Intensive Gardening
Intensively cultivated vegetable gardens can supply a great
deal of a family's food
from very little land. However, to maintain their
productivity, these gardens
require a lot of fertilizer and some special techniques,
which are discussed below.
As one crop is finished, another is put in its place
throughout the growing
season. Without additional fertilizer the soil would soon be
worn out. Cost of the
garden can be kept low by using compost and a crop rotation
system that also
includes poultry or other livestock, which can give a steady
supply of manure.
This virtually eliminates fertilizer costs. The best way to
ensure a large supply of
manure is to keep the animals in a pen, barn, or corral,
especially at night.
THE SOIL
Fertile soil includes organic matter and minerals. The best
soil is loose and has a
crumbly texture that breaks easily into small pieces a few
millimeters in diameter.
The deeper the crumb structure exists in the soil the
better.
If the soil is compacted or dense, it can be loosened by
first plowing or tilling to
break up the soil. Tilling also controls weeds. This work
can be done with a pick
and shovel, a hoe, or a heavy fork. A small tractor, or
animal drawn tools, may
be helpful in a very large garden.
The soil can be improved by: 1) adding manure or compost, or
by returning to the
soil plant materials that you or your animals do not eat, 2)
rotating crops, 3)
working the soil only when it is dry enough. Test for
dryness by taking a handful
of soil and squeezing it. If it sticks together tightly, it
is still too wet to work.
THE GROWING BEDS
Make planting beds no wider than you can reach to the middle
of for planting,
weeding, and harvesting. In that way you won't have to step
on the beds and
compact the soil. One meter (three feet) is a typical width.
Lay the beds across
any slope to slow water runoff and reduce erosion. The soil
may be raised in long
mounds so that it will warm more readily and be less subject
to flooding. Edge
the mounds with stone, brick, concrete block, heavy boards,
or other material to
hold the soil in place. This is not essential, but makes the
garden easier to care
for in the long run.
Leave a footpath between the beds that is wide enough to
walk in and to allow
some space for the tops of the growing plants. You will want
to be able to work
between the beds without damaging plants. Build a secure
fence around the garden
to keep out chickens, rabbits, cattle, and other animals.
If there is a stream or a tubewell nearby, the garden can be
watered by running
water in furrows between the beds, or by hand watering.
Widely spaced individual
plants, such as tomato, pepper, or
eggplant, can be watered by burying
a jar with a tiny hole near the
bottom in the ground near the
plant (Figure 1). The jar is filled
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with water, which seeps out to be
used by the plant as needed. This
is quite a bit of work, but can be
very effective in very dry areas.
Bury the jar when you set out the
plant so you don't disturb the roots
later. Check the water level in the
jar about once a week, oftener if
need be.
FERTILIZING THE SOIL
Growing plants take nutrients from the soil, which must be
replaced or crop
yields will slowly diminish, and intensive cultivation uses
up nutrients rapidly. The
major nutrients are nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and
calcium. These can be
bought as chemical fertilizers, but are also found in plant
matter and manure.
An inexpensive way to enrich the
soil is to use compost from a
compost pit or crib that is located
near the garden (Figure 2). Pile the
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materials into layers as shown.
Keep moist. Turn and mix every
week or so as they decay. When
the compost gets to be dark and
crumbly, it is ready for the garden.
Composting will not usually supply
all the fertilization needed, but will
add nutrients to the garden soil
and improve soil texture.
The simplest way to fertilize and improve soil texture at
the same time is to use
animal manure. If you use fresh manure, spread it over the
garden at the end of
the growing season and work it into the soil. During the
growing season, it is
best to use only seasoned manure.
If only fresh manure is available, a small amount of it may
be used to make a
weak "tea" that can be poured around the growing
plants. To make the "tea" put
a shovelful of fresh manure into a bucket of water and let
it stand for about a
week. Dilute the liquid until it is the color of weak tea
and use it to water your
plants about once a week.
SELECTION OF CROPS
Select crops that suit the climate and your family's tastes.
