CLOSE TO NATURE

CLOSE TO NATURE

    In the era of modern tech and discoveries, the need to rediscover us has increased, so has the deterioration of nature. Sustainable development is the correct step to take towards protecting nature, We often forget the surrounding habitats when we think of development .We have wrecked enough damage to the delicate balance of environment by ignoring the fact that without it's help any possible progress is not possible . These flaws are the reason why we begin to fear the possible bad outcomes of nature like bigger problems like global heating and unexpected natural disasters                                                                                                                

    Most of the people blame industries as the major pollutants and foes of the environment, but everyone is to fault, as even in every day life, pollution is caused mostly, because of usage of plastics which eventually end up in  water bodies and  increased utilization of vehicles. We  keep disregarding the priorities to nature that each person must uphold. World level conferences which are held only for namesake does not help in implementing something new. Only speeches about preserving the environment is not enough, conservative measures should be executed rather than be told. So the responsibility is our's to take action to save our habitat, the earth                                                                                                

    In this New Year 2022, we should pledge to protect the trees and not to disrupt nature in any way .This could be the only way we can take step towards development. when we look after nature it takes care of us .  

               In bird sanctuaries, the ecological cycle can be noticed more easily. many birds from variably different locations come there during breeding seasons, but many breeding grounds have been turned into wastelands, Thus reducing the the population of the expected groups of birds.These birds have their own ways of helping out the habitat.They help in the maintenance of biodiversity and also are great bio-indicators which point out the status of our environment.                                

The natural ecological balance in wetlands:

Mangifera indica(Mango)

                   Mango is one of the most important and also our national fruit. It has more than 100 varieties. India is the highest mango producing country. It has grown over 1.23 million hectares and nearly 11 million tonnes of fruits. The fruits are very favorite among people because of its taste and fragrance. So it is considered as a king of fruits and also best fruit in commercial market. World wide it grown as commercially around 80 countries. Out of this India ranks first in the production as well as area.
                  It can be cultivated wide range of soils and climatic conditions. It is very easy to cultivate. Mango has a good source of vitamin A and vitamin C.

Mango flowers in intermediate time

MANGO FLOWERS

MANGO

     Mango tree management is very important to achieve maximum profit in this cultivation. It depends on selection of superior varieties along with proper tree management. Some of the varieties grown in India are: Bangalora(kilimuzhu), Alphonsa, Banganpalli, Neelam, Himsagar, Kesar,  Kishen Bhog, Langra. Apart from that recently many hybrids released from agricultural universities.Some of them are Arka Aruna, Arka Anmol, Mallika, Amrapali etc. Accordng to Tamilnadu conditions, Bangalora is the good variety for better yield.

      There are many different techniques also followed to improve the yield in mango cultivation. One of the technique is ultra high density planting (UHDP). Generally the space between the trees are recommended  10m*10m, but in UHDP they recommend only 4.5m*4.5m. In this method we can plant nearly 895 plants per acre. At this technique, its growth is also controlled. In this technique, the trees are not allowed to grow beyond two metre so that we can manage the tree from diseases and pests. It is also easy to pluck fruits.

                                                          

                               

India - Climatic Seasons

 India - Weather:

      As per the Indian Metrological Department, there are four seasons in India.

1. Winter Season(January-Febraury)
   December and January are coldest months which is between 10-15°C.

2. Pre-monsoon season - Summer(April to June)

Rain fall of pre-monsoon Season - IMD

3. Rainy season - South west summer monsoon (June to September)
                India gets most of the rain during this season.

4. Post-monsoon season- NorthEast monsoon season(October to December)
         South india gets the most of the rain in the North east monsoon.

 

Ornamental Flowers

Some of the  ornamental  flowers ,

                                                     

Flowers

Flowers we have seen in common but looking very pretty ., here some of  the flowers,

Rose

Rose

Bean

Periwinkle

Abutilon indicum (Thuthi)

Bhindi(Okra/Lady's finger)

Cucumber

Gerbera

Jasmine

Green Manures

Green manures are excellent source of nitrogen, even more micro nutrients. It is low cost manuring so it called as poor farmer's manure. It enhances the soil structure and organic matter in the soil. Excellent remedy for the alkaline and saline soils. It improves the soil fertility. It also prevents the nitrogen from soil erosion. It improves the soil aeration and organic matter content. It improves the soil structure. It stimulates the growth of beneficial microbes and other soil organisms. Green manures are playing effective tool in controlling weeds.

Other objectives of green manures:
It can be used as a catch crops, shade crops, forage, cover crops. So it has the multipurpose uses.

