Project Papaya V3.1 An Update

The 3rd batch 1st planting. The 3 Mas Solo, with fruits awaiting ripening.

Our 3rd batch of trial was started back in April and now is on the 8th month. As we plant in stages, we have tress in ranging from small to awaiting ripening. The last batch planted were in November. The 3 confirmed Mas Solos are awaiting ripening. From these 3 trees I was trace back approximately how many Mas Solo that we are having. Some of the characteristic that I had observed are, short height, sturdy fat trunks, and on the trunk where the leaves had fell off, it developed into an eye sharped marking in purple color.

2nd planting was close to our pond. The clay soil here is very hard and being a bulldozed ground, there were no top soil. We had quite a number of plants dying off, due to the drought. Some were replaced many times yet still not successful. There are only about 15 trees here, and of various stage of growth. I find that this the most challenging area as the ground and weather was at it most unfavorable condition. Even though it was close to the pond, the pond dried up during drought season.

3rd planting was at the most fertile ground, and close to the creek. Unfortunately as with the pond, it dried during drought. We have about 20 trees here and all of them are waiting to ripe. The trees have quite some fruits, but unfortunately due to the drought, quite a numbers are irregularly shaped and not fully developed. We shall most probably sell these off as green papaya or use the fruits for seeds. Most of the trees here are Mas Solo.

4th planting was done, inter-cropping with pumpkins. We had initial watering problem and many died during the drought. Here we ran into weeding management as there were pumpkins too. With the pumpkin harvested and out of the way, things got simpler. We did plenty replanting. This area is the largest and were split into 2 part, lower and upper. The lower section were planted first. The variety here are mostly from our local mother tree, and some maybe even Kampung variety. We may have up to about 200 trees here.

5th planting was done along the access road, just behind the row of Berangan banana. Again due to the drought, there were plenty replacement. Some of the trees here are Mas solo. After this planting, we continued to plant here and there, where we find any idle land, or land that is not fertile. As papaya can withstand 'hot' fertilizer. We use lots of chicken dungs on our papayas. We had also transferred close to 300 papayas into Parcel 1. Lately most of these are for replacement.

We had stopped propagating papayas at the moment as we had lots of unhealthy seedlings lately. Not sure if it's due to the seed source or nursery bed. Another reason is that we are waiting for the Mas Solo to ripe and propagate them. We hope the Mas Solo taste sweet and is accepted by the market. We hope that the fruits shall ripe soon, germinate and transplant just before the the dry season.

Powdery mildew.

Checked with the agriculture department the other day as they were running an incentive scheme for fruits & vegetable. Unfortunately we do not qualify. Looks like we shall have to do it on our own.

The initial 30 plants, the productivity has dropped and we has lesser harvest. We are getting lesser ripe fruits as we are harvesting green papayas too. Those that are irregularly shaped, we harvest it as green papaya. The pricing is only half the ripe papaya.

1 papaya tree were heavily infested by Powdery mildew. Had it washed down with fresh water, removing almost all of the Powdery mildew. Shall give it some fungicide soon.

Trunk of Mas Solo.

Supposedly to e non seasonal, I find that there is a growth period, and a flowering period, hence fruiting period. It's probably depending on the weather (temperature and rain). This affects our production, a period with fruits, and a period with no fruit. Am thinking if we can control the fruiting to regular basis. Maybe irrigation helps.

Stay tune for more updates.

Trunk of the normal Papaya.

 

Failed Grafting

Came back to my farm on the 3rd December 2012, after attending MAHA 2012 and spent some time home with my family. Finished checking on all my grafting, Avocado, Jackfruit and Rubber trees.

My blistered hand, after a week of treatment with moisturizer.

Avocado, I did about 140 plants. I now have 20 plants that I feel is good. 40 plants that is budding and 20 plants on a 'maybe'. Those that I feel is good, I've loosen the grafting tapes and plastic bags. The budding and 'maybe' plants, I had remove the tie on the plastic bag, hoping to reduce the humidity. Removed weeds and those unwanted buds on the rootstock. This is to "force" the grafted buds to grow.

For those failed plants, I had put them aside. I find that maybe half of them can be reused, some need time to regrow and some totally 'dead'. I consider this as another failed run as I am targeting a 85% successive rate.

