After growing greens on a trail plot we realized that the soil nutrient level is very low as its very sandy and the soil hasn’t been fertilized since ages.
We then decided to mix up a few techniques and try it again …. Luckily we succeeded (atleast as of now)…
We made shallow beds which were 5 ft wide and 12 ft long, the idea was that one should not step into the bed as it would harden the bed. When the bed is only 5 ft wide one can access the center of the bed from both ends without stepping in.
Then we add a big basket of dry leaves/organic waste from the nearby park/vegetable market ( one tractor load costed us Rs.250, we needed 4 loads for 30 guntas ) we then mixed it up with soil sending some organic matter below the soil and some above.
The idea was if I had give Jeevamrutha then it needs organic matter to survive. The reason mixed it up and sent some below the soil is because the locals said that it would decompose fast and encrich the soil (just went by their confidence levels and experience). The reason I wanted some leaves on top was for Jeevamrutha to do its job better (not getting into details about that).
After this threw the seeds on the bed and sprinkled a small quantity of FYM just like an icing on the cake, then gently mixed it up so that seeds could be covered with some soil.
We then used a 1 inch flexi tube with a shower head to water the bed. This gave a micro sprinklers effect just that it wasn’t fully automatic.
We sprayed jeevamrutha (1:10 ratio) after about 15 days and have planned sour buttermilk and cow urine spray on the 21st day.
After about just 23odd days we have already harvested about 3 different types of greens and got a great response from consumers.
They said it tastes great and will want a weekly supply……
Just thought of sharing my experience on this forum and would like to get some more suggestions to improve the same.
That is great idea. Actually this is where Amrut Mitti process comes into picture. I do not know if you read about Amrut Mitti (NatuEco) Farming. If not please check it out. It was introduced by Late Professor Dabolkar and currently Mr. Deepak Suchede has a model farm baded on this and they give free training. I believe Dr G Nammalvar followed this approach and modified it little bit. The idea behind Amrut Mitti is to get the soil fertility back. It is about 140 days up-front work but it is worth it. Based on my understanding (after reading many books including ZBNF and NatuEco) combining Amrut Mitti and ZBNF would be an excellent combination and win-win situation. Of course I have not tried implementing it but I would when I start my farm.
Bhayya Pushparaj your Posting is very Impressive and useful to Our interested Natural Farming Forum Members . Your Video is GOOD. It is better to Provide Text also to know more and for Future References.
I am glad you liked it. It is very good concept and as I said Deepakji provides hands on training for free of cost in his model farm. If anybody interested then they can contact him through his email id (which is available @ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shripad_Dabholkar (who is the inventor of NatuEco/Amrut Mitti) approach achieved record results in Grapes production in Maharashtra.
BTW, I can’t read Hindi either (but I can understand and talk) so the above translated book is the one that I always refer. There are few other PDFs also available and I will try to share them also.
Just to let everybody know that Armut Mitti process is to create top soil with all the necessary nutrients in 140 days - a similar top soil creation could take 100s of years for nature. Unfortunately we have destroyed the top soil by using Chemicals and Pesticides so we have to create nutrients rich top soil through Amrut Mitti Process and make soil fertile again. Once soil becomes Living Soil (or fertile) then nothing could stop the farmer but the problem is farmers are not ready to do this initial work for various reasons.
