JungleBiker

...more cars mean, more greenhouse gases to be released, also with the fact that more trees will be cut down, more deforestation,

Hmmm... or does more cars mean more rubber tyres needed, and more rubber tyres means more trees planted (i.e. rubber trees)! And by the way, more greenhouse gases (CO2) means the rubber trees grow faster.

Never seen a cow eat Bougainvillea. Maybe cows have tough mouths and stomachs, but the needles/thorns (whatever they are called) are strong and sharp

I stand corrected. Good to know, looks a lot better than barb wire.

I'm trying to explain this to my wife but don't know how to say bougainvillea in Thai. Little help?

courtesy of Google Translate เฟื่องฟ้า

I'm trying to explain this to my wife but don't know how to say bougainvillea in Thai. Little help?

feuang fa

Good evening Khonwan.

Maybe you planted Paspalum plicatulum instead of Paspalum atratum?

Hard to eradicate and livestock are generally very reluctant to eat it at all. It can become an aggressive weed.

Try 24D. It takes about 5 days for the plants to curl over and die.

Regards,

Michael Hare

I wouldn't want Khonwan to waste his time and money spraying 2,4-D on his paspalum (grass) weeds, so would just like to point out that as mentioned in the other thread 2,4-D is used to kill broad-leaved weeds in grass without killing the grass.

Thanks Khonwan for the update.

Based on the experience of a friend of mine, there will probably be many more such hearings spread over a period of several years. Like I said before, I hope the father ends up paying you for all your costs and time wasted.

I suspect that the father had already agreed from the start to share the spoils with the investigating police officer and prosecutor (and possibly the judge), hence their attempt to find you in the wrong with regards to crossing the double unbroken lines.

In the meantime, I hope corrupt officials don't arrange for signs prohibiting U-turns/right turns to be erected near the accident scene and then later in court provide forged documents showing that they've been there since before the accident.

All the best,

JB.

...mixing rice bran 50-50 with the sand.

Rice bran or did you mean rice hulls/husks?

Thanks Khonwan for sharing this interesting story. I hope the father seeking 5 million baht is made to pay for all your expenses related to visiting the court, and for the precious time that he his causing you and your family to waste. Rather than trying to get rich, perhaps he should be taking responsibility for his son's crimes by apologizing and paying money to you for the losses, damages, inconvenience and pain suffered by you and your family.

All the best,

JB.

This is quite interesting as I have been trying to find grass seed in Thailand for nearly two years now only to be told that it is not available and if I wish to have a lawn I must purchase turf (!) now at Bt52/sq.m.

Given that I had no wish to pay many, many thousands of Baht for "threadbare" turf I have finally managed to import some seed from the US which I believe will grow successfully in Thailand.

If only I could have found where to buy seed in Thailand earlier it would have made things so much easier.

Actually the grass seed being discussed earlier in this thread is for growing grass to feed livestock, not for lawns. I think the grass seed that DP used to grow his 500 baht lawn was imported by him, not purchased here in Thailand. So I don't thiunk you have missed out on anything. The turf at 52 baht sounds very expensive! I thought it was usually around half that price?

Most Thais don't know that grass can produce seed.

Actually there are lots of Thai farmers growing grass for seed but they don't call it grass they call it rice. (For the non-botanists here, rice is a member of the grass family). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poaceae#Food_production

From reading the above I now know that this grass seed business is being run by a Kiwi. A Kiwi! Why not an Australian? Still good to know that a Kiwi is contributing to long-term productively for selected village farmers in northeast Thailand.

Why an Australian? Why not a Thai?

If you want to cut out calories and/or reduce the glycemic index of your meals then yes I'd cut out the rice and just have stir-fried veggies with some meat added - chicken without the skin has less fat than pork or beef. Don't eat too many eggs or leave out the yolks because yolks are high in fat.

Beans are a healthy way to get calories, protein and fibre in your diet.

Or do what I do - eat what you like but ride a bike (bicycle) for over 1,000km per month!

Hello FEF, this was a booth at a orchid show/contest(4 days) downtown Korat,

I saw this booth and took a look. I should have bough then, next day they didn't

have any more of the red ones.

rice555

That must be the same guy who came to the ag fair in Khon Kaen in Jan. I did buy a sucker of the red banana, plus a couple of other types, but now all my bananas are under about 1 meter of floodwater. They must all be dead by now.

