Can I grow aquatic plants in a 4-month rainy season?

Hi. I've got a garden in Guatemala.

There's one area that is lower, and when it rains the rain tends to pool there.

I could divert water from a nearby path, and I'm confident that would make it swampy and waterlogged during rainy season. I think it would be wet enough to grow taro and kangkong, which would be great to grow here.

The snag is: it only rains for 4 months of the year. the rest of the time it's bone dry.

Do you think it would be possibly to plant taro and kangkong at the beginning of the rainy season and harvest them before it finishes. What do you think of growing aquatic plants in an on-off system like this?

I say give it a try. My taro has been doing fantastic this summer because we have been having twice 'normal' rainfall. Since it freezes here, these were roots that had overwintered from last winter, and they were slow to start in May, but then in June we had about 3 weeks of constant rain and they really took off. You also might be able to coax them along into the dry season, it takes quite a long dry spell for the leaves to turn yellow and for them to start to show stress. With a lot of mulch, you might be able to stretch that 4 month wet season up to 5 or 6 months.

Both taro and kang kong will grow in soil, do not need standing water or even mud. If the soil has good moisture retention properties you should be good for a while on residual moisture.

hi Lawrence,

you might want to convert the wet area into a chinampas to store the water and grow taro, kang kong, and many other things



http://permaculturenews.org/2013/05/28/chinampas-2-0-an-elegant-technology-from-the-past-to-save-the-future/

Man, I wish I'd had this idea three months ago!

duane hennon wrote: hi Lawrence,

you might want to convert the wet area into a chinampas to store the water and grow taro, kang kong, and many other things

Nah, it's too small for that. The whole garden is 777 square meters; the wet hollow is about 30. I do dream of having a chinampa one day, but not on this site.