The failed Avocados.

Jackfruit, I did about 90 plants. Have 10 budding, and 4 'maybe'. I thought Jackfruit was the 'easier' one and I was totally wrong. Maybe it's due to the latex?

From the failed plants, I find that most of the scion dried and even rotted. Am still trying to diagnose what went wrong. Too young  rootstock? Wrong Technique? Bad scion? Too much tension on the grafting tape? From the failed plants I had quite a high numbers totally 'dead'. Another failed run.

The failed Jackfruits & Rubber trees.

Rubber trees. I did 6 of them, all failed. I tried 2 side veneer, 1 T-bud and 2 bark graft. This maybe be most probably due to the not so fresh scion. The scion was taken from our Parcel 3 and was left for a day ( water soak) before grafting. There were no damage to all the 6 plants, other than the part on the graft not "taking".

Guess I on the next coming week, shall savage the failed Avocado first as I feel that I have improvement on the Avocado.

Stay tune for more updates.

MAHA 2012 / A Typical Trip Home.

MAHA 2012

An Apps to identify the Rubber Tree Clone.

Malaysian Agriculture, Horticulture and Agro-tourism 2012.

Attended this exposition as it’s only held once in 2 years. On the previous visit back in 2010, I was just too fresh and didn’t know what to look for. 

A typical trip for me to Kuala Lumpur incur a long traveling time. Have to wake up early, like 5.30 am. Make my way to town, take the first express bus at 7.00 am. Another bus is at 8, but to be on the safe side, I usually takes the 1^st trip as I do not want to miss my flight. It takes about 3 hours for the express bus to go to the city Kota Kinabalu from Keningau. The airport is along the traveling route before the city and I usually arrange with the driver to drop me off at the nearest bus stop. The airport in Kota Kinabalu has 2 sides, KKIA, Kota Kinabalu International Airport and LCT Tg. Aru, Low Cost Terminal Tanjung Aru. Both involve a walk from the main road. KKIA being closer to the main road, it’s just a 10 minutes’ walk. LCT Tg. Aru is much further from the main road, a longer 30 minutes’ walk. Tanjung Aru town is along the route and I usually stop there for a break as most of the time I’m early. Have a rest, a cup of tea before proceeding.

Contract Farming.

Waiting time at the airport is also quite long, advance check-in like 45 minutes before the gate close, custom clearance, waiting to board. Being air conditioned, it’s still acceptable. My flight is usually in the afternoon, 2.00 pm. Flight time is about 2 hours 45 minutes. As usual, to disembark takes about 45 minutes.

A 15 minutes walk to express bus station to catch a bus to the city. If I miss the bus, then I shall have to wait for another half hour. Usually with the after office hours rush, a normal 1 hour 15 minutes journey can at times get extended to 2 and a half if it rain. From the city in Kuala Lumpur, I take the LRT train home. Arrange for a pick-up at the nearest LRT station. By the time I reach home, it most probably about 7.30 pm.

Attended Maha 2012 the next morning, it open at 10.00 am. Parking was a mess as we were given the run about to the assigned car park. A short 10 minutes’ walk took care of that. Started with Hall A, B then C. It then started to rain. I only manage to visit a few booths that interest me. I find that most of the booths are geared towards the public, rather than commercial farming. Also I find quite a large numbers of exhibitor that is not that relevant. I see booths selling irrelevant books, clothing, food, and even ladies accessories.

As other halls are quite far from these, open concept and with the rain, I just finish off the agro-bazaar, bought some durians and went off. This trip felt a bit disappointed.

Manage to visit the bigger exhibit, mainly Government establishment. Some of the stuff that interest me is a company incorporating solar energy to farming and Post harvesting management. Manage to speak to a Roselle manufacture and there may be a lead for supplying / contract framing. The problem for me is that our farm is in Sabah and their facility is in Peninsular.  Bought some publications off MARDI and collected some catalogs hopping that these maybe be of use to me.

Solar powered insect zapper.

Coating for post harvesting.

Hydroponic

Rain guard system.

Hope the next exhibition is better.