If you want to grow
vegetables to sell, consider community tastes as well. Try
to choose an assortment
that will give you something fresh from the garden
throughout the season. Unless
you have some way to preserve the produce, don't plant more
than you can eat,
give away, or sell fresh. But do plant vegetables you like a
lot or want in
quantity at intervals of a couple of weeks so that you will
be able to harvest
them over a long period. Keep in mind that in a well-fertilized
garden plants can
be more closely spaced and will yield a larger harvest for
the space.
Some crops may be planted directly in the beds while others
are best started in a
seed box and later transplanted into the garden beds. The
table below gives a
partial listing of both types of vegetables.
Seeds To Plant and Seedlings To Transplant
Vegetables that should
Vegetable Seeds to Plant Directly in the Garden
be Transplanted
Broccoli
Black Colocasia Okra
Cabbage
(roots)
Onion
Cauliflower
Beet Pigeon pea
Chinese cabbage
Bitter gourd Pointed gourd
Eggplant
Carrot Potato (tuber)
Indian spinach
Collard Radish
Lettuce
Coriander Red Amaranth
Mustard
Cowpea Soybean
Pepper
Cucumber Sweet corn
Spinach
Field bean Sweet potato
Tomato
French bean (cuttings)
Green Amaranth Sweet pumpkin
Jute Sword bean
Kohlrabi Turnip
It is a good idea to rotate the vegetables in the beds each
season. That is, plant
one type of vegetable one season, another type the next
season, and so on. Each
type or family of vegetable is subject to similar pests and
soil diseases. Planting a
different type vegetable in the beds each season helps
prevent the build up of
these pests and diseases and gives the soil a rest.
There are four basic families of vegetables--root
vegetables, leafy vegetables,
legumes, and fruiting vegetables--so the rotation would span
four seasons.
Peas, beans, and such are legumes, which means that they can
make their own
nitrogen plant food and so enrich the soil. Plant vegetables
that need a lot of
nitrogen in the bed when the legumes are finished. Root
vegetables are grown
primarily for their thick fleshy roots--radish, carrot,
onion, beet. The leaves of
some root vegetables, like beet, are often eaten as greens.
Fruiting crops include
peppers, eggplant, tomato, and white potato.
Leafy vegetables--cabbages of various kinds, lettuces,
spinach, collard--are grown
for their leaves, which are rich in vitamins and minerals.
Some leafy vegetables
tolerate cold weather better than others and some do well
when it is hot, so it is
possible to have some kind of fresh greens from the garden
almost all year round.
When you are planning your crop rotation, include broccoli
and cauliflower in the
leafy group, even though you don't eat the leaves, because
they are attacked by
some of the same pests as the leafy vegetables.
Plan the beds so that as one crop is finished another takes
its place (with the
addition of a little compost or seasoned manure). Save space
by planting vines
like beans and cucumbers on trellises at the edge of the
garden, situated so they
don't shade other crops. Stake tomatoes, peppers, etc., with
posts of bamboo or
whatever is available to keep the fruit from rotting on the
ground.
MULCH
Cover the soil around seedlings with a thick layer of grass
clippings, leaves,
straw, or other material. Some people use black plastic,
which is expensive, or
even layers of newspaper. The idea is to keep the soil from
drying out so fast
and to keep weeds from sprouting. Mulching may seem like a
lot of extra work in
the beginning, but it saves a lot of work over the season.
It also saves water,
and the organic mulches, like grass and straw, enrich the
soil as they decay.
Sources:
Paul J. Abrahams. VITA Volunteer, Atlanta, Georgia
J.W. and J.B. Fitts, VITA Volunteers, North Carolina
Harlan H.D. Hatfield, VITA Volunteer, Bend, Oregon
James M. Corven, VITA Volunteer, Washington, D.C.
Silage for Dairy Cows
The small dairy farmer who maintains five or six cows on two
or three hectares
(four or five acres) of fodder and pasture grass is usually
faced with a serious
decline in milk production during dry or cold periods. The
decline in milk
production is nearly always the result of the seasonal
scarcity of fresh, succulent,
nutritious feed. Without good feed, cows are obliged to eat
dry, strawy, weedy
grass, which not only lacks nutritive value, but often
causes digestive troubles,
constipation, and difficult birth. These troubles can be
dealt with easily and
cheaply; good health and a high level of production can be
maintained-by the use
of silage.
