Meet the “black horse” of the farm: Zone Sasha. This section of the farm at a far-flung corner is at the lowest point of the entire 2-acres. Due to its geographic location, it’s swampy, or at least used to be. In fact, 5 years ago, this area was a wetland. However, tonnes of sand and silt have been washed down this area over the years due to some unscrupulous development and an illegal squatter up the hill, resulting in an increase of soil level. In short, this is a very difficult and challenging terrain to work with resulting it being “abandoned” for quite some time until now.
I’ve recently cleared the area to make way for fence works and opening up an access road as I would also need to put up a gate to secure it. This exercise has indeed revealed a clearer picture of the potential this area holds.
I’ve found edible wild ferns (paku pakis, as confirmed by locals and indigenous people who have been harvesting it for the past 5 years) that can fetch a very good price. I’ve relocated some to be intensively cultivated by a future thick wall (filter) to be built which would hold back incoming sand/silt.
This area can also hold 2 medium size ponds on a gentle gradient (for a cascading water flow), a bog that would readily welcome taro and kangkong, a meandering small earth drain for even more water-loving edibles, and multiple micro tributaries forming intersections that would be ideal for banana circles. How’s that for a productive landscape that would have easily been deemed as “degraded and poor” land?
In short, every landscape feature serves a purpose in the holistic view of permaculture farming.
