Organic Matter Now Green, Brown, Dark, Dead, Black – Then, Good Earth!

Above, the dead leaves that spread well to cover the field amidst the growing crop is Good Friday, which precedes a resurrection on Easter Sunday – on this field, the resurrected soil will produce a crop that is Heaven on Earth, just as Jesus the Christ resurrected and brought us Heaven on High!
(trash farming image[1] from Quora.com)

Above the above, PH Secretary of Agriculture William Dar and Aida Page share a Facebook post with this legend: “Make soil richer with leaves;” the image supplied that accompanies the article I myself have written (03 October 2019, “Appreciating Organic Farming[2],” Agriculture.com.ph).

The lower image is perfect, soil covered 100% – if you are going after mulching, as the dried leaves protect the soil from drying up and slowly enrich it with the nutrients from their deteriorating bodies.

But surface mulching, as you can imagine, is a tedious way of practicing organic farming. I know of an excellent way that I have been plugging/blogging about since 10 years ago.

On page 49 of my 124-page book titled ICRISAT Innovations Shape The Future Of Drylands[3] published 2011, with Mr Dar still Director General of ICRISAT, I wrote:

By rotary tiller, the organic matter (OM) is first shredded in 1 or 2 passes of the tiller, and then on the 3rd pass incorporated shallowly – an inch or so – into the top soil. No deep plowing of any kind. Slowly, the OM is transformed into humus, the richest single source of soil nutrients you can find on Earth…

When you rotavate the field with weeds still growing along with the crop refuse still standing, you make the soil richer with leaves plus stems plus branches plus flowers that are shredded and create a soil-vegetation surface mulch with bits & pieces already mixed up and on their way to deterioration. The easiest & most natural mulch and the richest in the world already in place!

To be sure, we can call that field mulch farming.

On Facebook is shared: “IFDC's Strategy: To Feed The Soil Is To Feed The World” I agree with that. At the same time, you will feed the world with the richest food if you do my field mulch farming. The best way to improve soil health is to supply it with the best organic matter.

Cane-Co[4] says:

Mulching improves the soil’s capacity for moisture retention and prevents up to 70% of water loss from surface evaporation. During the dry season mulched soils are more drought-resistant. During the rainy season, the extra layer of substrate slows down water flow across the fields, which increases absorption and keeps the fields from eroding, especially when battered by heavy tropical downpours.

What I now refer to as field mulch farming is essentially trash farming as described and explained more than 70 years ago by gentleman farmer Edward H Faulkner in his 2 books, The Plowman’s Folly (published 1945) and Soil Development (1952).

Field vegetation is organic matter that is always there, ready to apply, no need to buy!@517


[1]https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-method-of-soil-conservation-in-arid-and-semiarid-regions

[2]https://www.agriculture.com.ph/2019/10/03/appreciating-organic-farming/

[3]http://oar.icrisat.org/1933/1/ICRISAT_innovations_shape_the_future_of_drylands.pdf

[4]https://caneco.gd/trash-farming-simple-but-effective/

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Historical PH 1st Holy Mass: Mazaua Or Limasawa? Fr Amalla Vs Maria Serena Diokno Vs Ambeth Ocampo – And The Priest Is Right!

Image
We Filipinos celebrate 500 years of Christianity today Wednesday, 31 March 2021, Christianity brought to pagans by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan sailing the seas for Spain. The historical question is: Where was the first Holy Mass celebrated: “Limasawa” (in Leyte) or “Mazaua” (in Butuan)? Catholic priest Fr Joesilo C Amalla has just published the book (above), An Island They Called Mazaua, that argues the island of “Mazaua” in Butuan is the “true site of first Holy Mass in the Philippines [1] ”  and not “Limasawa” in Leyte (ANN, 07 January 2021, Manila Times ). The declaration and discussion are made by Butuan-based Fr Amalla in his 644-page book. Among other things, he writes: The truth is that the prevailing state- and church-affirmation and multiple reaffirmations of the island of Limasawa as the site of that first Holy Mass have no factual, historical and geographic (bases) whatsoever nor any shred of evidentiary support from cartographic studies, navigational in...
Read more

PSAU, An Outstanding Public University In Pampanga, To Lose 310 Hectares?

Image
310 hectares of public land in Pampanga currently under the jurisdiction of the Pampanga State Agricultural University (PSAU) are in an intellectual managerial deadlock, having to choose between 2 agrarian schemes: ü Agrarian Ownership? The Department of Agrarian Reform (the DAR) distributes the lands to new individual farmers.   ü Agrarian Stewardship? PSAU retains formal stewardship with profit sharing with countless landless farmers in such projects as: agroforestry, bamboo, coconut, coffee, genebank forestry, goat, mixed orchard, mulberry, silvipasture, and tamarind production. I think like that with the news story by William L Beltran , “PSAU Appeals Retention Of CARP-Able Landholding, Offers Stewardship [1] ”  (26 March 2021, PIA.gov.ph ). I can feel the anguish of PSAU’s President Honorio Soriano Jr . The 376 hectares of land owned and titled to PSAU have been, according to Mr Beltran, “validated by (the DAR) as coverable under the Land Reform Program of the...
Read more

UPLB, Where Has All Your Extension Gone? Gone To Flowers Everyone! When Will They Ever Learn?

Image
What do you mean “Extension”? Here is “Dean Umali’s Rule” as his colleagues remember it [1] : “When a farmer visits your office, stop everything you are doing and give him his due attention, for he is the primary commitment of your being in this institution.” What is known as “UPCA’s Golden Age of Extension” is 1959 to 1969, when Dioscoro L Umali was Dean of UPCA – that is according to Louise Sigrid Antonio et al writing 25 May 2014, “Dioscoro L Umali,” in their blog The Heat Ray Of Archimedes ). I was Freshman at UPCA when he became Dean in 1959; later, I remember UPCA agronomists really busy with national extension projects involving rice and corn. (top image [2]  from Philippine Science Heritage Center, Facebook ) On 20 November 1972, through Presidential Decree 58, the UP System was created, with UPLB as one of the universities in the system. Unfortunately, while the college UPCA grew into the university UP Los Baños, the Extension function grew out of the universit...
Read more