Grafting

Am doing some trial on fruit trees and in order to shorten the incubation time to fruiting, I have to look into grafting. Grafting can shortens the fruiting time to about 3 1/2 years as it takes on the traits of the mother tree (scion) which is already fruiting. Am doing some trials on grafting Avocado and Jack fruit seedling as these are seedling that I have germinated at the moment. I do not have any grafting experience and I started off just with some basic research on the internet.

Bought some tools such as pruning scissors ($18.00), grafting knife ($4.50) and some grafting tapes ($16.00)

Started my first grafting on a Jack fruit seedling back in August. Then tried grafting on rubber and avocado seedlings. These were down just to get some feel on grafting. I was figuring that it should not be too difficult as I see plenty people doing it when I bought my rubber seedlings rom Lembaga Getah nursery. There were lots of doubts especially when I snip off the top of the rootstock. Found it rather difficult as things are always not as ideal like the diagrams / instruction. My hands were also to 'hard' to do this fragile grafting, and my eye sight is also not sharp. Grafting was progressing very slowly. There were also my share of cuts, on my hands skin breaking due to pulling (tension) of the grafting tape. At night I feel muscle pain on my arms & palms.

 Finally manged about 20 grafting. Left these for about 3 weeks as I was away from my farm, on vacation. Come back and none was successful. Was thinking, well it is the first time.

 Did a second batch of about 60 seedlings on September, then went on vacation. Came back and was very happy as the grafted part is still alive. Thinking that it did not dried up after 2 weeks, it must then be growing. Estimated that I had a 65% successful rate, real good as it was only my second attempt.

 

  I released the grafting tape, thinking that it shall grow faster / better without it. It was a big mistake, as once release, lots of the graft come loose and as they started to dry up and wrinkle over a period of just a couple of days. I then tied back some of the grafts, but was already too late.











Ended up with lots of spoiled seedlings. As my grafting position isn't too low, I guess I can still try again on these seedlings.



Did further reading and find that cleft and side/modified veneer grafting should be easier for Avocado. Also since the weather is getting hotter, I read that protecting the graft with a bag, shall increase the humidity and prevent dehydration, allowing the budding to grow fast.

My mobile grafting station is a very simple set up. A stump of wood as a stool, which can swivel (my buttock). Tools, drinking water, hand phone for music entertainment, a pail of water to keep the scion fresh. All of these can be shifted when the sun change direction. A normal day, I shift about 3 times.

This time, I waited and saw buds starting out. Yes, this is definitely a bud and it is growing. I shall not make the same mistake that I did by removing the grafting tape. I watched it for 2 days, and removed the plastic as I was thinking that too high a humidity, it may rot the bud. It was big mistake number 2. All of the buds start to dry off and died.Most probably due to sudden dehydration. Again another case of over anxious.

Again what a waste. Have to re-do again, and hopefully the rootstock can still be used. I cover back some of the Jackfruit graft and hope that it shall grow. Been very busy finishing off those that can be grafted (still not very sure when to graft). Shall be away again, attending MAHA 2012 on the 22nd December.

Looking back from where I started, my confidence and experience had grown. There were a couple of times, I though of giving up, but because of the difference in fruiting time, I force myself to continue. I estimate that I had put in about 150 grafts effort, mostly re-dos, some up to 4 times on a seedling. Also with the next couple of projects on fruits and rubber trees, all these need to be grafted. The next in line shall be Soursop and lime.

Hope that when I come back after MAHA 2012, I can see good results of my effort.

Stay tune for more updates, MAHA 2012.

Plantation Fire Aftermath.

Before the fire.

Here are the pictures showing before and after the fire. We had planned to clear this section as there is a water source, thinking that we could use this area to plant some fruit trees. This section was too steep and the bulldozer could not terrace it when we started clearing the land. Had already cleared a section manually, slashing with machete.

After the fire, we went back to check if the fire had totally extinguished. Another check was done about 4 weeks later, after my vacation. We find that the trunk is starting to rot, with insects inside the rotting bark. The bark had dried off and is peeling off the trunk.

The dying trunk. With the trunk damaged, I don't think we can do any tapping here. We then made a decision to cut off the trunk and leave a stump of about 2 feet. We hope that the roots had not die off and hope to have new growth at the base. Should this happen, then we may have a totally new trunk which we may tap.

