KW8, thanks for sharing.

Jatropha, tell me more about Jatropha.

Again, Jatropha is receiving coverage by the agri magazine AgriWorld, and this time it is cover story. The formal president of Pitaya Assiciation(watever they called it) has started with a couple of acres of Jatropha and he even imported a oil press from Thai to extract the oil. Another article mentioned that due to palm oil boycott by NGO for use in biodiesel, therefore Jatropha oil is expected to perform in a few years time when the diesel oil price shoot further.

Anyhow, I guess these guys are not getting the point here. Thou not a consumable oil, such large scale farming do displace food crop and it is not as productive as oil palm. But anyhow, large scale plantation is unavoidable if a certain crop is found being profitable.

Theres part of the article mentioned that it can be used as perimeter crop, if a market demand has been created for Jatropha, farmers can make an extra income out of it. But large scale farming is unavoidable once the demand is up. There are a group of folks even thought about

And ahh.. ic ic, Basella Alba is emperor vege..

- - -

MJ, btw, a little thing about your chili from thai... thai has much more chili farming then Malaysia, therefore, their chili is expected to have more disease, perhaps more variety too, they start treating their seeds with fungicide before sowing. So could it be this reason thats why your poor chili become fungus host?

Just got the latest Agriworld I read about a guy in the article who planting chili, hes new in chili as his farm mainly mata kuching and attempted to plant chili on his vacant land. The article also mentioned Turbo EM and Plantonic which i guess is part of the advertisement, it also mentioned that the farmer apply "activated carbon" around the crop for good. The most interesting part that caught my attention is this folk actually got all his seeds from the supermarket - buy in ripen kulai chili and take out the seeds.

This is the 3rd month of his harvest season, and most of his plants are going strong, pods more then leaves, but the pods appear to be slightly smaller then first harvest.

Know anything bout activated carbon? They looks like those charcoal people used for orchid.

- - -

And the magazine also mentioned about
- oil palm cloning, harvesting, fertilizer case study.
- jack fruit and mango and star fruit
- straw mushroom farming
- climate change, resources, and eco system
- pesticide guide
- compost
- a bit bout plant inheritance and DNA
- sparrow farming,
- about a fish farm that raise keli fish in water container(much like the one Para is doing)
- plankton(as feed) and spirulina farming
- beneficial life form in fish pond
- etc etc
Tell me which one you interest most i bet Para is ringing a bell.

This post has been edited by rexis: Mar 12 2008, 01:22 PM

MJ,

Ahh, i read about a papaya farmer give his seedlings some "aging" process to make the seedlings yellowish by reduce sunlight, reduce water etc ways of "torturing" them so that can grow up to be more tolerant to harm and less tasty to pest. So by now I have an impression that plants start their life better in compost or natural old soil.

Oh about the "activated carbon" they apply it by covering the soil around the plant and say it will prevent fungus growth and can act as "moisture regulator"(guess it means capture moisture). One paragraph only, you hv finish reading it.

Anyhow, i guess the purposes are interrelated and the main one should be like what you mentioned.

hi, KW.

Wonderful picture there, would like to know more details.

Can you tell us more about the details of your agri project?

Like whats the topic(intercropping kai lan and sweetcorn organicly? organic sweetcorn nutrition? etcetc),
objectives(how organic farming keep up with chemical farming?),
and how you do that(do you clear the land or the land ready for you? Do you get to use all those tractor etc?)?

It gotta be something related with organic!

I have always interested about Agriculture degree, perhaps you have some idea about is there any part time course in UPM? Particularly part time degree.

Pretty corn girl there , and am i looking at you gf or yourself?

- - -

MJ, ahh yes yes, hardening is the proper word. So what is the few of the ways to harden the crop? I know one way for sure, from the hydroponic site, they use fan to blow the seedlings to make them more resistance to wind.

- - -

Maize in Malaysia


My 2 cents! (no more 1 cent soon!)

edit: added spoiler due to long winded article

This post has been edited by rexis: Mar 13 2008, 11:11 AM

Not necessary need to eradicate weeds, I know some of the sweetcorn planters actually ignore the weeds and let them grow before they harvest, as according to them, this will help maintain moisture.

