The Annapurna wall – First 100 meters

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As mentioned in earlier communications; Annapurna farm is invaded by wildlife like pigs, deer and peacocks and it gets more and more difficult to grow crops in the farm. As also reported in one of our communications we built a short prototype of this fence a year back to get a good idea if this design is what we need here.

The first mini prototype fence at the north east of Annapurna. October, 2021

Since this is going to the be by far the biggest project Annapurna farm has ever embarked upon we want to make small steps to be sure what we are going in for. The farm has a periphery of 8km! So after the first mini prototype to see the idea in real, this year we embarked on step 2 to learn how this project can best be executed and what the cost will be.
We secured funds through a generous donor to be able to build 100 m of the fence. Andre designed the pillars and casted them in our workshop. The pillars are the skeleton of the fence and need to be really good to be able to last for decades. We did realize that the work took a lot of the attention away from the farm, but the pillars which we created, although quite costly, were of a superior quality. Then we cleared the area to be fenced with a jcb and hired a contractor to install the fence. Here we did a lot of learning; Since the fence is heavy and quite different from what is normally done in Auroville, it took a lot of trials before the team had it right. The contractor used a lot of manual labor for lifting and installing. All this made the job go slow and became quite costly in the end.

Now after all this, we feel we need a third step to be able to make a proper cost estimate. We still have some materials and funds to build another section of approximately 40 m fence. Since we now know a bit better what this fence entails, we will try to improve the pillar making efficiency and will use some lifting devices to erect the fence. In short, to use minimum labor and where possible use equipment for heavy work. This work we will do after monsoon when our main crops are harvested, and soil dries up to make it possible to work properly on the site.
Once this third step is done we will get back to you with the outcomes and needs…
*note that the barbed wire still needs to be strung over the wall part like in the concept-pilot.

A section of 100 meter fence pilot at the west boundary of Annapurna, September 2022.

Short updates where we are right now at the farm

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I Pictures: straw bales being made – straw bales in the rain.

We are in the process of harvesting the 20 acres of paddy and hope to finish in a few weeks. The paddy was planted with intervals and so the harvest is also happening in steps. In this way we can better manage the work. Most of the crop we harvest with a combine harvester, which saves a lot of labor. In the process we do lose some grain because machines are not as sensitive as ladies with their sickles. Still, economically we come out better and more importantly we can move much faster. This is essential to be able to bring in a green manure crop (leguminous rich plants), after the harvest, on part of the area so the cattle have some good fodder in the summer.

I Video: combine harvesting with music.
I Video: next step, baling the paddy straw.

Things are all connected and time is very essential because organic farming goes very much with seasonality. Moving fast is also important because we see that weather seems more erratic; and we get those bits of rain in these months, which is wonderful to give a little refreshing feel, but are quite a nuisance when you are in the middle of a paddy harvest. We try to go with the flow ..

Our new pup Enya got Parvo virus and we had to go for intensive treatment for a week or so, but with the help of Dr. Thiruselvam she got through the ordeal and the puppy is slowly recovering.

I Pictures: Enya puppy – Serena, Asta & Enya – Pongal ride – Madhuri checking the paddy harvest results.

We had our yearly Pongal celebration with a puja in January, shared a meal all together and of course there was the cart ride which brings joy ..

Madhuri, our usually-Mumbai-based volunteer, stayed with us for a few weeks to help analyze our paddy results; she is developing herself into a rice cultivation expert!

We will share more about this years paddy crop soon.

We are also busy with our infrastructure improvement projects.

I Pictures: Fence pillar mould development: Andre – Fence pillar mould development: Kanduvel & Sudha – Upper pond preparation for liner.

The pilot boundary fence is going on. We got a lorry load of cuddapah stones (a rough black lime stone) and Andre prepared a few sets of pillar molds. We will start producing the pillars with a small mason team this week. We aim to put up another 100 m in this next phase.

A few days back there came a technician from a company from Coimbatore to look at the upper pond (a relatively small pond embedded in the hill of soil which was created when digging the big pond a few years back). He explained what still needs to be prepared before the liner can be put in place. This week he will send us their quotation for the material and we will start to work on this as soon we are freed from the harvest work.

Then at last we are on the point of getting a small three wheeler electric vehicle (Ev) for transport of our products. With the bulky bananas, which will become more and more part of the daily deliveries, our old mopeds cannot handle it anymore. Our jeep which is over 20 years old will soon not be able to be used anymore because new laws are going to be implemented to ban old vehicles from the road.

We had ordered an Ev from a company in Chennai who after many months of false promises did not deliver; we had to switch to a more reliable company. We are still fighting with the company in Chennai to return the payment we made to them. It’s a difficult thing to deal with and feels not so nice. Even things which look simple on the face of it are often quite challenging to get executed…it’s our collective karma probably.. because I see a lot of people around us here struggling in similar ways and maybe we need to see the process as the thing to focus on and leave the rest to the big picture …😉

New Fence

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The world has changed a lot since we began farming here in the mid nineteen-eighties. Land prices have increased manifold. Indian population has grown by more than 70% and industrial development is growing very fast in our area. Educational institutions and big hospitals are springing up everywhere.

All this is happening at the cost of agriculture. Lands are being bought up by the big industry or real estate developers and the pressure on the remaining farms is getting more intense by the day.

When we started Annapurna farm we made a bund around the land and planted a live fence of thorny bushes which would sort of protect the fields. Borders were not really a big issue and land disputes with neighbours were generally solved amicably since there was not too much at stake. The only hassle we had were with stray cows and goats which would wander into crops regularly;  that would raise the tempers because the animals were the bank where local people had put their savings into, while we had put all our energy into the crops.

Today there are less cows and goats in our area because people have actual bank accounts with savings and family gold as investments. There is also less need for firewood collecting because LPG cooking gas cylinders are now commonly used. All these developments have led to the proliferation of wild life (mainly pigs and deer) which are much more difficult to control than domesticated animals. Since the land is very valuable, local land owners tend to push boundaries whenever we turn our heads; they do not respect our green fences. This happens very fast with powerful backhoe tractors (JCB) and chain saws which are now part of the daily landscape in this part of the country. Once a fence is moved it is a whole, long, complicated story to get it back on the proper place. Emotions can run very high!

All this is surely good for our personal yoga but we also feel it is important to put something more effective in place in order to protect the farm; the future will surely not get better in this respect.

Right now we cannot use extensive areas of the farm effectively because of the wild pigs and deer which destroy almost any crop.

Annapurna has a long boundary of approximately 7 km; so you can see, that is a very big job.

As mentioned in a previous newsletter (July 2021) we have received some funds to start a pilot to build a test fence to assess the material to be used, cost involved and practicalities how to get the work done.

Pictures: Old fence with broken pillar, existing life fence, the new fence concept

This summer we have started to build a very short section to get a feel of the concept we have in mind. The 5m fence which we put up feels good, solid and up to the task for what we need. It is basically a grid of slotted concrete pillars with kadappa  slabs which are put 45 cm into the ground and about 1m is above ground level. Over that we put barbed wire for 90-100cm. Some years back the Land Board of Auroville had put up a fence on a few sensitive parts of the farm, but this fence is not very effective and is easily vandalized, so we felt we really need something more solid, reliable and long standing.

The next step is going to be a pilot of 100m fence. In the process we hope to find a suitable contractor and to make a proper cost calculation of what this kind of fence will cost. Besides setting up the new fence we will have to clear the boundary and prepare the land for all this work.

Once the picture is clear we will have to find funds to do this work; this will give Annapurna farm a more secure future in the middle of this very dynamic and challenging environment.