Stone terraces, Part 4

This is the stone terrace that we built since around February-March 2010. It has blocked and impounded several cubic meters of organic matter like dried leaves and branches, eroded topsoil brought down by the flash flood, and so on. The Before and After pictures after the thick dried mahogany leaves were cleared on the terrace.

Here’s a comparison of the pictures, June 2010 and April 2011. This structure has survived the past flash floods during the last rainy season. Meaning the structure is stable and well-constructed enough. And the thick organic matter behind the stones have acted as supporting materials to impound everything that was brought down by the flash flood.

Another comparison of the terrace, top view. There was a huge deposit of dried leaves last month and this month under the mahogany trees. We just have to gather and transfer those that are far from this impounding area.

And here's the gully that we hope to be covered with various organic matter and rich soil in a few years. I would say that this is a rather ambitious project. The depth of the gully from its two high sides is probably around 8 to 10 meters. This area will three important functions: (a) reduce flash flood during heavy rains, (b) impound organic matter and rich top soil, and (c) beautification as the stones will become a huge wall someday.

Vegetable plots

The main products in our farm are mangos. Then forest trees, and a small rice output. I will write more about them in future “Farming notes” series.

Recently, our caretaker, Nong Endring Paragas, partnered with one of his neighbors in the barangay proper, Anoling, to plant more vegetables during the dry season. They planted sitao (stringbeans). It was a good decision. Sitao would grow up to 4 months, nearly 3 months of which a farmer can harvest twice a week on average on the same plant. So they have regular supply of free vegetables in their house while earning some money by selling the surplus products.

They also planted talong (eggplant). From the pictures I took last weekend, it seems that their talong are growing well. Photo above, that’s me . Photo below also shows some kalabasa (quash) and ampalaya crawling on an elevated structure.

These are organic vegetables. The scope of production though is small scale. Their excess harvest are sold only in the barrio or in the town center.

Nong Endring also has several banana plants. The main enemy of banana though, are the bats and sometimes rats. They attack the bananas even before the fruits would mature. Grassfire and forest fire from somewhere in the uplands would also damage bananas and other crops.

Stone terraces, Part 3

Working in the farm in Pangasinan, north of Manila, is one of my favorite hobbies. We have many trees there. Forest species include mahogany, molave, acacia auri, acacia mangium, narra, eucalyptus deglupta, benguet pine or agoho, karael, etc. Most of the trees we planted nearly 2 decades ago, the others just grew as part of natural vegetation in the area.

I go there every 3 or 4 weeks. Building stone terraces on hilly areas where the soil is prone to erosion and landslide during heavy rains is among my favorite activites. There are many stones in the creek nearby, our caretaker or some locals hired on extra, 1-day work, would gather those stones.

We built this terrace sometime in April or May 2010. But I started taking photos only last June 20. This area used to be a gully, rainwater easily passes through this natural canal. Until I decided to simply block this natural water path -- to trap the eroded topsoil and various organic matter from upstream.

This is the view at the back of the terraces. Various organic materials like dried leaves and branches, newly-cut branches. Small stones are placed at the back of the bigger stones to stabilize the former.

Top view. These were also taken last June 20, 2010. A row of stones per layer, the smaller stones at the back stabilize the bigger stones in the front.

A month after, here's a newer view. The "stairs" of stones on the right side have been there for at least 4 years now. Seemed that we built a really strong terrace that can withstand even a strong flash flood.

Another back view as of July 25, 2010. Fresh deposit of fallen leaves and branches are just dumped at the back. My goal is to fill up and flatten the gully with lots of eroded topsoil from upstream and the hilly slopes brought down by the rains and flash flood.

And here's how small water run off is trapped at the back of the strong terraces. Should the flash flood be strong, water should be able to penetrate in lots of pores as the stone terraces are not cemented.

By end-2010 up to today, this is how high the terraces has become, it should be at least 5 feet tall, with 4 layers of big stones in the front. See how our caretaker, Nong Endring Paragas, will soon be dwarfed by the height of these terraces in the next few months.

Another top view of the terraces. Four layers now. And more organic matter are deposited at the back each week.

Resting after carrying and moving those big and small stones. I hope to see this area a huge and high wall of big stones in the future, when it was just a gully and natural water path just several months ago!

Bt Eggplants and Organic Farming

Mainstream environmentalism is often marked with romanticism. They romanticize the "native, non-bio-tech and organic" crops. Thus, they rabidly oppose the use of biotechnology, microbiology and other modern biological sciences in modernizing agriculture.

A few years back, many environmentalists attacked the use of Bt (bacillus thuringiensis) corn, using scary imagery and illusions about the dangers of using natural and soil-dwelling bacteria like Bt on humans if they eat Bt corn. Aside from fear of the "unknown" like using biotechnology in corn farming, the environmentalists also feared a multinational agri-business firm, Monsanto, as the pioneering company for Bt corn. SEARCA in UP Los Banos has a good scientific but simple explanation about Bt corn and why it is not harmful as pictured by the rabid environmentalists,
http://www.bic.searca.org/info_kits/btcorn_primer.pdf

Just what is Bt? Is it really a "stranger" to crops and soil, imported only by profit-hungry multinational capitalists to exploit farmers and consumers and make huge profit in the process? Picture of Bt from wikipedia.

