permaculture advocate in Zimbabwe - too little/too much rain

I went to the plot yesterday and saw how the mint has started to grow into the onion beds. I panicked and started pulling out the shoots. I have read and seen, how invasive mint can be, so this was not supposed to make me panic like I did. I then shifted the level at which I am growing the mint on,  for now. I am now growing it at the bottom of the beds, to hold the soil together at the base.

In the meantime, I am experimenting with the stem that spreads just below the surface. When I was digging out shoots for replanting, I liked how the stem formed  a mesh right below the ground surface and an idea came to mind (I was back to my normal senses). The beds in this area use up the organic matter we put in the beds fast, such that in a few months, it does not show that we would have put any. I will experiment with the 3 beds I started with, whether its possible to allow the mint to grow a little into the beds and then cut the stems as close as I can to the edges of the beds. Because of the amount of mulch I am going to put, the stem I would have cut off from the part exposed to the sun,   might rot, because of lack of sunlight. If the mint is as invasive as I have seen, more stems will grow into the beds, and if I continue to cut at the edges, this might be a good source of organic matter. I just need to see if it can be done without disturbing the plants too much.

In the keyhole bed I harvested my first few spinach leaves.

I was thinking about mint and the possibility of it affecting the growth of the onions because it is invasive, and as the weekend was drawing near my anxiety was also growing. I was doubting the decision I made, also I remember noticing that the onions that were at the edges of the bed that has a lot of mint, looked smaller than the rest of the onions within the bed. I weeded and mulched last time. The onions are looking healthy, even the ones that looked small have grown. The onion section really looks like an orderly and productive plot, which is the goal. I did not see mint in the beds at all, so far things are looking good.

We are working on the second mulch for the onions. Mai Kumbi and Kumbi are so fast, and we will probably be done by the end of this week. I just realised today that we are starting to work on a new plant. By this, I mean  focusing on what it takes to grow it organically like we did with maize, and for now, we are doing with onions.

We have been planting beetroots, but without necessarily investing in how to grow it.  This time, we planted a few plants, and as usual the seedlings' leaves have started turning purplish, and for a change, I am able to work on this. We had planned to put the beets in batches, but I stopped us from planting another bed before we could find out how to fix this issue.

We have been concentrating our weed tea on onions, and now we are going to focus more on the beets. So the plan is to first see if there will be any changes that will be brought about by the weed tea, if there is still no change, I'm sure I would have researched on the next solution to try out. Our weed tea also has ashes and a few bones added to it.

Your weed tea is likely to help the beetroot seedlings. In many plants, purple colour is a sign of low phosphorus uptake and is more often seen in cooler conditions like winter gardens. Your soil might have enough when the weather is warm, but in the winter it's not as available to plants, so the bones in your weed tea can provide the extra that is necessary. If the bones are burned this will help even more.

I went to mai Kumbi's workplace because I missed spending some time with her. There was nothing 'business' worthy to talk about. We just haven't talked much as a result of the differences in time schedules. We caught up with each other's lives, and in all this, we decided to try out a bed of tomatoes for selling. We both know that for us to be able to sustain ourselves, we need multiple and consistent products that we can sell throughout the whole year. As we are working on the beetroot bed, we can work on a tomato plant bed as well, since we cannot continue to add beetroots, until we can take care of the ones we have already planted.

The other thing that was a highlight in our talk was how she started helping mai Moyo, the one who digs holes in the field. Mai Kumbi makes flowers for putting on graves, and she picks up some of her raw materials in and around her area. She no longer has time to do this, so she calls mai Moyo now and again to do this for her, and she pays her. The two have developed a beneficial relationship, and I really like this. She said she is going to find more of her coworkers who need these raw materials and she will direct them to mai Moyo. This means that mai Moyo has a cushion in between her employment.

What made me happy is that our connections are now economically beneficial, and we are looking at what we have for ourselves as well as for others.

Weed tea was poured on the beetroot plants,  and it might still be too early to see notable changes. Today, I dug in some aged compost and ash. I soaked a bone and eggshells in white vinegar for 3 days, and I poured this to the beets after diluting. I am hoping some nutrients were extracted from the bone.

Extracting nutrients from bones and shells using vinegar helped me to explain the concept of atoms, ions and molecules to my niece. It was so hard to explain to her because she could not even imagine what I was trying to say.  An egg shell dissolved in vinegar, I could see from her face that she gained some understanding that was different from the other times. My other niece cannot make it. I would have loved for her to come and study close to me before writing, but I have to accept that, it is what it is.

