A growing number of businessmen are taking to farming in a big way to de-stress
Photo: K. Ananthan
Green HOLIDAY Anand Rao with organic mangoes
As kids, many of us dreamt of growing our own vegetables and chilling out in an orchard where luscious mangoes and guavas dangled at arm’s length. For most, it remained just a dream. But some have managed to translate it into reality and enjoy
the best of both worlds — preside over their businesses during the week and turn farmers on weekends.
For someone who is 100 per cent city-bred, garment manufacturer Anand Rao can wax eloquent about farming. As a child, he loved the idea of owning a farm.
Going organic
Twenty years ago, Anand picked up 40 acres of arid land at Bodipalayam, off Pollachi Road. Inspired by the philosophy of Masanobu Fukuoka, father of organic farming, he coaxed the land into supporting plant growth.
Effective water management saw the well filling up again. His rambling orchard boasts 250 chikoo and mango trees each, guava, cashew and pomegranate trees, and a coconut grove.
Trader Allwyn Joseph grew up in a village. When he moved to Coimbatore, he missed that greenery. Eight years ago, he bought an eight-acre farm near Vellalore, raised cattle, and planted banana, greens and vegetables.
“The thrill I felt when I sold my first keerai kattu cannot be explained,” he says.
Adka Sreesh heads a store dealing in kitchen accessories. Weekends, he heads with family to his Mangarai farm. When he bought the two-acre property, once a brick kiln, seven years ago, the ash-rich land supported nothing. Sreesh and his architect wife Shama topped up the soil, and established a farmhouse.
The travel-loving couple picked up exotics such as wood apple, rose apple, Persimmon and resin-free jackfruit, and ornamentals. Now, their farm meets most of their fruit needs, and a greenhouse provides vegetables and greens.
Photo: K. Ananthan
Sreesh and Shama amidst rose apples
Treading a new path was not easy. When Anand started drip-irrigating his farm, neighbouring farmers scoffed at him. They ate their words, when after three years of drought, only his coconut grove remained.
Scientists told him a farm could not be run without pesticides. Later, the same people visited him to learn about organic methods.
A neighbour who refused to let him use boulders from his land to build a check dam thanked him when it raised the area’s water table.
Lessons from Nature
What kept Anand going? “Trees teach you patience,” he states.
Anand admits he made mistakes (a musambi grove perished), but he has learnt from them. Today, he can teach a traditional farmer a thing or two about farming, including the amount of water a plant needs, and when to pluck a mango (wh
en tapped, it should sound like a bronze vessel).
At his farm, birds get their share of fruits, and any excess is given back to the soil. “Birds need to survive too. How else will cross pollination take place?” he asks. To buy his farm produce, call 0422-4391232 or 4395218.
Sreesh is not into commercial farming. “We get a steady supply of fruits, enough for the family and friends.”
Some excess, mostly coconut, is sold at the store. “The idea was to live in a place where there was one sample of all species,” he says, walking through a farm with fruits such as kilo koyya and hog plum, and spices.
For pest control, he relies on neem oil and guinea fowl.
Following a Thailand example, Shama hangs a bottle filled with glue under the trees. Insects attack the glue instead of the fruits.
A learning process
Sreesh faces minor setbacks too. His farm is near an elephant corridor, and the pachyderms recently ruined his fence and banana grove. But, he lets that be, because “they once ruled this place”.
Despite all this, none of them would give up farming for anything.
“Time stops when you stay on a farm; There is so much peace, you just don’t want to go away,” says Allwyn, who visits his farm every day.
“Running a farm helps you unwind, and it is a great learning process,” says Sreesh, who visits tropical fruit farms abroad every holiday.
Anand says he is a different person on the farm. To hone his knowledge, he and wife Prema also did a course on bio-dynamic farming.
“I have become very sensitive to Nature,” he smiles. The only hitch? His friends tell him to stay off outdoor parties. “For, I can say when it will rain, by looking at the sky, and I am usually right!”
SUBHA J RAO
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