Silage can be stored in permanent
or temporary silos. Permanent silos
can be either upright tower-shaped
structures (see Figure 1) or
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horizontal, like the trench silo (see
Figures 2, 3, and 4). Upright stack
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silos (see Figure 5) and fence silos
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are examples of temporary silos.
The use of successive rings of
fencing is becoming widespread;
these silos can be lined with plastic
or paper or they can be unlined.
Many farmers have saved the
money needed for permanent silos
by using temporary silos for several
years.
Losses of silage vary with the type of silo, the crop
ensiled, its stage of maturity
and moisture content, fineness of chopping, and the extent
to which air and
water have been excluded from the silage. Losses run from 5
to 20 percent in
permanent upright silos; from 10 to 30 percent in permanent
horizontal silos; from
15 to 50 percent in temporary trench, fence, and stack
silos.
A silo should be located near the barn to keep to a minimum
the time and labor
involved in feeding.
Detailed instructions on silo building are given "Farm
Silos," Miscellaneous
Publication No. 810, Agricultural Research Service, U.S.
Department of Agriculture,
1967 (revised).
It is not worthwhile to make a silo of less than four tons
capacity, except under
very special conditions. Spoilage in smaller silos is often
excessive. A cow of
average size not provided with any other fodder will consume
about 23kg (50
pounds) of silage in 24 hours; on this basis a farmer
knowing the number of cows
to be provided for and the approximate length of the period
during which silage
is to be used, may estimate the quantity needed; for
example:
20 cows @23kg (50 pounds) per day
for 90 days
41,400kg
(90,000 pounds)
5 heifers @14kg (30 pounds) per day
for 90 days
6,300kg
(13,500 pounds)
5 calves @7kg (15 pounds) per day
for 90 days
3.150k (6.750
pounds)
50,850kg (110,250
pounds)
51 metric
tons (56
short tons)
The bare requirements would be 51 metric tons (56 short
tons) of silage, and an
allowance for wastage should be added. The tables may be
used to estimate the
dimensions of a silo.
A silo of ten tons capacity or less should be filled in two
operations, that is, on
two separate days with two or three days between operations.
Similarly, a large
silo should be filled in proportionate operations, though
this is not so essential as
with the smaller size. Table 1 gives trench silo capacities.
Approximate Kilograms
"Dimensions
in Meters (Feet)
(Pounds) of Silage Per
Top Width
Bottom Width Depth
30cm (1') of Length
2.4 (8)
1.8(6)
1.8(6)
756 (1680)
3
(10)
2.1(7) 1.8(6)
918 (2040)
3.7(12)
2.4(8)
1.8(6) 1080
(2400)
2.4 (8)
1.8(6)
2.1(7) 882
(1960)
3
(10)
2.1(7) 2.1(7)
1071 (2380)
3.7(12)
2.4(8)
2.1(7) 1260
(2800)
3
(10)
1.8(6) 2.4(8)
1152 (2560)
3.7(12)
2.4(8)
2.4(8) 1440
(3200)
4.3(14)
3 (10)
2.4(8) 1728
(3840)
Material for silage varies considerably. Corn, guinea corn,
sugar cane leaves, uba
cane leaves, napier grass, guatemala grass may be used
singly or in mixtures; the
important point to be borne in mind is that the material
should be young, fresh,
and green. Uba and sugar cane should be cut before the stem
is formed; guinea
grass should be cut before flowering and seeding takes
place; napier, guatemala,
and elephant should be cut while the stems are still tender
and green. If only
fresh, leafy growth described above is used, there is no
need for chopping the
material as it is brought to the silo. It should be
scattered thinly over the entire
surface of the silo, and should be constantly trampled to
cause consolidation.
Trampling close to the walls is especially important.
Silage that is considerably more nutritious than grass
silage can be produced by
combining fresh young leguminous fodders with grass when
filling of the silo. Cow
peas, edua peas, soya beans, Bengal beans, and St. Vincent
plum fodders have
been used with success at the level of 20-25 percent of the
total bulk. This
material must be chopped.
