are grown on bunds and used for adding green manures
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