Sesame Harvest 2023

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We harvested the rain-fed sesame crop from the far-out plot [id: 373] this week. It took us 3 days to finish the harvest* from 4 acres, but we managed to harvest most of the crop in time without seed loss [shattering] due to over-ripening.
*Sesame is harvested when the leaves turn yellow and start drooping and the seed capsules are green/lemon yellow by pulling out the plants.

Once the bundles come to the drying floor, they are stacked and “smoked” as a traditional post-harvest pest control method and left to mature till the seed pod is ripened. After 8 days the plants are taken out of the pile and dried in the sun. During the drying process the seed capsules will open and the seeds fall out on the floor. Once all seeds are on the floor, the plant stalks are removed and the seeds are dried, cleaned and stored in plastic airtight containers and flushed with CO2 because sesame seed is easily infested by weevils and bugs during storage. Before processing or sale, seeds are washed and re-dried.

Looking back over this season of rain-fed sesame crop, there was just enough rain to get the seeds germinated and plants established in the early stage and a few light rains to develop the crop. Rain-fed post monsoon crops are quite risky and it is very important that we get the right amount of rain at the right time or one can easily loose the crop when rains fail or are too heavy.
As plot 373 was tilled for the first time for the cultivation since many years, we did not observe the overwhelming growth of weeds and avoided weeding altogether. We protected the field with a solar powered electric fence to keep out the pigs, deer and village cows/goats.
Sesame at Annapurna is processed into ‘Gomasio’ to make the cultivation economically viable. Gomasio is a dry condiment/seasoning made using toasted sesame seeds and Himalayan salt (Classic Blend) and another with addition of pepper to the original classic blend. This is a low-sodium, nutritious, umami-rich seasoning that you can complement with a variety of foods, especially salads or simply plain rice and ghee!

Sesame capsules (pods)
Ladies coming back with the harvest.

Alley Cropping System | Gliricidia plot:392BB [Jun – Oct 22]

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The natural diet of bovines largely comprises wild grass, tree leaves and weeds. Increased domestication, however, has motivated farmers to rely on grain-based diets, as it makes it easier to maintain large herds of cattle and harvest higher yields of produce, be it meat or milk. Grains, in comparison to grass, are easy to store, to purchase in bulk, as well as to produce. Second-grade-broken grains are often easily available (read: cheaper) for dairy.

Annapurna dairy currently relies on grains, i.e. millet-based concentrate as well as home-grown fodder and paddy straw. While fodder (greens) is much more nutritional and natural to cattle, the quantity needed for consumption is relatively higher. To grow such quantities, one would require advanced pastoral management (optimum grazing), water, land, as well as protection of the land from other wild vegetarians.

The often asked question to us is how one farm off 135 acres, the answer is to make a system that serves the need of sustaining an organic farm.

A closer look at gliricidia 323BB will help to understand this better as it aims to sustain the rotational fodder for the dairy along with irrigated food crops, such as green gram, late sesame and corn.

For years, Annapurna has been cultivating the most outlying pieces (15-20 acres) of the land under dryland gliricidia plantations to produce fodder and biomass. These gliricidia were originally planted as a dryland crop to biomass for composting-mulching, and nitrogen-fixing to the soil, create organic fodder for the dairy along with far-off land protection and erosion. Food crops used to be grown between the lines of gliricidia as well.

In the month of June 2022, with the help of increased rain harvesting capacity over the years, we prepared alleys (spacing) between gliricidia to cultivate fodder under irrigated conditions. This plot was prepared by shredding down gliricidia alleys to provide the biomass for the first rotation with fodder crop 一 Phaseolus Tribola and perennial fodder Sorghum.

This system was visualized by Tomas years ago as a mean to reduce yearly compost input (creating biomass | organic matter). In the coming season, we intend to observe if the plot will be able to sustain itself with the biomass created from the gliricidia and legume crop rotation. This plot will further rotate into food crops and eventually into a fruit plantations; banana.

The aim is to slowly move towards minimizing the reliance on millet grains to having the herd predominantly fodder (grass)-fed while extending the land under long-term cultivation. As of today we harvested about a ton of leguminous fodder – Phaseolus Tribola and test cut of the perennial fodder sorghum from 392bb.

Alley Cropping System*

Hedgerow intercropping, also referred to as Alley cropping system is a type of strip cropping or agroforestry practice, in which fast growing trees and shrubs are established on the arable lands and annual food or forage crops cultivated in the “alleys” between the hedgerows. The shrubs or trees are usually planted in rows of 2.0 m to 6.0 m apart, with crops cultivated between rows. The trees or shrubs managed as hedges are pruned periodically during cropping phases to prevent shading of companion crop and the pruning applied to the soil as green manure and / or mulch. This improves the organic matter status of the soil besides proving nutrients, especially nitrogen. This system also creates a more favorable microclimate for crops by shielding them from drying winds. Trees or shrubs and crops components are managed to be complimentary rather than competitive.