The use of molasses is recommended in all silos, for
increased palatability,
increased nutritive value, and in the case of young grasses,
or silage with
leguminous mixtures, as an aid to the essential
fermentation. Molasses should be
used at the rate of 10kg per metric ton (20 pounds per ton)
of grass material, as
follows: if the material is wet with rain or dew, add two
parts of water to one of
molasses before application; if the material is dry, add
four parts of water to one
of molasses. As each layer of material, several centimeters
or a few inches thick,
is laid down, sprinkle on the molasses-water mixture, unless
a blower with a
continuous molasses sprayer attached is used. In leguminous
mixtures 25 percent
more molasses should be used.
Inside
Diameter
Depth of Silage in Meters
of Silo
in Meters 2.4
3
3.7 4.3
4.9
5.5 6.1
6.7
7.3 7.9
8.5
9.1
----------------------------------------------------------------------
3 9.9
12.6
15.3 18
20.7
23.4 25.2
28.8
31.5 35.1
37.8
42.3
3.7 14.4
18
21.6 26.1
29.7
34.2 36
40.5
45 49.5
54.9
60.3
4.3 18.9
24.3
29.7 35.1
40.5
45.9 48.6
54.9
61.2 67.5
74.7
81.9
4.9 25.2
31.5
38.7 45.9
53.1
61.3 63.9
72
81 88.2
Table 2. Number of metric tons of silage in a vertical silo.
When it is not possible to obtain young, fresh material, and
older material must
be used, then chopping is essential. Once the material has
been chopped the
remaining operations are similar to those described above,
with the exception that
only 6kg of molasses need be used per metric ton (12 pounds
per ton) of grass
material plus 35 percent more if legumes are included.
After a silo has been filled level with the top and has been
thoroughly trampled,
the silage will settle gradually over a period of several
days, bringing the need
for refilling once or perhaps twice to compensate for
shrinkage. After the final
refill a thick layer of dried grass should be laid over the
silage and trampled
down; finally, a few heavy logs laid over the dried layer will
assist consolidation.
A pointed roof over the silo with eaves reaching down below
the rim will shed
rain water.
Silage made in the spring of the year when grass is young
and nutritious will
keep perfectly until the winter or drought period comes; then
it is possible to
supply cows with feed every bit as nutritious and as
palatable as fresh grass in
the natural state. It is true that some
cows do not take naturally and readily
to silage, but they may be taught to
consume it with relish.
When a silo is opened to feed cows,
logs and the dried grass layer should
be removed. It is commonly found that
a layer of silage several centimeters (a
few inches) thick from the top
downward will have spoiled--turned
black or slimy with white streaks of
fungus here and there. This should be
thrown away.
The color of the good silage exposed below may be green,
yellow-green, or
brownish-green, and it will have a strong pleasant smell;
there will be no
sliminess or streaks of fungus. The silage may be fed at
will to cattle, care being
taken only that each day's supply should be removed from the
whole surface of
the silage rather than from one spot; in this way an even
surface will be
maintained and no one section will be over-exposed to air.
After each day's
supply has been taken out, the surface of the silage should
be covered with old
bags to prevent drying out; if it should become necessary to
interrupt the feeding
of silage for more than a day or two, then the silage must
be sealed off as it
was when the silo was first filled.
WARNING - GAS DANGER IN SILOS
Suffocating and, in some cases, poisonous gas may be present
around silos.
Suffocating gas from fermenting silage, mostly carbon
dioxide, forms in all
silos shortly after filling begins and continues until
fermentation stops.
Poisonous gas, when present, is nitrogen dioxide. Its color
and density vary
with temperature. At room temperature it is orange yellow
and 2 1/2 times
as heavy as air. As the temperature rises, its color becomes
darker and its
density becomes lighter. The gas, being heavier than air,
collects and
remains in any depression or enclosed space when there is no
strong, free
movement of air. Danger of nitrogen dioxide gas occurs only
during filling
and for about a week after.
Many lives have been lost because of carelessness in
entering a silo where
there may be danger of gas. Gas is a particular hazard in
below-ground
silos. To stir the air in a silo, tie a rope to a basket, a
blanket, a large
piece of canvas, or a tree branch and then drop the article
into the silo
and raise it a number of times with the rope.
Source:
The Farmer's Guide. Marvin D. Van Peursem, VITA Volunteer,
Newton, Iowa.
Kingston, Jamaica: Jamaica Agricultural Society, 1962.