I have read somewhere in www.journeytoforever.org about an article that talk about a fruit estate which over fertilized their land and result in reduced production, after they hv abundant the estate for a year and back, they accidentally discovered that, although the estate is nearly outgrown by 'weeds', the fruit trees also looks very healthy and bearing lots of fruit. It is said that the weeds that have deep roots actually bring up the deep soil nutrient and sort of balanced up the soil, etc etc. I remember one type of plant they mentioned is close relative to egg plant.

- - -

Hey, tell me about your earthworms and <Planters>.

I hv used to keep a box of earthworms(just 10+ la till they breeding small one) until my mum found it ^^" and hv been interested about breeding stuff with organic plant waste.

- - -

Replying other topic after proper digestion

MJ,

ICIC, no prob, so how? Everything done already? Coming liao?

Ah, so thats the purpose of GAP, proper control of weeds is always crucial for any sensible harvest.

We have been terrified by stories of heavily pesticided crops causing sickness and cancer(especially by direct sellers selling vitamins - eat vege also no uses so eat my pills, WTF) and this is how people promote the organic way too.

Agriculture is actually working *against* the nature so there is no 100% "natural" way to do it, the nature is always attempting to turn your farmland back to forest and weeds is one of the proof. You need to put weeds down to knees by properly control it, either chemically or manually.

Theres an interesting idea i read about to make use of geese in weeds control(they are vegetarian), that is raise a batch of young geese with types of particular weeds so that they are used to eating the mentioned plant. When they grow up, release them in the farm and they will clear out all the weeds for you full time.

But, i guess it wont take too long for the geese to discover that chilies pods or seedlings etc are delicious as well!

- - -

Welcome daniel_ng, perhaps you can share with us a bit about your background?

Guess MJ will have a very good understand about this one but its an open topic.

What method we can use to extract oil content? From fruit, seed, etc.

Pressure - using screw press to squeeze out the oil content with high pressure, can involve heavy equipment that can process tons of ingredients per hour to a hand operated screw press with 1-2 kg per hour.

Water seperation - something like how they extract olive oil?

Chemical - use a chemical solvent to wash out the oil content, high tech stuff.

---

Lets say I happened to have some oil seeds here, what is the best way to extract it?

I have been thinking about using a car hydraulic lift to press the content thru a wire mesh. But it seem a little complicated and messy.

So I am now looking at the olive oil way, I am going to blend/beat the seeds into pulp, then pour the goo into boiling water and let the oil float naturally, then i scoop them up.

Hmm, did i posted any Jamnapari information before? But i did mentioned it before somewhere in this forum.

Feel free to ask here, I will see what I can find. Even better if you feel like contribute.

Dont forget about my vegetable/crop related courses too! Basically, if possible, all agri related course

Indeed fertilizer and pesticide industry is a very rewarding business. Nowadays everything is record high... perhaps except cement due to many mega projects left their future undecided.

Do we really need RM300k to start up a composting business?

Perhaps start big goes big too, but what if for a fairly new field like vermicompost? Its considered a bit risky isn't it?

How popular is vermicompost? Yup i can see some vermicompost in ACE hardware or occasionally in hypermarket, but i would rather pay that price for a organic plant supplement spray.

RM3 per kg is a little too pricy, cost is the main factor that prevented vermicompost from being popular, as for RM3000 per ton, you can get a decent imported inorganic fertilizer with immediate result. Most farmers would opt for the latter choice. And for plant based organic compost, you can get for like half of the price.

Is it a must for vermicompost being so expensive? Why is it so expensive? No way to reduce the production cost?
(update: most likely this is influenced by marketing strategy, price of worm compost in KL can go up to RM5-6)

Vermicompost cost factor, the raw materials(organic waste) are virtually free, the main workers(earthworms) only required some starting cost for the firsts batch, and they will multiply. So the main cost lies on:
- collecting and sorting
- transportation
- containers if you using worm bin

You see, if one can make a RM3 per kg vermicompost and sell to garderner and household, compare to one who can make a RM1 per kg vermicompost and sell to commercial plantation.

Vermiculture - Wikipedia
Compost Worm - JourneytoForever.org
Cheap and easy worm bin

This post has been edited by rexis: Mar 25 2008, 02:35 PM

Anything related to agriculture can be discussed.

Since I am doing some revision about vermiculture, likely they will be one of the topic.