I went to check on the beetroot today, and there is some change, but I felt it could be better. I realised that the hearts of the plants were under the soil, which is a result of watering. Since the soil is sandy, it kept burying the plants. I exposed all the plants, and I also poured duck soup mixed with ash. And now I wait.
For the bed, we are going to put the next batch of beetroot, I have worked in some compost and ash so that the new seedlings have better soil to start with.

The beetroot looks good now. Today I added fresh duck poo into some water and poured this into the beetroots. Because of how sandy our soil is, it is wise for us to keep feeding our soil, so in addition to the weed tea, for the beetroots, we will add the duck soup weekly.

I have been selling peanut butter so that I have a source of income that is a little bit stable. There are some pressures that come in my life financially that slow down progress at the plot, and this is my conscious attempt to reduce these. The business is growing slowly, and growth is slow because of my marketing belief. What I do is to let people know I have peanut butter, I do not necessarily become aggressive, with a mission of convincing people with no intentions of buying  my product, to buy it. I want to fill up an existing need, as opposed to creating one. Those that taste it, come back for it, and the number of people is increasing steadily. There are areas that I am looking at, adding on to the quality of the product:

Finding a way of keeping the prices stable.
Maintaining the quality of the product.
Making sure it's always available.
Reducing the cost of production ( including recycling what we can).

These are things that are out of my control, and the peanut butter business owner is the one who can control most of these things. Already, the price of the peanut butter rose a few weeks after I started selling, and the quantity within the container was reduced. I asked if I could still buy at the same price, and he agreed. I have started asking my customers, who are my neighbors, if they can give me back their empty containers, and some of them are willing to do this. I can go with these containers back to the peanut butter guy at no cost, on his part.

The fortunate part is that we have a relationship, which is making us look beyond just making money. I started buying extra peanut butter to fill up the bottles to the original level. This reduces my profits, but it has helped in keeping my product a stable and consistent brand, and I now have regular customers.

It became obvious that I needed to meet with the peanut butter guy to see how we can help each other out, to make our businesses genuinely stable, including looking for cheaper sources of nuts or capital to stock up nuts and as a result, prevent effects of fluctuating raw material prices in the market. A few days ago we talked about things that make any business in  our environment so difficult to grow and we came up with a map on how, from his side he can stabilize his business, which in turn will make my small business stable.

Some days after our discussion, he met someone from Women's Affairs who saw his project, and she thought it was a really good one in comparison to business they usually try to help. She wondered if he had women he was working with so that he could be assisted in growing his business. She had seen the bottle neck in his production process. The person he thought to call was me, and this was because of the talk we had. For him, I was already involved in his business, but it was just not formal. If he starts getting help, it means stability for my small business, too. So I am considering being a part of this. Of course, it will be after I hear what it  means to be involved and whether it aligns with developing a regenerative business.

We have harvested the biggest banana bunch since we have started getting bananas from our banana patch.

I had the first harvest of pumpkin leaves, from the pumpkin plant and it was a serving for 3 people. I am still finding things that do not attract rats to my garden, and I already succeeded with mint and onions. I have harvested mint once, and I am drying the leaves that I get and storing them for making tea. As for the onions it's been weeks since we have been using them in our cooking. It's still a very small garden, but I am just proud that it's an addition to our easily accessible productive space.

The beetroot bed is looking good. I added soil from a termite mount because, Even though the leaves are green, the plants look smaller than they should. There is a space right in front of our yard that is being turned into a shopping mall. I was greatly disappointed, but yesterday, I decided to make the best of what is available, and that's how I decided to take the soil from the termite mount which is in this space. If this works. We can feed so many vegetable beds.

I visited my sister over a week ago and mulched her beds. I had never thought to ask if she wanted to have her beds mulched, I just assumed she had no time to mulch. When she came she was not too excited because she wanted her garden clean. She did not remove the mulch and a few days ago she called and told me how her view on mulch has changed because she noticed the great difference in the rate of water evaporation between  beds with a thick mulch over those that either had no mulch or those that had little mulch. She said she is likely going to be mulching from then on.

I went to the plot today, and the termite mount soil seems to be changing things, though it does not show much on images. My plan was to rush to the plot 3 times a week to carry soil from the mount in preparation for the new bed we will be planting more beetroots. Mai Kumbi said this is a task she can do because she is not doing much at her flowers stall. This means I can concentrate on another plan that can add to our income, or just improve our quality of life, so that I keep this family very interested and invested in this place. I can only do this if the quality of life they have a chance of living while they are at our place is better than they can find anywhere else.