The Gully

The Gully

We’ve decided to name our new orchard area the Gully, after Fern Gully (the movie) because we needed to clear out a bunch of old unproductive Mango trees and we labeled them with a painted X to show we would cut them, it was straight out of the movie! Minus the fairies of course! ;-) We’ve got a ton of fruit trees in and we’ve been planting handfuls of nitrogen fixing trees called Gallinazo (locally) or Shizlobium (latin) along with creating a footpath lined by vetiver to hold the soil in place. Harvesting vetiver is a dangerous job! For those of you who are not familiar it is a type of deep rooted grass that is great for erosion control. BUT…here’s the catch…it has sharp edges that like to slice your arms, legs and hands while harvesting. You look like you’ve been through a battle when you’re done, but it’s worth it to save the soil and the hill!!
Anyway I’ve been learning a ton working here with all the awesome mentors that are here. Sometimes I surprise myself by how much knowledge about species and processes that I have gained. (I just gave myself a little pat on the back there!)