WE HAD THIS WEEK BEEN WORKING ON WAYS OF CONSERVING OUR SOIL AND WATER. 6 COUNTOURS HAD BEEN PEGED ON A 1,2H FIELD AND WE ARE STILL WORKING ON THE BEST WAYS TO INCOPERATE OTHER CONSERVATION MEASURES TO ACHIEVE OUR ULTIMATE GOAL OF HOLISTIC SUSTANABLE PRODUCTION .POTATOES ARE PLANNED TO BE THIS YEAR'S MAIN CROP.THE AVERAGE MEASURENMENT OF OUR CONTOUR IS ABOUT 1,2M BASE WIDTH ,45CM RIDGE HIEGHT AND 1M RIDGE BASE WIDTH.
THE CONTOURS THEMSELVES ARE SPACED ABOUT 15M APART AS WE WANT TO HARVEST AS MUCH WATER AS POSSIBLE.THE PLOTS ARE AS WELL DIVIDED INTO 2 POTIONS ONE WILL SERVE AS MINIMUM OR ZERO TILLAGE PLOT AND THE OTHR AS A CONVERCTIONAL TILLAGE PLOT.NO TRACTOR DRAWN EMPLEMENTS WILL BE USED IN THE ZERO TILLAGE PLOT AND THE SOIL WILL BE KEPT FREE FROM COMPACTION THEN THE YIELD RESULTS WILL BE COMPARED.CONTOURS ARE WIDELY USED AS A RAIN WATER HARVESTING AND SOIL CONSERVATION TECHNIQUE.
Hi Tarirai,
ReplyDeleteVery interesting posting.
Will you be deep mulching the 'no-till' plot to suppress the weeds?
"A plant gets up to 95% of all the nutrients it needs from the sky (gases and sunlight), NOT the soil. Of the 5% taken from the soil, half of it is the essential nutrient nitrogen, which, if the plant is grown in combination with a legume, can also come from the air."
Therefore only 2.5% of the plants nutrients come from the soil.
http://fukuokafarmingol.info/fover.html
yes we will deep mulch the zero tillage plot.to suppress weeds,enhance microbal activity by keeping soil moist and warm.Our land is slopy decreasing 1 in every 4,5 to 5m so deep mulch will reduce erosion by increasing infiltration,I got your point on plant nutrients that come from the soil but can you elaborate it further in relation to deep mulching.THANKS
ReplyDeleteHi Tarirai,
ReplyDeleteI am sure that you already know what deep mulching is. It has to be deep enough to block out the light. There are enough weeds around to harvest for mulching obviously before they have seeds on them. You can simply lay the mulch on top of the existing weeds as they are or you can chop the existing weeds and leave them on the ground as green manure. Then place the mulch on top. It does not really matter. So long as the mulch is deep enough to stop the light. When you plant your seeds or seedlings you simply drill through the mulch so that each desired plant can get light.
Read about deep mulching i