Types of green manuring:
1.Green leaf manuring crops
2.Green manuring in situ crops

Green leaf manuring crops:
It is raised in other location and collected the green biomass and added in to the soil. They have to be incorporated in the soil by fine ploughing. The crops should be cutted during the flowering stage. Some of the green leaf manure crops are ,

  1. Pongamia glabra (Pungam)
  2. Tephrosia perpuria
  3. Calotropis gigantia (Erukku)
  4. Gliricidia maculata
  5. Ipomea carnea
  6. Azadirachta indica (Neem)
  7. Leucaena leucocephala (Subabul)
  8. Cassia pistula
  9. Indigofera teysmannii

Calotropis gigantia (Erukku)

Tephrosia perpuria(Wild indigo)

Health Benefits of Brown Rice

Many of us thought Brown rice is nothing but the brown colored different variety rice. But brown rice is unpolished rice or unmilled rice or partially milled rice. Nothing but it is a whole grain. Every rice grain has an outer layer called husk. The husk is removed in both the white and brown rices. Apart from the husk, the thin brownish layer called bran is there. In white rice, the brown layer is removed during the polishing process. But in the brown rice it is not removed, only top stiff layer is removed. All the nutrients vanished in the polishing the grains. Only starch remaining in the white rice.

Paddy(Before milled )

Brown Rice

Nutritional values of Brown Rice:
Brown rice has a low Glycemic index compared to white rice. So it reduces the risks of  diabetics and also cardiovascular diseases. It controls the blood pressure levels and reduces the constipation. This is the good reason for medical experts stressed to eat the brown rice instead of white rice.

Parthenium Weed (Parthenium hysterophorus)

Parthenium is a invasive and hazardous weed which is spreading alarming rate in India.  Its germinating is faster and each plant can produce 25000 seeds. It spread by humans, animals and wind. It is affecting the crop production, livestock and humans. It contain the toxic material parthenin which cause dermatitis and respiratory problem in humans. It can grow in wide range of areas such as road side, forests, waste land, crop field etc. and also can grow in all climatic conditions.Even in metro cities also spread all over. It can grow very aggressively and spread in vast areas very quickly.

PartheniumWeed

Second National Conference - Antimicrobial Resistance : A Cause for Global Concern

2nd National Conference on Antimicrobial Resistance - A Cause for Global Concern.

Date: 6th to 8th February 2012. 

Venue: Allahabad,India.
       
        The  Conference is  Organized by 'The Department of Microbiology & Fermentation Technology, Sam Higginbottom Institute of Agriculture, Technology & Sciences, Deemed-to-be-University', Allahabad .


For further details and registration:
NCAR

Mr.Narendra Modi's great idea on saving water

      The honorable chief minister of Gujarat Mr.Narendra Modi blogged about one good idea for saving water in long time ago. Again I shared the idea to all people because of the importance of that information. I will thank for the Chief minister for this information sharing.

     Today water scarcity is the major problem in many areas. Saving water is important compared to saving money for future generations. We have to make the green environment. For that this is the great solution in drought prone areas.

       

     

      Take a unglazed clay pot and kept it in underground, along with roots of a small plant. Don't put any holes in the pot, just place it in the soil. Then fill the pot with waste water collected from the kitchen. Need not watering for one week to that plant. It serve as the natural drip irrigation. Nowadays we are going a drip irrigation for saving water in the fields, this idea will help to utilize the waste

water to grow gardens.

For more details:
A Daughter,A Tree,A Teacher

Goat Farming

       Agriculture and allied activities support livelihoods of nearly 70 percent of India’s rural population. In recent years, land based livelihoods of small and marginal farmers are increasingly becoming unsustainable, since their land has not been able to support the family’s food requirements. As a result, rural households are forced to look at alternative means for supplementing their livelihoods.
Apart from farm activities, farm community needs extra income from other occupations. From this they can earn much more income compared to other sectors. They are engaged with these activities when they are in adverse conditions.i.e time not suitable for farming like more drought and flood conditions. That time, this income will save their family needs and savings.

There are many non farm occupations are there like goat farming, mushroom cultivation, emu farming, silkworm culture, poultry farming, vermi compost making etc..,

Goat farming:
          Goat is known as ‘Poor man’s cow’ in India and is a very important occupation in dry land farming system. Suitable for small and marginal  and landless laborers. It needs less grazing lands and initial investment is low.Risk of goat farming is less compared to other livestocks species. It is a economically viable sector to the rural people. They are resistant to diseases. In a short period we can get more revenue.

 

Semi intensive method

Amla Tree - Nellikai, Phyllanthus Embilca (Emblica offcinalis)

Amla(Aonla)  is a indian gooseberry native to India. Amla has a high medicinal and Ayuervedic properties. The fruits have the great source of vitamin C. A small fruit of amla is equal to 2 oranges in terms of vitamin C content. It is used as a good liver tonic in Ayurveda medicines. Apart from medicines the fruit juice extract is used in shampoo preparations and oil, hair dyes. It is also a very important ingredient in the famous Chyavanaprash, and a constituent of Triphala (three fruits) powder. It helps the digestion, prevent the dysentery, cleanses the liver. The dried fruit powder used in a cosmetic sectors as a removing age spots. It also reduces the blood sugar level. So over all it has the highly medicinal values. Obviously the plant have a greater demand nowadays.