 We then saw off the the trunk and did a stock take, total 150 trees affected.

Out of the 150 trees, there are 10 of them which I think are still healthy.

After much consideration, I made a decision to replant the affected trees, as the earlier we replant, then earlier it shall grow.

Bought a truck load of seedlings from TG Agriculture, a nursery producing rubber seedlings. Since the clone RRIM 3001, nicknamed Clone 1Malaysia is very readily available in Sabah yet, our friend suggested we take the clone PB 350, which is a clone good for latex & lumber. It's easily identified by the "round" shape leaves. Manage to load 208 plants into our truck.
Characteristic of PB 350
 Recommended for both latex and timber production. Potential latex production is up to 1,663kg per hectare per year. 1.16 cubic metre of wood volume per tree after 19 years of planting. Resistance to wind damage, pink disease (Corticium salmonicolor), Corynespora leaf disease is good, Oidium and Colletotrichum leaf disease are average. Average bark. Colour of latex white.
Would sure love to get some Clone RRIM3001 in the future as the  specification is even higher.







Since we have some extra, we started to plant those at the new terrace in Parcel 3 and Parcel 2. By the time we were about to plant at the affected area, to our delight, we found some stumps had actually rejuvenated. We then went about checking other stumps, and those that had no signs, we try puncturing the stump slight beneath the ground level. Latex is still available, a definite sign that the roots are still alive.
 Shall leave these and monitor in a month's time. Hopefully by then the new growth is mature enough. We then have to prune it to a single stem. Let's hope that these shall grow back in the shortest time possible.

As for the new seedlings, we shall transfer and plant these in Parcel 6.

Do stay tune for more updates.

Project Jackfruit.

Looking into planting of Jack fruit trees. As there are 2 matured trees at our little farm, propagating should not be a problem. We started by collecting the seeds and germinating it on raised beds. I find that it germinate better with the seeds soaked for a couple of hours and planted in about 3 cm deep. The soil help to moist the seed, preventing it from drying up. Should the seeds dried up, it no longer can germinate.

I transfer it as soon as it germinate (once it reached more than 3 cm). The roots are deep and fragile. We carefully dig it up without damaging the roots. The survival rate is usually good. I guess we have more than 50 seedlings now.

Grafting the the seedling is difficult as there are latex once the stem is cut. Tried grafting on 3 trees, but had not been successful yet. I read that Cleft grafting and modify side veneer is more appropriate for Jack fruits trees. Cleft grafting give a very strong union and can withstand strong wind. Need to work on my grafting technique as I'm not getting it right yet. More on my learning of grafting on another post.

Some of the seedling should be right for grafting. It is suggested to be "pencil" thick, so I guess maybe 1.5 cm. Facing lots of obstacle in grafting due to my in-experience and learning through read ups and you-tube on the internet. Also the fear factor of damaging the root-stock.

The newer seedlings. Hopefully we could germinate many seedling, graft it then transfer to the rubber plantation, Parcel 1, 2, 3 and 6. Planning to plant it at the ridge and road sides. Jack fruit having tapper and deep roots should be able to withstand the strong wind. 

Sugar Cane

We are doing some trials with sugar cane. As I read that it grows well close to water. Have a friend growing this sugar cane on top of the hill in Palm oil plantation, for own consumption. It is growing well and lots of mature cane dying off as he can't consume that much. Took some back. Am testing these close to our pool as we do have quite a long stretch of sandy / rocky area at parcel 6, 3 and 2.

Was suppose to plant these cutting horizontally. The 1st batch did not grow. Second batch we tried planting it vertical and slanting. These grew. The slanting ones have more shoots.

Spoke with a couple of my contacts and the only market that I found till now is to the Sugar Cane juice sellers. Shall try to find more market in the mean time.

Plantation Fire

We had a plantation fire on September. Had never even dream of this happening to us, but it did.
We were suppose to go into Parcel 2 to do some weed management. Started to have a bad feeling since morning. As we reached Parcel 2, our access road was blocked by the bulldozer, that is clearing some of our land and our neighbor's. As our pump and water tanks are arranged in the pick-up truck, we couldn't proceed to do our work. We waited till about 10.00 a.m. yet the bulldozer driver did not arrived. We figure that they may be off for the day. We cleared the entrance to Parcel 3with parangs, then proceed back to Parcel 1. We took an early lunch break as it was already 11.30 a.m.

