As the Corn Grows...
Almost ready to harvest my parcel of corn.
Here, insects are collecting pollen for their hives. This is of no help to the wind-pollinated corn. Perhaps the wasps and bees reduce the presence of other, more harmful pests? Either way, the corn is producing.
Some stigmas happy to have met the pollen of another lucky plant:
As Edlin works her parcel of Frijol (beans) in the foreground, check out my Maíz in the background. Notice the gradation of growth, which is due to the multiple levels of fertilizer I have used as part of my experiment.
posted by AdamSoup @ 8:34 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
Looks like some of the corn is almost ready to harvest. What happens to all the produce, does EARTH use it?
What kinds of fertilizer are you using? The higher corn is the most fertilized I assume? Is it chemical or natural? How is the fertilizer harmfull to people and/or the corn and/or the envirnoment? And how does EARTH feel about the use of such things???? I would have thought they'd be totally anti-pesticides as an environmentalist organization. Or is that much difference just from natural pesticides? Facinating stuff!
-Janet
To answer your questions...
The produce from this class generally belongs to the students that produced it, but some students give their harvest to the cafeteria. On the last day of class, we BBQ'ed a lot of the corn along with a few jalapeño peppers (good with lime and salt but extrememly spicy).
EARTH has other crops on campus, for example pimiento (black pepper) and bananas that it sells commercially.
About fertilizerz and pesticides... Well, EARTH's environmentalism is one of slower, institutionalized progress than it is a radical all-or nothing ideology. Originally the place was a very typical agronomy school which focused far more on the business and efficiency of agriculture than it did on environmental impact.
That said, the place has come a long way and looks like it's moving even faster these days to strengthen its environmental education.
In class, my project involved the use of different levels of standard 10-30-10 chemical fertilizer without pesticides. Other students investigated organics, but the projects were, to some extent, predetermined. I think these exercises are viewed as a means of giving first-year students general experience before teaching them the specifics of organic agriculture and integrated pest management, topics which come up in later years.
The corn on the far right of the photo was fertilized twice. One issue with my experiment was the possibility of the fertilizers running off. The week after I fertilized, there was an almost constant downpour of rain. Being that the 10-30-10 I used was point-applied, rather than part of the soil itself (like in some organic systems) it is likely that runoff occured.
I also burned a few plants by applying the 10-30-10 too close to the plants and concentrated in one place. This was simply due to my inexperience in agriculture.
-Adam
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