Here is a brief description of Bt, from http://www.bt.ucsd.edu/what_is_bt.html

What is Bt?
Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) is a spore forming (flash animation) bacterium that produces crystals protein (cry proteins), which are toxic to many species of insects.

Where is Bt found?
Bt can be found almost everywhere in the world. Surveys have indicated that Bt is distributed in the soil sparsely but frequently worldwide. Bt has been found in all types of terrain, including beaches, desert, and tundra habitats.

How many kinds of Bt are there?
There are thousands of different Bt strains, producing over 200 cry proteins that are active against an extensive range of insects and some other invertebrates.

How does Bt work?
Bt has to be eaten to cause mortality. The Bt toxin dissolve in the high pH insect gut and become active. The toxins then attack the gut cells of the insect, punching holes in the lining. The Bt spores spills out of the gut and germinate in the insect causing death within a couple days.

Now these environmentalists have attacked the field trial and experiment of Bt eggplants in UP Mindanao, Davao City campus. The City government of Davao itself ordered and implemented the destruction of Bt eggplants inside the UP Mindanao campus -- they uprooted the plants! See news today, Davao exec orders uprooting of Bt eggplants

The use of science like Bt in various crops like corn and eggplants is supposed to help farmers raise their income via (a) higher yield and lower crop damage, and (b) little or no need for expensive pesticides, insecticides, contributing even to organic farming. Consumers also benefit via larger crop output and hence, lower and stable prices. But ugly environmentalism and their hatred of biotechnology and profit-motive makes the activists become irrational.

Philippine population is rising by 1.8 million a year, net of death and migration. Since our land area is not rising, and some agri lands are in fact converted to residential and commercial areas, there is no way but use modern science in agriculture if we are to help feed a rising population. Thus, environmentalism should consider this reality before they resort to destructive activities like uprooting and destroying crops using biotech and Bt technology.

My Treehouse, Update

I am a month-end (or “trying-hard”) farmer and a lower middle class urbanite. Since I go to the farm (Pangasinan, northern Philippines) every 3 to 4 weeks to visit a farm that I manage (I don’t own it), my dogs (I used to have 7, now down to only 4) and our farm caretakers, I need to have my own house there. And since I want to live in Makati where I hold an office but I also cannot afford to buy a condo or townhouse, I have to continue renting a place.

So I got no house in Metro Manila despite various government housing “programs” (to be discussed in future postings) but at least I got a house in the farm. It is easy and non-costly to put up a house there, an all-wood house, because we have lots of trees that we planted since the early 90s. And this is what I got there – a treehouse!

It’s a 2-storey, all-wood, no walls (except the toilet, of course), slatted-bamboo floor, house perched on a big and live mahogany tree. We built it around March 2005, so it’s more than 5 years old now. The tree carries the bulk of the weight of the house, but there are 8 smaller posts that help support the house and give it more stability.

The roof used to be cogon, neatly tied and arranged. It’s cool, not hot on cloudless days and not noisy when it rains. But remember, this house is perched on a live tree. The tree’s trunk on ground floor is getting thicker but not rising. The second floor though is rising by about ½ to ¾ inch per year. And the trunk where the roof is clamped is rising by about 3 inches per year! The roof has to be repaired every 2 to 3 years as rainwater slowly seeps into the trunk and into the house.

This is the house until early 2009, before we changed the roof to iron. Termites were able to climb up the house and they like munching the rain-soaked cogon roof a lot, contributing to the damage to the roof. The part covered by wooden slabs is the toilet. Notice the stone terraces on the right side, fronting the treehouse.

And this is the house this year. The cogon roof at the ground floor and second floor has been changed with galvanized iron. The termites on the roof are gone. It’s not so hot during cloudless days, mainly because of the surrounding trees and their leaves. But it can be noisy when it rains though.

I mentioned above that the 2nd floor is rising by about ½ to ¾ inch per year. The tree’s trunk is rising and getting bigger there, it is trying to move apart the two huge 3 x 6 inches support beam of the 2nd floor. Since the beams are well-secured, the tree has tried a new tack: if it cannot push them away, it will swallow them!

A close up view of the thick new “lips” of the tree. At the rate the “lips” are moving and expanding, this part of the wood will be entire swallowed in 3 to 4 years. I do not know if this will break the wood or it will strengthen it by then.

This is a view of the house 5 years ago, sometime in April or May 2005. Notice the trees surrounding it were still thin and small.

And this is the house last month. The trees surrounding it have become bigger and taller. At least two big and leaning trees have been cut already as they posed danger to the house during typhoon season.

