Congratulations!.. Nice developments and looks great, How much did the container cost? im just curious
Hello Fellow Farmers, another update on where we are now -
Lost more than a month due to the lock down where we could not travel to the farm hence nothing much moved. Once we started getting to the farm - we had trouble with a few neighbour farmers as this land on which we are setting up the farm has not been in use for more than 40 - 50 years. Most of them did not know that it was owned land and used to use it for traversing to their farms as a short cut. Once we started development work they started getting wary … but you cant allow people, animals, tractors, trucks and other equipment to cut diagonally across your field which is what we told them. We agreed to leave them a short road and also give them access to our road. Not that we were trying to profit because of their not having access but - we did not want them to go through a whole lot of trouble in the important time of planting. Any ways - all settled and work has started again at the farm.
Viji our land development contractor has been instrumental in getting us back to speed with almost 24 hour operations running for the past few days. He has been a gem and so has his team.
Whats moved since last time -
we now have a water storage tank
the boundary trench has been deepened considering it will start raining soon here.
What was pending is -
-
Pitting
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Land leveling - filling up soil in a sort of long nalla that we have.
Heard that it was dug up to create bricks… so have to get that filled up first. We expect the work to be completed in two / three days and after that we would be finishing up the mix with the usual components the VAM’s and the astobacters of the world.
After mixing up the supplements and would be filling up of the pits with the respective mix of the fertilizer and soil. we will follow up with one run of rotovator in a cris/cross way so as to clearly mark the pit and also get the surroundings ready for receiving green manuring seed.
we have sorted out our FYM requirement with over 75 loads now ready. With a healthy mix of Cow/ goat/chicken Manure. we did hit a road block when we asked our farm manager about where we could get go muthra from desi cows … He was at a loss and we were surprised as he did not know what jeevamruth was and also that there are only 10 desi cows in the whole village… a sad but very true story of this village… Any suggestions on how to fortify the FYM would be greatly appreciated.
Planting will be next month so till then cleanup and getting the pits sorted is the order of the month.
Will add more details as and when there are developments…
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each one costs about 2,00,000 addition is transport
Great going!!! Keep posting your progress. We eagerly wait for your updates.
Hi Psunderesh,
Congratulations on the wonderful development and initiative taken for your farm. It’s great to know you are cultivating using organic practices as cultivating organic has a lot of benefits for soil health and overall environment.
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Great initiative starting a new farm on your virgin land. Thank you for the frequent updates on your setup activities.
I am starting a new farm too, and co-relate the issues you are facing. Please share your contact if possible sir.
Further updates from the farm -
- Pitting completed. we had to complete close to 4200 pits which are now done. There is a 10% variation in the line which is being sorted out manually.
- We need red soil to be mixed into the pits which was a pain to arrange but finally done so that’s in place and ready when we are.
- Needed Neem cake and that is something we will start working on next week. Hopefully that will have sorted out the basic needs issue and we can be off on pit filling up.
This has been a awesome learning journey and it will make for interesting stories when i retire i think 
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Further updates…
Rain has been playing games with us and we are trying to work around the rain as there is labour shortage just after the rains.
we need some supplements to be added to the FYM and now have arranged for Neen cake and Honge Tree cake (Indian Beech tree). These act as antibiotic as they are bitter and have qualities which will keep the root zone safe. We were planning to add one basket of red soil however that has been very elusive as it is becoming hard to find places where you can get red soil with permission. We are currently transporting lake soil to fill where pits which need fresh soil. With rains are hampering our progress we are chugging along slowly towards getting ready for planting mid july.
A few pics of how it is looking around the farm -
Racing against time to complete… cheer for us guys…
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It has been a long time and updates are due -
- All the pits now have their share of soil , FYM and have been turned over and are ready to accept plants.
- WE had a huge amount of rains about 15 days ago and the field was almost under 6 inches of water in various places. This helped us because the Pits were fully drenched and we did not need to use ground water to drench the pits.
- WE are now waiting for the saplings to come in - they are expected closer to the end of this week so by 1st August we should have started planting and hope to finish the planting by the 10th. The rains should be starting around the 15th august … so if all goes well … we should have the farm ready to welcome the rains.
Pics in the near future.
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Our plants arrived
We are almost done with planting. We had some major issues with electricity and labour. With almost 8 PPL taking leave on day two of planting to no power or intermittent power during the whole time.
We even bought a diesel motor to ensure the plants have water during the whole process and to prevent any plant mortality.
Updates in a line-
- Plants arrived and planted
- Road work completed
- Design and discussion on drip in progress.- it is rainy season so no rush there. With no subsidy we will have to review what to do.
It was a very hectic schedule so more updates a bit later but for now… We are up and running as a farm…
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How are things progressing?
On a separate note, does anyone know how much manure would a full tractor trolley carry?
Man proposes and nature disposes.
The humongous amount of rain that has come through in the past couple of months has left a lot of farmers distressed and a few completely broken.
because of rain over Sept - Oct - Nov 3 lakes were filled up and overflow didn’t stop for a month… Our farm was inundated and all the plants were underwater for a couple of weeks-
It will have to be all fresh start for us and we are re evaluating options while we wait for the water to subside.
on the trolley question 4T max is what i heard or 5 - 7 buckets if you use a JCB
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Your turn now!
We had the devastation in Telangana Jun-Sep 2021 and things subsided only after that. Never saw such rains before, with water having no where to go.
4t fym: I got figures 1.5t - 5t depending on who I ask - I am trying to assess how much we are really adding to the soil. I will get a load on weigh bridge next time.
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Hi psundaresh, Its nice to read your updates on the progress of farm, Can you help me to understand more on getting land for lease. What prechecks needs to be done? what documents needs to be verified? Which government body involved in getting this done? any difference in green belt/yellow belt land agreements. if it looks big to explain here plz send details on mail: vinayaktelkar@gmail.com
Thanks in advance
Hi Sundaresh, Hope your farm has come up very well by now. I’m looking to dig a borewell in my land near Gauribidanur, could you please share the contact of Water Diviner that you have explored.
Also, I’m interested to visit your farm near Gauribidanur to get inputs on setting up a farm, will be glad if you can share the location of the farm.
Regards,
Shivakumar
8660365232
Preferably Geologist that uses scientific methods to identify point for Borewells
Hi Vinayak, after doing the land on lease i have realised it is better to do this via a lawyer. Mind you it has humongous risks which are apart from the law - example - the land lord might be ready to sell the land 2 years down. the land lord my ask for attrocious rentals, your business takes off and you have to move but you are bound by the agreement… so on and so forth. please decide based on your business idea and what you intend to grow.
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Hi sundar can you share your contact number