Thanks Rice for the hortasia link.

Regarding plastic, I usually buy stuff from TCT but I have a leaflet here that I think I picked up at the agriculture fair in Khon Kaen in January of a company that (just looking at the photos) seems to be selling similar stuff - or maybe they're just selling netting and woven materials?

Ching-Yang Co Ltd.

Tel 034 321551 - 6.

[email protected]

I hope you'll let us know what you find out.

JB

I've got a few pineapple plants in my garden and recently harvested some fruit (see attached photos). Not difficult - just keep the weeds down, give some water during the dry season and wait.

Hi ForeverFord,

I'm in Khon Kaen and also have several different types of bananas (sorry I don't know the names) including a dwarf variety only about 1m high (but normal sized fruit), a tall variety about 5 metres high, a commercial chiquita type about 3 - 4 metres high, the common nam wah variety, and so on. And they all give fruit without much care. I do trim off the older leaves with the leaf spot disease to reduce infection of the newer leaves. I also chop out some of the suckers sometimes to thin the numbers of stalks (it's best to have only three stalks (of different ages) per plant at a time - a grandmother, mother and daughter - to avoid overcrowding and to maintain a steady succession of bunches.

The nam wah types (the short stubby/chubby bananas, commonly seen everywhere in Thailand) are generally tough plants and the fruit can be eaten fresh or cooked.

I wonder if you have some sort of soil problem - perhaps nematodes (eelworms)? Or a hard layer not far below the surface (plough pan)?

JB.

By pure coincidence, yesterday while driving in the centre of Khon Kaen I found myself behind a pickup with a picture of a boer goat on the back window, plus some Thai writing (I assume it was adverting promoting Boer goats)and a mobile phone number. I think if you call this number you will find the goats you are looking for: 081-871-8695. The vehicle registration plate was from Khon Kaen.

There are muslims and goats in Khon Kaen. You need to ask the local people - start by asking where for a muslim restaurant. There used to be a muslim restaurant on the main friendship highway - east side a few hundred meters up from the underpass - not sure if it is still there because I haven't been there in years. I've seen a few goats on a smallholding just round the corner from my place - looking at Google Earth I think this is the place: 16° 31.822'N 102° 55.119'E

There are loads of goats on the other side of the mekong river, e.g. Savannakhet in Laos. They eat them and ship them to Vietnam.

There was a German guy who used to be on this forum - started a goat farm but eventually gave up because they kept dying of parasitic worms. I'm not sure he knew to much about goat keeping.

JB

Hi Isaan Aussie

You could try:

Chiang Mai Royal Agricultural Research Center

PO.Box.54 Hang-Dong, Hang-Dong District

Chiang Mai, Thailand 50230

Tel. 66-53-114133-36

Fax.66-53-432277,114072

Mobile.66-81-8841426

Good luck.

JB

erhh~~ i thought cassava roots contain traces of cyanide if it's not process properly ?...no?

Yep, but I never said anything about feeding pigs with fresh roots. Methods of processing could be to chip the roots and sun-dry them or ensile them: Use of cassava products in feeding pigs www.fao.org/ag/aga/agap/frg/ahpp95/95-157.pdf

Thailand used to export huge quantities of sun-dried chips (and pellets made from these chips) to the EU for feeding pigs. The cassava products were cheaper than EU cereals. This upset the EU cereal growers so then the EU funded several projects in Isaan to get farmers to grow other stuff before they increased the import duties on cassava. One of the projects was a rubber tree project and that is one reason why you will now find many rubber plantations in the northeast.

I think these days most of the cassava is exported to China for making ethanol/bio-fuel.

JB

I've been a cyclist all my life but I have no idea what you are talking about.

Well originally someone wrote bouncer not boucher. I know a bouncer is a big guy who kicks troublemakers out of night clubs so I must admit I have never ridden one of those and hope I never do!

back bacon (molasses and black pepper cured.

Sounds good - now I'm feeling hungry!

By the way, going back to the original topic, I would say that there is good money to be made in farming in Thailand but the challenge (like in many businesses) is be innovative - do something that others are not doing, or least not doing enough to meet market demand. IsaanAussie's biochar/compost/manure-based fertiliser and tasty bacon look like good examples but I am sure there are many more. Of course farming, when done properly is actually a very technical/scientific profession - that is one reason why most Thai farmers are not rich - they lack proper education in the subject.

