Wednesday, April 25

Today's fieldtrip, organized by Brent Skura to go with his class, was to La Albarrada, an agricultural and technical training and experimental facility operated by the state government of Chiapas. We were first treated to an overly basic discussion of why trees are good for the earth, and then were fortunately handed over to a more interesting teacher, Dagoberto de León López, on the agricultural practices that they teach. The organization brings in people, free of charge in most cases, for two month training sessions. The agricultural training consists of eight modules, each a week long. About 20% of the training is study or theory, and the other 80% is the practical learning experience of working the farm.

Maestro Dagoberto explained the two emphases of the program: the integration of different aspects of agriculture into a sustainable system, and the development of techniques that can be easily applied by campesinos with few resources and few external materials available. The organization is also run in an integrated way: participants in the program work the fields and what is produced also feeds them during their stay. See Photo of Dagoberto explaining these issues to the class on the grass.

Another good example of the integrated nature of the program would concern the rabbits, whose feces are transformed into organic fertilizer and which are also eaten as meat. Once trained, campesino families can be presented with a breeding pair of rabbits to take advantage of the method. See Photo of Peggy talking to Dagoberto.

A good example of adjusting the technology to the resources available to campesinos involves growing oyster mushrooms. Dagoberto teaches techniques of growing the mushrooms on discarded organic waste like maize cobs with the kernels removed, or maize stalks: things that might normally just be burned. He also showed us a frame that can easily be used to provide the heat and darkness that mushrooms require, and discussed simple methods of keeping them moist so that they will fruit. When I asked how they seed the maize cobs with spores, he offered to show us, as some cobs were actually ready for this procedure, having been soaked previously for 24 hours in water with quicklime. He asked for a volunteer to participate and Andrés threw himself into the task (see photo). The spores have been commercially placed into sorghum seeds using holes made in the seeds with a needle. Andrés and Dagoberto each filled a plastic bag with seeded maize cobs. The bags had large squares cut out on each side over which material from surgical masks was taped, allowing the fungus to breathe without letting in insects that would devour it.

Dagoberto also showed us a compost pile and discussed methods of using the soil as well as the water runoff for fertilizers. with red wrigglers and talked about their mating and growth cycle. He talked about methods for separating these worms from soil one intends to use. He is quite funny, so he began by saying you should give them names and then call them. But he went on to note that the worms do not like the light, so one can make a pile of the soil and they will go down to the bottom, letting you take off the top. Another way is to put the vegetable waste they will be eating on another part of the soil and they will travel to it.

We also got to see raised fields, known popularly by the Nahuatl term "chinampa." Dagoberto showed us the route the water takes as it is brought from a river through canals to a series of graded fields and then returned to the river.

After the tour, the group retired to Tierra Dentro for lunch and a discussion of what had been learned.