ParaOptical, we got another guest

BTW,
If there is any topics you guys particularly interested and want to know more or discuss, do let me know so i can keep an eye on it while i go thru my agri magazine library.

Currently my proposed topic shall be
- chili farming *
- organic farming
- vermiculture *
- coffee tree
- soft shell crab (if anyone interested)
- sweetcorn *
- choices of short term crop
- Jatropha

Not sure do we able to go thru all of these, btw the * is the thing I am either more interested or more familiar.

Add:

Of course, we will have general topics like:
- potential of agriculture
- aquaculture economics (para, your job)


This post has been edited by rexis: Mar 27 2008, 03:12 PM

Who say no need? Everyone is recommended to prepare fees for a Nando's half chicken optional thou, I really dont mind you seeing me eating all nite.

Before this, I would like to ask, HOW should we recognize each other? Here are my suggestions:
- everyone carry one watermelon on head, available from jaya jusco.
- everyone dress red color.
- para/I go book a table under one agreed name like "para", "agri low yat", etc and we just see nandos counters and ask for it. *
- put up notice in front of nando's
- I/mj will bring a pot of plant and everyone just look for any table with a pot of live plant.
- para bring a dead fish and everyone just follow the smell...
- everyone wear a farmer hat(those made of straw) to identify each other
Anymore idea? (the * is the one i suggested)
(no everyone wear a red rose please:D )

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Agriculture: where to go?

Allow me to voice out some brain storming.

You interested to go into agriculture, and being motivated enough to do read up and study into it, but still, you are lack of idea about which part of agriculture you want to go.

Should I plant some front page cover crop from some agri magazine? Should I plant the famous oil palm or other cash crop? Should I take advice from Jabatan Pertanian to plant some new crops like vanilla, Jatropha, Rosella, etc? Or I just stick with something that are very common(high competition) but have steady demand?

-

I have been reading up Agriworld magazine for quite some time, and their front page stories can really bring up people attentions to a particular crop, not too long ago, they featured dragon fruit in front page stories for a few consecutive months, technically bringing enough highlights and ventures into the cactus plant. You can say they cover the stories because it is one famous topic at that time being, but no doubt that they bring even more attention at that crop. Many people venture into pitaya farming, not everyone succeed, some suffered badly with all their cactus having rotten stem disease, while some had their cactus drowned during the great flood. Of course there are successful example, but they do not earn their success by just sitting there and just waiting their crops to grow, but spent a lot in marketing their products, to both consumers as well as planters(in supplying seedlings, trainings etc)

-

Cash crop is the crop that grow for cash, and usually for satisfying commercial customers, long term crop like the top of the range oil palm, rubber tree, black pepper, cocoa, coffee etc, short term cash crop include maize, soy(which is not suitable or rare in Malaysia), cassava, sugar cane etc. The term commercial means in order to achieve efficient production cost, you will need a proper scale. Larger start up cost would involved, about which cash crop to pick, you will need to identify which cash crop is needed at your neighborhood, for eg, if the nearest palm oil mill is some 200 km away, dont choose to plant oil palm, as nobody would take oil palm from you.

-

New crop?! Ah, the opportunity of being a pioneer also means the opportunity to earn the pioneer income, you would have the change to earn a share of a new pie aka new demand, which might result an attractive return. However, there is always a risk, and the risk is you might just planted truckloads of harvest that nobody would take. For example, we can see aloe vera plantations in thailand, but it doesnt mean it is viable in malaysia, unless you can find some factory that will buy it in bulks. Another example, currently the folks from agriculture department has encouraging people to plant rosella, a plant that yield a sour red fruit that can be used to make health products, drinks, etc. But it would be best to identify if there is actually any available market for it first before you invest into a rosella farm. Are there any physical action taken by agri dept to encourage it? Are there any factory taking it? Are they suitable as fresh fruit? Are hypermarkets willing to sell it? Opening up a stall in the local pasar pagi is the last thing you want to do, I believe you can better make use your time to focus on planting higher return crops.

