Other Activities

Its been a little while since I made my last post.  I was discussing my progress with a friend in Canada and mentioned I needed to make an update.

First of all I selected the first plot of land to start this experiment. I may go on to work on the second plot and have the option to buy another that I believe is adjoining the first plot.  I have not seen the plot that is for sale so I don't have any details on it.

So far I've marked the contour near the middle of the plot I selected.  For the past week I've been digging a trench along the contour line, that I will widen and dig deeper. I was thinking about hiring someone with a backhoe equipped with a jack hammer to dig this swale. I mentioned this to Jorge and he said that people may not see this as something they could accomplish if a lot of money had to be invested. So  I've been digging the beginning of this swale by hand, primarily using a pickaxe.  Some areas have had a decent amount of soil with maybe 20% to 30%  rocks ranging in size mainly 2 to 5 inches diameter with the occasional 2 to 3 foot diameter. Other areas are upward to 90% stones of the same dimensions.

The contour takes a 90 degree turn close to the other side of the property.  Here suddenly the ground became 1 solid rock that extends at least 20 feet that I checked so far and may extend to the end of the property. So I've retreated to my arm chair to think about what I might do with this area.

The solid rock area is clearly a water shed, I can see where the water flows over the rocks. one option may be water reservoir, although its not in a good location for irrigation.  I'm leaning toward the idea of building a Hugelkultur mound on contour, although being solid rock I can only hope to store water in the mound itself. I'm also considering hiring someone to dynamite a section of this rock, to see if there is gravel, sand or soil under it. Maybe even a combination reservoir with a Hugelkultur mound against it.  Not sure yet.

I will have some picture of my progress very soon.

On another note, I'm working on a few small things at my Casa in Town. I noticed most dwellings already have small forest gardens containing a variety of fruit, nut trees and the occasional Mahogany  or other timber species. Although the owners generally rake up all the leaves into a pile and burn them.

I was leaving my Casa one morning and noticed one of my neighbors raking up tropical almond leaves, that were in his front yard and on the road. I've seen this done many times and I knew they would soon be burnt.  So I approached him and asked if I could have the leaves.  He looked puzzled and asked why I wanted  them, I told him I needed them for compost. He agreed to let me take the leaves, so I started bagging them up, he asked me for a bag and started helping me. Neighborhood children gathered around to watch and some even decided to help as well. Later I drove by another place and noticed another person raking up their almond leaves, so I asked them and they let me take them.  A similar gathering of children took place, but I over heard one kid saying "Mucho Basura" meaning a lot of garbage, as he sat there giggling and watching us bag up the leaves.

I ended up with around 30 regular sized garbage bags full of leaves from these 2 trees.  I had been gathering scraps from Jorge's restaurant and his fathers fruit and vegetable stand,  which were beginning to stink in 20 liter pails.  I made a large compost pile "approximately 8' long, 4' wide' 4 or 5' high" with the leaves and scraps and a few bags of Leucaena leaves I gathered from the road side.  The pile heated up by night fall and in a few days had sunk down to half its size.

A few weeks have gone by and now the pile is not even the required 3'x3'x3', although its still pumping out a lot of heat.  I didn't shred any of the leaves or other components and many of them are still in their whole form. So this pile might take a while to finish.

Doesn't look like much now

I've also planted a few Moringa trees and an oregano bush. I've sparsely spot mulched them with weeds I pulled from the lawn and fronds from fallen coconut tree branches.

 Moringa in front of my Casa, with a little spot mulch.

Oregano bush that was given to me by the same guy who located and brought me a lot of Moringa seeds. Now happily growing on the back west side of my Casa.

I've also convinced my land lord to stop burning the leaves the trees drop and leave them on the ground. I came home one day to find he had raked them up and piled them around a couple tree trunks.  I will pull them away from the trunk a bit and let him know that fungus and bugs might attack the tree, but its still great that he was willing to try something new.  Already I've noticed a major increase in the bird population as they are scratching and playing in the piles of leaves.

My back yard, now with the first addition of leaves that didn't get burnt. These trees drop a lot of leaves, so I expect this area to be covered in a year.

The Land

Today I wanted to take another look at the land that I hope to transform into a productive food forest. My friend Jorge who is working with me on this project sent me a message on my cell phone to let me know he was waiting for me to come over, so we could head over the the land.