JB.

If you are talking about mandarins (the easy peel citrus that you see everywhere during the "winter" months, then I thought it was the other way around - good taste but difficult to grow! (Due to pests and diseases - so usually require lots of chemicals to keep them healthy, plus good nutrition, irrigation, soil management, etc). BUt as the others suggest, why not try and see what results you get.

If you are talking about proper oranges (thick peel, difficult to peel) then I haven't tasted any good oranges produced in Thailand.

There are a few mandarin varieties around - I can't remember the names of them now - one is Shogun. They should be budded onto special rootstocks - there are a few rootstocks in use in Thailand - you are supposed to select the rootstock to suit your soil. Rootstocks also affect the quality of the fruit but not to the extent that you need to worry about for a home garden.

I agree that the nut grass, coco grass advice sounds like BS.

JB.

it´s amazing that not only most of the Nongkhai farmers but also the farangs here seem not to be sure of the necessary NPK mixtures..

It's not that amazing.

Ideally you should adjust the amounts of N,P and K (and other nutrients - macro and micro) according to an analysis of your soil (every plantation is different). There is a soil testing lab here in Khon Kaen, I don't know about your provinces.

Even better is to also analyze the plant tissue to check the nutrient levels inside the plant and then adjust fertilizer applications accordingly. (Kind of like doing a blood test and adjusting your diet or lifestyle to reduce cholesterol or blood pressure, etc). To do this you need benchmarks to compare against.

Here are some links explaining more about this stuff in relation to rubber - if you take some of the key words (like rubber analysis and nutrition) I am sure you can find much more info:

http://journals.lww.com/soilsci/Citation/1941/07000/Leaf_Analysis_and_Plant_Nutrition.6.aspx

www.agnet.org/library/eb/398/eb398.pdf

There are special digital pocket meters that you can buy to test some of the key nutrients in plants, e.g. http://www.specmeters.com/Nutrient_Management/index.html

All of this (soil and plant nutrient analysis) is too advanced for your typical Thai farmer, so that is why the government has come up with some simple general recommendations that are "good enough" for most situations. But this means that in some cases, some nutrients may be deficient (so plant growth will not be optimum) or in surplus (so you are wasting good money buying stuff you don't need).

By the way, the main reason for putting phosphate in the planting hole is because phosphate does not travel easily through the soil. If you put it on the top, it tends to stay on the top (it "bonds" with the soil) and does not go down to the roots.

JB

Hi IsaanAussie,

I guess you may have already considered these ideas but just in case you haven't...

Re growing your own pig feed with not much land, instead of cereal crops how about growing cassava roots (for the energy) and stylo leaves (for the protein)? Perhaps also throw in some broken rice and bran from the local rice mill? Plus you could still use some purchased feed to provide a more balanced/nutritious diet.

Re selling pigs for the same price as the locals, how about adding value by making your own ham, prosciutto, sausages, etc?

JB

Thanks for the replies.

Sounds like it should be somewhat easy enough. Seems patience will be the key in letting them mature enough to produce fruit.

I usually put my hardwood cuttings, with leaves removed, vertically in a pot of potting compost, water well, and then put a plastic bag over the top to stop everything drying out (tie a piece of string around the circumference) and place in a shady place to prevent the sun making it too hot inside the bag. Eventually (after about 3 weeks) roots and new leaves will be made. So then rip a hole in the top of the bag and water well. Then over the next few hours gradually make the hole bigger to reduce the humidity and allow the plants to get used to drier air. Likewise gradually move them to a sunnier position so that they get used to the bright sun. You can root several cuttings in one pot. After being hardened off you can plant them in your garden (try not to disturb the roots too much).

In the rainy season you can put them directly in the soil like SoiDog2 suggests. But I usually put them in vertically, e.g. if say the cuttings are 20cm long, put them halfway in the ground.

If well taken care of, I reckon you should see fruit within 12 months. If you prune them back after fruiting you can get a second crop in the same year (i.e. two crops a year is possible).

I guess you know that mulberries are the source of food for silkworms - they eat the leaves, not fruit. So there are some government sericulture centres around Thailand where you can buy mulberry plants at low cost. There are several varieties. They all give fruit but I heard that "Chiang Mai 60" is good for fruit production.

JB