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| Organic Wellness meetup @ mud house Terra Farm |
I gathered some members of Organic Wellness Meetup
and a few of my nutrition course students to
visit Terra Biodynamic Organic Farm @ Blue Valley
which is about 1.5hr drive from Cameron Highlands.
I heard so much about Terra Farm
for a long time,
be it for their famous mud house, exotic "tree-motel"
or their vibrant, tasty organic produce.
But never did I find a decent time to visit them
due to the distance of travel and my busy schedule
until recently.
Despite the long distance of some 250km from Kuala Lumpur
and having to rush to and fro within a day,
it was a very rewarding one day educational trip!
At the farm,
we received 2hours biodynamic farming lecture
and another 1 hour of farm touring conducted by
the farm owner, Mr Ng
who opened our eyes to more indepth understanding
about organic farming
and biodynamic skills to boost life force of organic produce!!
Some of the important points I gathered from Mr Ng:
1. A strong and healthy crop can naturally wade off pests on its own,
due to strong defence system.
2. The life force and health of a crop rely on the health of the soil.
3. Conventional organic composts
do not supply good enough amount of nutrients,
to offer life force to the crops and help build up their defence systems.
4. Biodynamic organic skills focus on fermenting nourishing compost
which "stores" nutrients in colloidal form in the soil.
5. The colloidal form of nutrients prevent over absorption of nutrients
during evening time, otherwise will cause intoxication of the crop,
and easily leached away .
6. Crops that grow on biodynamic compost
have got two distinctive features
i. webby feeder roots which penetrate colloidal soil structures for nutrients
ii. naturally waxy leaves
7. Biodynamic compost is different from normal organic compost,
in the process of fermentation where, over-heating and over-tossing
are avoided, to minimize nutrients loss (oxidised).
It's meant to imitate humus top soil of primitive jungle.
The biodynamic lecture mainly focused on topics of soil health and compost,
But, there are actually many other ways to grow a crop biodynamically,
In fact, biodynamic farmers also apply other techniques
to boost the growth and life force of crops.
As Mr Ng briefly mentioned,
there is a natural technique to make the soil more reflective of sunshine
to encourage more photosynthesis,
so that the plants grow faster and strong naturally
(just like plants that grow by the seaside receiving more reflective sunshine)
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| Mr Ng and tour mates in mud house living room |
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| Mr Ng, delivering Biodynamic Lecture |
After the enriching lecture,
we all had a buffet style organic lunch,
which was prepared by Mr Ng's wife, Ms Wanjing.
The Biodynamic vegetables were truly tasty
even cooked plain, with only sea salt (ie no other condiment)!
The vegetables themselves had their own flavours,
as Mr Ng emphasized.
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| Biodynamic Buffet time |
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| Biodynamic dishes |
After lunch, we had another lesson in the field,
checking out
how biodynamic feeder roots look like,
how the naturally waxy leaves were shiny and robust,
how biodynamic composts were colloidal, moistened and spongy.
Absolutely intriguing!
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| Biodynamic Veggie with Feeder Roots Systems |
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| Waxy leaves of healthy Biodynamic Coffee Plant |
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| Biodynamic carrot with strong flavour & aroma |
This one day trip was truly a learning experience.
The organic agriculture has always been accused of being
inefficient in yield and uneconomical.
we were provided evidence in front of our eyes,
that organically grown crops could robust, big and strong.
The critical point lies in the faith and
the passion to research for better ways to nurture organic crops =)
May organic agriculture prevails!
Feeling blessed,
Kee Yew
pureland2012-at-gmail.com
. Terra, Organic, Biodynamic
{Learning Holistic Wellness for Wisdom and Compassion}
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