It is early June and the buzz going around among
the few farmers who are still cultivating rice is – “Kai Nattie / Machine
Nattie?”
Nattie
means Transplant and the question is “Do you plan to get the rice transplanted
manually – by hand – Kai Nattie OR do
you plan to hire a Rice Transplant Machine? The locals have mixed opinions on
the Machine transplanting – but I for one was keen on doing it this way. It saves a tremendous amount of time and
money.
The seed
sowing method is different for Machine transplanting and that is how the
discussions and questions start in June when seed sowing is to be done. For those of you who have not read my earlier
blog posts, the nursery preparation for manual transplanting is linked here.
So the difference starts with preparing the soil
in which the seeds are to be planted.
You have to mix the soil with the compost and then sieve the mixture. There should be no stones or pebbles in the
mixture else the machine gets jammed.
So I
decided to have the rice nursery on the terrace as it would also be safe from
the cows/wild boars and peacocks!
A set of 50 plastic trays was purchased. My farm hand Yogesh brought a few basket loads of fine soil and compost up to the upper room and a large net for sieving the mixture. I started mixing the damp compost and the soil- it was similar to making pastry dough – you have to get it all crumbly first – no lumps. The netting did a good job of sieving the mixture and soon the trays were all filled and levelled.
A prayer in my heart and I started sprinkling the seeds on the trays.
Rice germinates very easily and there is no need to cover the seeds with another layer of soil. Hay is laid evenly over the seeds and then a generous sprinkling of water. The very next day I could see the sprouts and the third day the rice saplings had pushed the hay up by an inch.
A week later the rice saplings were ready to be exposed to the sun and I removed the hay gently.
A carpet of green adorned the terrace!
Just a
regular watering was all that it needed.
And July first week, the plants were ready for transplanting.
The rice
transplanting machine is a fascinating one!
After the field was ploughed and muddled up with a 2 to 3 inch deep
water level, the machine was brought in.
A note about where the machine comes from :
We have a
local “Dharmasthal Sangha” which has most
of the modern machines required for farming.
They let out this equipment for a very reasonable hourly rate and the
trained operator brings the machine to your farm. He starts the timer when he starts the work and charges you
for the total time that the machine was used on your land! Amazing isn’t it? (You can read more about this here https://skdrdpindia.org/agriculture/chsc/)
We had already rolled up the ‘Mats of Paddy saplings’ out of the trays in which they were planted.
They rolled mats were then carried out to the paddy farm. Several mats are unrolled and placed on an angular tilted frame and operator sets off pushing the machine. It trundles along and a set of hooks pulls out clumps of the saplings and plants them into the slush as it moves on.
It briskly covers the length of the field, is turned and then brought back to plant the next
several lines of saplings. The whole
process of transplantation which would have taken 8 to 10 labourers a whole
day, gets done in an hour and a half!
After one
year of not planting anything and then one year of a failed crop – due to
destruction by the wild boars, I hope this time things are better.
I plan on
getting an electric fence to protect the crop from boars. I hope the Jeevamruth works its magic and
pray for a decent harvest.