Was figuring since we were already at our plantation which is 29 km from town, might as well do some work before we head back to town. Decided to break up into two teams in Parcel 3, send 1 team to clear off some bushes on the slope and 1 team to fill up the water tank so that we can use the water to do weed management. I was with the team filling water. After we did 1 run and as we were going down hill to fill water at the stream, we saw some heavy smoke close to the area where the other team was suppose to clear. As we were approaching, one of our helpers requested us to bring some water to the fire area. We immediately rushed down to the stream and set up to pump water.

Unfortunately the water pump could not start. Took me about 15 minutes to trouble shoot and rectify. The fault was due to the loosed plug head connector. This may had got loosed as we sped down the hill and also the carburetor of the water pump had over flow. Got the pump started and rush back to the fire area. One of our neighbor had came to help. We immediately set up our pump and got to work. Initially all of us are stunned and did not know what to do.  After a short while, we accessed the situation and decided to start with the left and we were banking on the access road on the right as well as top of the hill, which we hope shall act as a barrier to stop the spreading. The fire was spreading fast and wide, due to the wind, which was changing direction a couple of times.

The fire was fueled by the dried up weeds and bushes. We could not get very close. We then adjusted our high pressure to pump at a very high pressure so that we can spray at a distance. We manage to control the fire and decided to move to the right, the access road. As the fire was about to subside, the wind changed direct again and the initial spot was back on fire again. We rush back and put out the fire. This time we dosed the the area and also try to fully clear off the flame as the fire was under control on the right due to the road acting as a fire barrier.

Finally we finish off the left and move back to the right to clear off the remaining flame. The fire had subsided as it had ran out of fuel to burn. We also tried to put out the flame, burning underground, due to the buried wood.

As the day was getting dark, we had to call it a day. Left 2 of our helpers over night on site to monitor the flame.

The aftermath of the plantation fire.

Went in to check a 3 days latter. Seems to have subsided. A rough estimate counts about 460 trees affected.
 Went to inspect the tress closely and find that the tress did not burn up, but experienced flash burn and the leaves burnt up. I think the trunks are still okay and hope that they can rejuvenate.






Shall have another inspection on the burnt area soon, as I had just came back from my vacation. Stay tune for more updates.

A Short Break In Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh & Mui Ne

Ocean's Republic.

Took another break in Vietnam, one of my favorite destination. I like this place mainly because of the food & people. Spent 10 days there. Our initial plan was to spent some time at the beaches, but was cut short and moved back to Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) as the Typhoon Geami approached. We were at Mui Ne beach, Phant Thiet during the time when it strike, so had to cut off our trip to Nha Trang, and move back to Ho Chi Minh. Our neighbor, staying at the same guesthouse Mui Ne Hill 2 was diverted back from Nha Trang to Mui Ne after half a day's journey.
Mui Ne, Phan Thiet area is fun and is good for a

Mui Ne Hills.

short visit. The only dislike is the slow bus journey. It takes slightly more than 6 hours to reach Mui Ne from Ho Chi Minh. Due to the long journey, we spend 3 days there. Some of the eating places we visited were Ocean's Republic, Red & Blue & Hoang Vu.

Hives of activities at the fishing village.

The fishing village was full of activities in the morning. Fisherman bringing in their catches of the day.

White Sand Dune.

We visited the White Sand Dune, it was very hot in the afternoon. Had some fun time there doing sand sliding. As this is the first time, we ended up having sands all over. The sans here is extremely fine.

Kite Surfing.

Kite surfing is getting popular in Mui Ne. A couple of coaching school had spruce up on the beach. It looks fun watching these guys kite surf.











Spent a couple of days back in Ho Chi Minh. Most of the time we went searching for good food, from fine dinning to street food. Manage to find a VND 6,000 Tiger draft. La Villa French Restaurant tops the list. We had a marvelous dinner. the food was fantastic, especially the dessert. We again visited Fanny Ice Cream which we feel that it taste better in Ho Chi Minh than in Hanoi. This being the last vacation for me this year and it's back to work from now (in a few days' time).