Amla Fruit

Cultivation methods:
                              
Soil and climate:
           Good fertile and loamy soil is suitable for cultivation. Sandy soils also recommended. Water logged conditions not suitable .There are some good hybrid varieties such as Banarasi, Chakaiya, Kanchan, Krishna, NA6. Black and red soils also suitable for cultivation. The tree can grown in dry regions also.

Land preparation:
            Early period of monsoon is good time of planting. During May to june is best time for land preparations. First the field should be well ploughed and levelled. With the distance of  7-10m distance of pit digged with the depth of 1 cubic meter. Pit was exposed to sunlight for 20 days, then filled with 15 kg of FYM(farm yard manure) .

Gloriosa superpa(Glory lily, kanvazhi/kalappai kilangu)

Gloriosa superpa is one of the medicinal plant grown as a commercial crop and will give good returns. NABARD is providing the loans around 80-90% for cost of cultivation for it.Among the medicinal crops it gives more returns like cash crops.
Other names: Kalihari, Glory Lily, Flame lily.

Gloriosa

General information:
                    It is an annual climbing perennial herb with tuberous roots. Growing between 3.5 to 6 m in length. Tubers and seeds contain colchicine, isoperlolyrine and related tropolane alkaloids, sitosterol and its glucoside, 2-hydroxy 6-methoxy benzoic acid.Flower’s contain Luteolin, its Glucoside, N-Formyl-de-Me-colchicine, its Glucoside and 2-de-Me-colchicine. The colchicine content varies from 0.15 to 0.3% in the tubers and 0.7 % to 0.9% in the seeds.

National Conference - Changing Scenario of Food Science, Technology and Agricultural Products

National Conference on
“Changing Scenario of Food Science, Technology and Agricultural Products”

Date:    November 11-12, 2011

Venue: JHANSI, UTTAR PRADESH, India

For further details visit,
http://iftbu.org/seminar.htm

Cocoa Tree Plantation (Theobroma cacao)

Cocoa is one of the important cash crop which fetches good revenue for small farmers. Currently India is importing 40% of its need.  Its demand in India is increasing 15% annually. Cadbury India, Jindal Cocoa, Amul, Campco are encouraging cultivation in India. It is sensitive to direct sun light, so it is cultivated mainly inter-crop with coconut or arecanut trees and  make additional revenues. In India, mainly South India is cultivated with it. Also Gmelina Arborea ( Kumil, White teak, Gamar) can be used as shade.

Varieties:
Popular commercial varieties are Criollo and  Forestero.  Trinitario is hybrid of  Criollo and  Forestero.
Other varieties are Amelonado and Amazon.

Gmelina Arborea( Kumil , Sagwan) Pictures

9 month old - Gmelina Plantation

Karnataka Global Agribusiness And Food Processing Summit 2011

Karnataka - Global Agribusiness & Food Processing Summit 2011

Venue:
           Bangalore International Exhibition centre,
           10 th Mile, Tumkur road, Madavara Post,
           Dasansapura Hobli , Bangalore - 562123
         

Date: 1st and 2nd December 2011

Registration at: http://www.bounteouskarnataka.com/register-form.htm

Live natural and be healthy - II

1.Wrightia antidysentrica(Snow flake,Milky way, veppala maram): We afraid of fruits because of ripening methods. Especially banana, sappota, mango fruits. For making profit easily majority of the fruit vendors using calcium carbides for ripening the fruits. Even very raw fruits also ripened with in one night by using the calcium carbide. Government also taking necessary steps to prevent this. But they cant control fully because of more needs of fruits. But people should have think it off. It creates more health problems like vomiting, dysentery etc. If we use regularly means we can lead to heavy health problems also. For that we can the traditional ripening methods. It is very easy and no harmful effects also. Use snow lake leaves for ripening the fruits especially bananas. Bunches of banana kept in a sac and put snow flake leaves means it can ripe with in two days. It gives too good taste. It can be used all fruits ripening also. This plant also used in veterinary medicines particularly for cattle.

Live natural and be healthy

    Nowadays all people running behind the organic products for the name-sake and afraid of health hazards. But we are neglecting our local plants that can be raised in any adverse conditions and without using any in-organic materials. Those crops we would have seen very frequently but we are not aware of the benefits. Some of the useful plants are:

Monthan Banana

1. Monthan banana:
This varieties almost gone in cities. Rarely used in villages, but it has more medicinal values. It is mainly used for reducing heat in our body system. Monthan fruit is used for chicken-pox patients. It helps to reduce the fever and heat level. Taste also too good compared to other varieties.

Gold Euphoria

Gold is moving up higher and higher on euphoria. The rupee's depreciation against dollar and uncertainty in europe region pushing the gold higher in the indian market.

Why gold is rising when inflation is high? Because of the fear of losing the currency value and more defaults.



Gold Price(10 gram pure) has reached Rs.28000 in our market and corrected from there.
Is still gold has some value for investment? Gold price will soften once European crisis is resolved. There is lot of volatility  because of the that. So those who want to invest in gold phyical/etf , can wait some more time for correction to Rs.23000 levels.

Happy Investing.