今年は引っ越しをしたので、去年の畑とさよならをして、新しい畑を探していました。私が今住んでいる岡山の美咲町は山が多くて、田んぼがたくさんあります。美しい棚田の風景がいっぱい見えます。前の家の近くみたいに、ひろーい、平な土地というのはあまりなくて、畑は皆の家の近くにちょっとだけ、自分が食べる分を皆さん育てているかんじです。そして、イノシシがたくさんいるので、イノシシが畑や田んぼに入ってこない用に、柵がしてあります。木製の柵だったり、ワイアーフェンス、そして電柵、種類が豊富です。
私が今仮住まいを借りているのですが、その真下に田んぼが二枚あって、聞いてみたところ、貸してもらえる事になりました。とてもありがたい事に、朝起きたら、おはよ！って上から藍の姿が見えます！
ここの田んぼの準備で少し大変だったのが、最初にたくさん雨が降った時用に田んぼの周りに溝を掘りました。その後に、トラクターで田んぼの持ち主が耕してくれました。本当にカチカチで、トラクターに甘えました。その後に畝を立てて、これは手で。ぎっくり腰になりました。田んぼの周りの斜面は仮住まいの大家さんが刈ってくれました。私のパートナーのでんでんもいっぱい働いてくれて。。。夢の用に畑の準備おけい！大感謝です！
苗もちょうど大きくなっていたので、移植。そして、私が失敗したのは。。。鶏糞を肥料として畑に撒いたら、葉っぱに虫さんが。いっぱい。。。雨が少なくて、感想しているせいもあるかもしれないけれど。。。とにかく、ぜーんぶなにかしら穴が空いていて。。。これからどうなる事か。。。
ここの畑の素晴らしいポイントがまだあります。まず、風景！本当に最高過ぎます！聞こえるのは、鳥の声と、近くで草刈りをしている音くらい。。。風が気持ちいいし、空が綺麗！そして、大家さんが山に行って、黒いホースを、山の小屋から持ってきてくれて、畑まで山水が流れています。浴槽もちょうど大家さんが、使っていないのがあって、それに水をためて、水が必要な時にその水を使います。最高です。今年は藍の近くに頂いた綿の種も少し蒔きました。そしたら芽が出て、可愛いです。鶏糞をまいたせいもあって、雑草もすごく元気に育ちそうです！
良い藍の時期が過ごせます様に！たくさんの学びがありますように！
Since I moved this year, I had to say goodbye to my hatake in Yorii. The soil was so soft there… and my indigo was very happy there, so was I! last year… My new home, Misakicho in Okayama prefecture, is a place where there are lots of mountains! In Japanese, oka means hill and yama means mountain… I didn’t realize the real meaning of this until I moved here. We go up and down hills and mountains all the time! Anyway, all this to say that there are no vast flat fields like there were where I lived before. Most of fields we see are rice fields, and because all is hill or mountain, the rice paddies are terraced.
Luckily I was able to borrow the small rice field right beneath the house I am renting at the moment. My landlord, my partner and I teamed up to prepare the land for the indigo, and by the time we were done, the seedlings had grown quite a bit so I was able to transplant them into my hatake. The work was different than in my previous fields. We had to first dig up a groove all around for water to flow through in case of heavy rain (rainy season is coming soon and rice paddies are not as water-absorbant). Then a neighbor came with his tractor, thank you! and made the soil quite soft… it was so hard before, clay-like. We then made furrows (I hope this is the right english word) and were ready for the indigo! The one thing I did differently this year is that since everything was behind schedule compared to last year and it was a new field, I gave the indigo some composted chicken manure. Maybe because of this, or because there has been no rain and the leaves are quite dry, almost all the leaves in the field have small holes in them, they have been eaten by bugs… what to do…
There are two awesome things about my field this year. One is the landscape, the sky, the quietness, the sound of the birds, the fact that I can wake up every morning and just look down to say hello! this is so great! and my landlord went to his cabin in the mountains to pick up some long black hose from which mountain water pours straight to a big bathtub that is in my field. This makes it possible for me to water the indigo when it doesn’t rain for too long. I also planted some cotton, that is just sprouting~ very cute… some of them still look like they are wearing a hat! so much and many new types of weed I am discovering too!
hope it will be a good year~ I’m sure I will learn so much!