Paddy season is on again.

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Rice cultivation and dairy work are the two most intensive activities at Annapurna Farm.

Dairy is thriving throughout the year with a daily need of attention and work to be done. Paddy cultivation is happening for about 7-8 months per year in the field, and is very intensive with peak labor needs at planting and weeding time.

This starts in August with the first paddy seedbed and a small puja (= ceremony) to invoke the gods for good fortune, field preparation, planting, weeding and finally harvesting. We make about 8-10 seedbeds in a period of 80-100 days to be able to plant 20 acres over a period of 3-4 months. We are trying to speed up this process by organizing the work better and use our resources more efficiently every year.

In fact, preparation for this season’s paddy has started directly after the harvest of the previous rice crop by applying compost and establishing a green manure crop (to enhance soil fertility) on the fields since we had late rains and the rainwater harvesting ponds had lots of water. Then there was the preparation of nursery soil in May/June.

  • Beginning of the rice season Puja
  • Levelling the paddy field
  • Madhuri and Tarun
  • Good green manure this year
  • Paddy seedbed to be transplanted
  • Paddy planting

Every year we do some experiments and tests to learn, improve and keep our minds from getting into a rut. This year we are introducing a few new varieties of rice which our volunteer Madhuri organized for us last season. Then we do a few plots of direct sowing of paddy with a paddy drum seeder which Tarun, another of our volunteers, borrowed from his farmer friends.

Both these volunteers have moved on but were very helpful in the work here and we are still very much connected to support each other where possible.

Incorporating green manure with the cagewheels tractor.
Sowing paddy with the seed drum.

Direct sowing of paddy is not new to us, but the drum seeder is, and we want to see if this method of sowing seeds in rows on the field helps us to cut costs of transplanting which is a major expense in the cultivation. 

We try to find paddy varieties which suit our conditions and can be sown at any time around the monsoon time so we are more flexible when weather is erratic and unpredictable. Most traditional varieties are very time-bound.

Very slowly we are trying to make the paddy cultivation more resilient and economically efficient, it is a wonderful and endless endeavor and totally in line with our work in Auroville.
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Short Sunday morning weather musings

It’s raining again; just listening to that old song of Supertramp…

And that is what it has been doing a lot in July. We got a whopping 19cm of rain so far spread over 9 days which is quite different from last year where we got less than 5 cm over the same period.

At that time we were praying for rain to be able to establish a green manure crop in the rice fields. This year we are struggling to get the land prepared in the moments the soil is dry enough to be cultivated.

Weather and agriculture are the perfect means to learn patience, detachment and surrender. I used to have sleepless nights because the weather was playing truant and would stop the field work at crucial moments, destroy the crop at harvest time, complicate and halt construction work and much more. I surely learned a lot there and am much more accepting what comes and goes with that nowadays.

This reminds me of a movie where a guy is being accused of treason and is in jail and pretty relaxed with that. His lawyer asks him why he is not worried because he might get the death penalty for this. Then the accused asks the lawyer: ”Do you think it will help me if I would worry?”  

Right now we’ve gotten most of the green manure sown in the paddy fields and hope to finish it next week. The road repair which we started got stopped because to drive tipper lorries with material into the farm the soil needs to be dry not to get stuck.

The Gliricidea nursery has been planted and seeds start to sprout nicely in this cool and rainy weather.

Nursery.

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This week we started to work on our Gliricidea nursery. This is a yearly ritual where we prepare a nursery of 5000 or more Gliricidea seedlings to plant on the lands which are not easy to control.

Ambika and Sengani filling nursery packets with soil. Young Gliricidea widely planted.
Mature Gliricidea row planted.

Once grown, (by September/October), the seedlings are planted in straight rows in the field so we can mechanize the work of cutting and shredding. Most of the plantations are used to prepare shredded material to add to the compost. Annapurna still buys every year many loads of compost in the bioregion, and we want to bring that amount down over time by creating more biomass. Some of the shredded material is used for mulching our guava orchard.

Gliricidea Sepium is a medium-size leguminous tree which can be cut back periodically and will grow back thereafter. The leaves are rich in nitrogen (protein) and good for fodder and enriching soil/compost. It grows extremely fast when conditions are good.

The farm has planted 15-20 acres over the years. Some plantations are wide spaced and we can plant crops in between; some fields are more narrow and can only be used for creating organic matter.

Gliricidea is an important plant in our farming system and we give it due attention. Organic matter management is a very important part of an organic farm system.

Generally deer, stray cows/goats are not fond of it and pigs are only a real problem in the first year after planting when they uproot young seedlings. In this way Annapurna can still make productive use of parts of the farm which otherwise are ruled by wild life and stray animals.