A view of the house on the 2nd floor. Yes, those are live new leaves and branches that grow on the trunk. We have to remove some of them; otherwise, they will grow even bigger and occupy the entire house.

A tall, “Tarzan-like house” would need a Tarzan-like carpenter. That carpenter is Charlie Espinoza, the one on the left. Charlie is cool: a rice and vegetable farmer, tricycle driver/mechanic, carpenter, various other jobs, He’s the one who repaired and/or changed the roof. Assisting him, on the right, is Danny Paragas, who also assists his father, Nong Endring Paragas (not shown here) in taking care of the farm.

For those who plan to build their own treehouse too, the first thing to do is to have many trees near your area. Plant trees now on your private land, or take care of those that have grown naturally. Take note that the operative term is “tree growing”, not just “tree planting”. The former means planting trees for the long-term, the latter describes tens of thousands, of such activities every year. An average “tree planting” activity by various groups consist of 99 percent tree planting and 1 percent monitoring. After the picture-taking and being published in some newspapers or posted in some online sites, the newly planted seedlings are left on their own. After a week or a month, many of those seedlings are dead – choked by vines and tall grasses, or got burned in forest fires, or eroded by heavy rains and flash flood, or got trampled by farm animals, etc.

Mini-dam

Last weekend, I visited the farm again, slept in my treehouse and got a really long and peaceful sleep, from 9pm to 5:30am, 8 ½ hours of peaceful and deep sleep. Prior to that, I was so tired I also slept from 5-7pm, until Nong Endring woke me up for dinner. Our viand then was one of our free-range chicken who tend to free range a lot, they do not go back to their chicken house in the evening anymore. Either they will be stolen by other people, or some wild animals, especially monitor lizard (“bayawak”) will get them.

Here’s the front view of the mini-dam that we started building a few months ago. As of July 11 this year, 3 layers of stones.

And this is the front view last weekend, July 25, we started building the 4th layer.

Top view, as of July 11. New layer of dried leaves brought down by a small flood the previous weeks deposited at the back of the stones.

Top view, as of July 25. More stones added at the back, more weight, more stability, in case huge and strong flash floods will come in the next few weeks.

Back view, late June this year.

Back view, last July 25. The 3rd layer of stones at the back has been covered by dried leaves already.

This is the gully that we hope will be covered by soil and organic matter brought down by rainwater and flash flood in the coming months and years. Several cubic meters of loosened soil from the higher elevations are expected to be impounded here.

This will be our first experiment at impounding eroded soil and organic matter brought down by flash flood. I personally chose this site because the volume of flash flood here is not so big, unlike in other waterways in the farm.

A wider view of the mini dam plus the stairway going up to my treehouse.

More updates and photos in the coming weeks and months.

Stone terraces, part 2

The main purpose of building stone terraces is to trap organic matter (like dried leaves and branches) and loose soil so that they will not be easily eroded by heavy rains and flash flood. In the process, (a) a new layer soil will be created and (b) the area is beautified.

This is a short terrace, about 1 foot high. Front view, bigger stones are visible.

And the back view. These are smaller stones. Soon they will become invisible when they are covered by organic matter.

Some dried branches are put at the back.

A few weeks later, dried leaves are added at the back.

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Below are the terraces I constructed in our house in Cadiz City, Negros Occidental.

The lower layer was built more than a year ago. The upper layer was built about 3 months ago.


The 3 layers of terraces are shown here. The flowers’ roots should benefit from the decaying organic matter below the soil surface.

The stairs. My older sister who takes care of the flowers was very happy with the terraces I built for them. My mother who is already old and sickly enjoys watching the flowers.

My treehouse, July 2010

My treehouse is now more than 6 years old. It was built around December 2003 and was finished around March 2004. It is all-wood, 2-storeys high, slatted bamboo floor, originally cogon roof (now galvanized iron), and perched on a live mahogany tree.

The advantage of putting your house on a live tree is that the main “post” does not age or being attacked by termites; on the contrary, the main “post” gets stronger through time as the tree becomes bigger.

One disadvantage is that the tree is getting bigger and taller, and new branches are sprouting up inside the house.



And on the roof, new branches are rising too. These new branches + rising tree require regular repair on the roof, once every 2-3 years at least. That’s one reason why after 5 or 6 years, the original cogon roof has to be replaced by galvanized iron. The termites also do not stop from attacking and eating the cogon roof. They seem to "smell" the roof several feet below, from the base of the house.



And below, here’s how new the new “skin” of the tree would try to swallow a 3 x 8 inches wood.



One view of my treehouse, from the base up. The first floor of the house is not rising, the tree is getting bigger, and it causes some mis-alignment on the floor. The second floor is rising by perhaps 1/2 to 3/4 inch per year. But the roof is rising by about 2-4 inches a year.



Another view from the opposite side.



Side view, with the toilet, covered by slabs.



Farther view and the surrounding trees.



I’m proud of my treehouse. The only house I truly own. I sleep there once every 2 or 3 months.