When I arrived, his father had just finished packing up his setup where he sells fruits and vegetables every morning. I noticed he had a wooden crate with a mix of plastic bags, news paper, cabag and beet leaves and he was depositing a few mango’s that had gone bad. With my very poor and limited Spanish I asked if I could have his organic trash. He happily started digging out all the organic matter placing it in bags. I also noticed Jorge had a crate with similar contents, so I asked him if he would use 2 crates and put all organic matter and paper in one as I would love to take it every day. Jorge was taught about the values of compost by his father when he was young, He now has a degree in psychology, works at one of the local schools and runs a restaurant. He laughed as i dug threw his garbage and separated all the organic matter and loaded it in my vehicle. He said to me “Maybe everyone thinks permaculturists are crazy”.

“Turning waste into resource, is one of the key principles of permaculture. I've been an organic gardener all my life. My fathers gardens introduced me to the concept and later I continued with my own gardens. I think the waste in this town is an untapped resource. I hope I am able to convince at least a few Fruitarias and Restaurantes to start separating their organic wast and allow me to take it for this project.”

After I collected their organic wast, we headed over to the land. The Rainy season ended back in September threw November, Things are starting to dry out. The ground cover will be brown within the next month. The following are a few photos to help illustrate what I am working with. 

This is the right side of site 1 of 2. It is between 2 other plots that are currently bing worked.

The site has not been used for a while. Its nicely covered with brush and has a few Jabim trees.

Left side of site 1. Notice the relatively bare rocky ground in the field we are shooting from.

Me walking up the rocky hill in the neighboring corn field. The corn is sparsely planted.

Corn growing out of the rocks!
The corn has not been harvested yet. We pulled one cob out and placed between the bent stalk. I later put the cob back in the husk, as I'm sure the farmer worked hard enough to grow this.

Oranges as mulch. I will have to ask the farmer about this.

Site 2 left and right side.

I have been given the option of working one of these 2 sites. I have not decided yet, but I am considering site 1 because it seems to have more vegetation and possibly more rocks.

Now I need to get to work. In the coming days I will settle on one site and start marking out contours. I hope to hire someone with a backhoe equipped with a jackhammer, to chissel out the rough swales, I am sure there will be many hours of hand work to finish them off. 

I hope to start planting just as the rainy season begins in May. I need to find seed for all the plants I am interested in. So far one man whent out of his way to find Moringa seeds for me, he gave us a call a few days ago and told us he had some Moringa seeds.  I was expecting maybe a few hand fulls of seed, to my suprise he had 5 large garbage bags between 1/2 to 3/4 full of moringa seed pods! Other plants of interest are Leucaena, Date Palm, Sugar Palm, Saramuyo/anonas, Ramone "Maya nut", Guanacaste "Piich", Tamarind, Figs, Pitahaya, Passion fruit, chia and many more.

leucaena is native to this region although I hope to get a few improved non hybrid varieties that grow faster and produce more wood or more leaf.

The Concept

Hello Everyone,

I've been living in the Yucatan now for almost 8 months.  I consider myself a novice permaculture enthusiast.

During my stay here, I've learned a little about the agricultural practices here known as Milpa. Some of the land is privately owned, but a good deal of the land is Ejido "Its basically Communal land" I'll let wikipedia explain further details. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ejido

The common practice on each Milpa is slash and burn.  they cut down all the trees and plant matter at the end of the rainy season, than burn all the organic matter near the end of the dry season. They do this for a couple years and than move onto a new piece of land,  leaving the previous land to fallow for 6 years or so before returing to continue the cycle.

The land here is primarily comprised of porous calcium lime stone, which seems to be mixed with varying amounts of red or black soil, sand and gravel.

I was amazed when i first arrived here to see hills of what seemed to be solid rock, planted with a crop of corn.

During the dry season I see extensive use of irrigation. they grow vegetables, fruit trees, coconuts and variouse grasses.

I've began thinking about ways they could posibly improve their land use, reduce costs and increase yields. Permaculture has been demonstrated around the world, to reduce water and fertilizer imputs while further ruducing labour and increasing yields. So maybe these idea's could be put in practice here aswell.

A great example of the power of permiculture was Geoff Lawtons Greening the Desert video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzTHjlueqFI

If results like this can be achieved in such an unlikely environment, than why not here aswell.  The lack of soil may be the biggest problem with this area though. Water harvesting swales seem to be exclusively built on land with either soil, sand, silt or clay.  So the question that needs to be answered is "Can this technique work in this porous rocky landscape?".

http://permaculture.org.au/2010/11/25/gabions-water-soaks-in-the-desert/
Gabions are an inspiration that makes me think this technique might work.  Establishing swales on this type of land in the Yucatan may well work similarly to these Gabions.  So combining the techniques of keyline, swales, gabions, pre filled with organic matter to hold moisture longer. Maybe we can eliminate or at least greatly reduce the need for irrigation.