One of the main queries I get every week usually revolves around the status or progress of the various forests I have set up. Most of the time, I think, we do things more for show than anything else. For instance, at school, we students used to be given training in some task or another as part of the service week observed in connection with Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday. The message sought to be conveyed was that all kinds of work were noble. Therefore as part of it, we were taught how to build a compound wall, level the ground, dig furrows around trees and so on. Another skill we learnt was how to plant saplings, and use bricks to build a parapet wall around it. Thus we built six or seven parapet walls, with each batch of students building at least two each.
A while later, one of the students got selected to participate in a state-level sports competition. A well-built chap, he needed to get training, because getting selected was itself a matter of prestige. He started in right earnest. The item was shot put, and he was good at it. As a result, with each throw, he knocked down a wall. In a week, nothing was left of the walls we had erected. He won a prize at the state-level meet, and later joined the army. You too might have had such experiences. Maybe that is the reason why you ask about the forests that we created some time back, and wish to know whether they still exist, whether they thrive, or whether I’m making tall claims.
Right now, I’m sitting behind the forest we set up on top of a rock. I don’t know how much of it you can see but I will take you to it in a few minutes’ time. But let me explain its backstory. We created it formally on 19 November last year by planting a sapling, and planted the rest on 10 December. Today is 22 June 2021. Seven months have gone by. This is a forest on a rock. We bore tiny holes on it, inserted sticks in them and then filled the enclosed area with potting mixture. The sticks were then removed and the saplings planted. Our belief was that as the plants grew, the roots would go down through the holes in search of water. Prof. Miyawaki had conducted this experiment at a province called Kanagawa in Japan, over 12 acres of rocky terrain. Here, we did this on a tiny, 120 sq. ft strip of rock because such a project is expensive, and we meant it only as a prototype. Let’s take a closer look at it. This forest was put up on a rock six to seven months back. The reason for saying this is to tell you that abandoned quarries in our land are generally used to dump waste materials. Some others collect water and become ponds. These latter ones can be used to raise fish. If you wish, you can use abandoned quarry sites to create forests.
This forest on rocky land can be seen as such an example. You may have got an overall picture of it by now. I am standing nearly half a foot below the forest. This enclosing metal wall is two-and-a-half feet tall. A two-foot layer of potting mixture was spread over the rock. So all these plants stand on top of it. There is a thick layer of mulch, comprising dry leaves. Nearly all the plants have grown to an average height of more than seven feet within these six months. Most are taller than me, others are not.
This is pongamia. This willow-leaved water croton is not tall, growing to the side. This is oleander. This is bird cherry, a foreign species. This is white-coloured jungle geranium. This is bandicoot berry. Its peculiarity is that as soon as it blooms, it attracts the most number of butterflies, black bees and blue flies. It spreads quickly too, almost like a wild plant. This plant with thorns, I was told, is the olive. This is Spanish cherry. What is noteworthy here is that not all plants grow at the same pace. The Spanish cherry has only started to grow tall. This is an invasive species – Mussaenda. Its stem appeared unexpectedly. We should have uprooted it. I have to check how its growth affects the neighbouring plants, and how it thrives on rocky ground. On the other side is the mulberry. This is Asoka that has grown to its customary height of three feet. That one is peepal which has grown eight to nine feet high. This is henna. This one, I think, is child life tree. This is the Indian laurel. It is not growing fast, maybe because of the rocky ground. The Indian laurel requires a lot of water. This plant looks very familiar but I cannot recall its name. This is peepal. It hasn’t grown well. This is white orchid tree which has put out flowers and seeds. Next to it is the cashew which usually grows over rocky land. This is a banyan which is growing well. This is the dye fig. It has grown ten feet tall. The stem is slanting. If we hold it straight we will be able to see how tall it exactly is. This is the golden shower. We had to lop off its main stem because it grew too tall. This is the tamarind. A passion fruit creeper has wound itself over it. Time is not ripe to permit this creeper here. This is the Asoka which has grown taller that the other one. Maybe because it gets more sunlight. When we come over to this side, these two plants do not show much growth. This is the Indian tragacanth. This is the Ceylon olive. Both are rather slow growing. In between these, is a native jack. This one is coral wood. We had cut its stem but new branches have sprouted. This one is crown flower. Its growth is good. On this side, a drumstick tree is flourishing despite our having cut its branches. I believe this is the tree that grows at the fastest pace in the world. It is already 25 feet tall. That is Indian fig tree. Two of them have been planted close to each other and both are competing well. In between them is the white-coloured jungle geranium. Elephant apple. Malabar nut. On this side, cotton. The bolls have burst and cotton has fallen on the ground. So the cotton tree has reached its full maturity within this short span of time. This is Malabar tamarind. It has not grown well. The white orchid tree is fine. The seeds have appeared in six months. The bamboo you see here was not planted. It was fixed as a stake but leaves have sprouted from its stem. It should be removed. This is Indian mulberry. It has grown well. This one is golden shower which is also flourishing. It is ten feet tall. Some of the plants here – golden shower, cotton, drumstick, coral wood, mulberry, golden silk cotton tree – have grown to a man’s height. If the golden silk cotton tree had been tied to a stake, it would have grown taller. Nevertheless, it is taller than me. We have not done anything more here. We planted the saplings and filled the ground with mulch. There is a strychnine tree too in there. It is very slow to grow. It is almost difficult to spot it here. If it had been planted in the middle, the growth would have been slower still. But a tamarind here has grown really tall. This is beach almond. It is growing well.
In short, there is a lot of competition among the plants. What we see here is the clumping of plants within this small area. In a short period of six months, they have grown taller than they usually do. In the case of peepal, Indian fig tree, drumstick, golden shower and beach almond, the growth is extraordinary. The plant whose name I could not recall earlier is either champak or burflower. But I’m not very sure. Most of the plants have grown well. Some need a little more time to grow, like the Malabar tamarind, the strychnine, the Indian tragacanth or the Ceylon olive. So the experiment on the rock is six months old and has registered this level of growth. Imagine what the growth rate would be on ordinary soil.
You must definitely try out the Miyawaki method in your own plot. This area has one more peculiarity. It covers merely 120 sq. ft, a little more than a quarter cent. It is possible to create a forest even in such a tiny space. There is no need to fear that it will attract snakes. A mesh has been fixed all around the forest. Even if a snake enters this area, its head or its tail will inevitably be visible. Therefore, go ahead with creating a micro-forest near your house. This is a classical example. Please try it out.