I’m at my Puliyarakonam plot now. You know that this is on an incline, and I’m standing right in the middle of it. It descends to 100 feet from here and ascends to the same height. What you see behind me is my first Miyawaki forest, planted three years back. The trees there stand at 30 feet or above. Here, you’ll see another Miyawaki forest, two years old and set in two layers. So, there’s a lot of greenery there. On that side is a one-year old Miyawaki forest, made up of fruit trees and vegetable plants, like brinjal, papaya, and so on. Behind it is a forest on a rock, and other trees besides. In short, I’m surrounded by forests on all four sides. The pan shot will reveal it.
A three-cent plot lay barren in the middle, and we wanted to find out what we could do with it. Earlier, the heat in this place was unbearable. On this rock face, we spread a layer of soil (one to two feet thick), cow dung powder, coir pith and so on, and planted a vegetable forest in order to examine whether we can have a forest inside forests. Many papaya plants grew and produced good quality fruits. They are past their prime now but we will show you some shots taken earlier. Guavas too can be seen. Besides, we grew African bird’s eye chilly, ginger, turmeric, green chilly and so on. We also fixed three trays here and mixed many species of plants in them, like cabbage, cauliflower, Guatemalan indigo (that is full of seeds) and so on. I had recorded all that.
We also planted four banana plants by inserting the stumps inside shallow pits. We did not made a ridge around them, as is the traditional practice. Yet the yield was very rich. Hereafter, we will not remove the saplings that naturally sprout around the mother tree, but rather let them grow and produce fruits as and when they do. If we plant them together, we are likely to get fruits all at the same time but the bunches will be small. However, with this natural method, we can do harvesting in a staggered fashion. Banana plants are useful for their leaves and stem too, and also make for good fodder. We harvested nearly 200 brinjals from these two plants. A few more remain on them. We also got a lot of guava fruits, elephant yam and a variety of lady’s finger locally called ‘mara venda’ from this forest.
Right in the middle of this plot is a fish pond. I’ve shown you video clips of it earlier. I shall show them once again so that you can see the change that has come over the place. The pond is less than a year old. I raised Pangasius and Tilapia. Now Pearlspot has been introduced into it. In this forest, I’ve planted many saplings of ‘mara venda’ because it will give yield for a longer period of time. Beyond that are medicinal plants, including dwarf white bauhinia.
What I meant to tell you is this. Don’t be put off if you have only a very tiny piece of land to spare. Even if you have only a five-cent plot, you will be able to make one-metre-wide strips of Miyawaki forest on all four sides. If it is a rocky, barren land, put up a fence two or three feet high, fill it up with soil, and plant saplings. Even such tiny forests will bring about a substantial change in the micro climate of the area. The atmospheric heat will decrease, rain water will seep into the soil, insects will come in large numbers and help in pollination, and so on. And if you put up a house right in the middle, you won’t feel any heat indoors. Besides, you will get vegetables from the forest that will fulfil your domestic requirements. You can make an outer layer for the vegetable forest with papaya and brinjal plants, guava trees and so on. Or even banana plants. Please try out this model.
To incentivize you, we shall show you close-up shots of the four bunches of banana we harvested from this forest. Also, the papayas and brinjals. If I can grow them on top of this hill, you certainly can in your plot with better soil quality and fertility. This is proof that any kind of land can be cultivated because here, the leaves that fall on the ground form the major source of manure. Leaves and earthworms and micro-organisms have played a big role in improving the quality of the soil here. So please try out this model.