-

The thing that always in demand is fresh vegetable and fruit crop, or any freshly eaten or home cooked crop, like mushroom. There are plenty of choices, leafy vegetables, gourd vines, chili and tomatoes, root vegetables, fruit trees, fruit vines, etc. In vegetable/fruit farming, it would be not advisable to depend on middle man or whole sellers as they will chop you with low price, but in many case, people do depend on them to cash their harvest, in some case, if your farm have enough varieties of vegetables, you can open up your own vege stall or shop to market them. Generally the wholesale price is depends on the availability of supply, during good months with good weather, you will score a beautiful harvest tonnage, but might suffer low price due to over supply, during bad months with poor weather, or disease(like the papaya rotten disease), price will be very attractive, but you get low or even no harvest. The ideal would be planting your crops in a greenhouse, which would require more capital.
(if you plant commercial chili, sweetcorn that you secure contracts/agreement to send your harvest to factory for processing into maggie chili or canned mushroom at a agreed fixed price, should be considered as cash crop)

-

Conclusion - IMHO

I would think that the best scenario is to own a couple 10s of acres of matured cash crop. Thurs you will not need to worry much about where your harvest should go, you just focus on increasing yield and expansion.

But not everyone will be able to own a piece of land or own it long enough for you to plant anything long term. Or not many people have enough cash to set up a farm big enough to be efficient.

I am a small starter, which aimed to be big, my thinking shall be up start in small scale and expand my business. I would opt to rent a land first(or even just go and occupy lands under high voltage cables, nobody using them anyway) and put on whatever grow up fast and easy to market to sustain myself as well as to grow. They would be short term crops. And over time, I would slowly acquire my own piece of land, put on some cash crop, as well as some intercrop hopefully they can help pay for the new land running cost.

I shall counter infertile soil with fertigation, but if the soil is okay i would go for the most basic way, technology comes in when I have capital.

And once the cash crop kicked in after 3-5 years, I would achieve an income that I would never make it by working as employee for 3-5 years, furthermore, a much greater freedom as well as more relaxing lifestyle.

This post has been edited by rexis: Mar 29 2008, 01:02 PM

MJ, hybridizing between Kulai and etc etc chili, can we call that kulai too? Or we should call it MJ Kulai?

How do i know if a chili is kulai? Oh yeah, btw, read about a "oil kulai" breed that bred by a chili planter, that guy is agriculturist degree from taiwan. He claimed that this "oil kulai" is much more resistance to disease, but the article never say anything about how to contact that guy or if hes selling seedlings etc. I think the AgriWorld has his contact.

Should buy all the kulai from different farm and sort out the stronger gene. Sound like a time consuming work.

Your coffee seeds germinated? Thats wonderful. My chili seeds all still sleeping in the sowing pot.

Went out to collect more castor seeds, the two castor trees near my house is having a fruiting boom.

Yes yes, please post them!

This post has been edited by rexis: Mar 31 2008, 08:57 AM

Btw where is the worm farm? Is it in Kajang? Never realized theres such farm hidden in Kajang!

So ROTiJOHN have you purchased any cacing from the worm guy yet? How was it?

MJ, you are teh man, exactly that nobody can stand in our way, not even boss.

and OMG OMG OMG i got one survival here!!! My 2nd batch chili got one sprout!!!!

Survival rate... 10%

So total how many people? 7?

So method of gathering is to look for those folks with that agri shine in their eyes in nando's at the time stated above...

Consider it as a overexcited reaction. Sort of like a fella on 2 bag of 3in1 434 monalisa coffee in one cup.

Chewing thru some nice wormy pic... laterz

Replying ROTiJOHN post so everyone get to see the pic here.

It looks like Zaman the worm captain is pretty well established there!

I am thinking about renting a cheap property(below 400) to rear earthworm with large plastic containers. Para, my figures earlier might be over exaggerated, 100kg worm for a room might be too much, but how about rearing 200kg of worm in a small apartment, i am sure it is not too packed isnt it. So assume you produce 1/3 of the biomass weight worth of castings:

you would collect...
2000kg worm casting, give 500 utility 400 rental, you got over 1k profit if you sell them at only RM1 per kg. Add a small packaging facility(plastic bag and the sealing heater), and make 1kg package and sell for RM2 per pak.. and that is without sunshine, part time(just grin food scrap and feed), weekend for packing and harvesting.

Seriously, is it really that good?
(btw, got pic showing spaghetti of worms ah?)

This post has been edited by rexis: Apr 2 2008, 10:00 AM

Leaf production or nursery.

ROTiJOHN is visiting all the vermi farm everywhere ler, time for our agri club to organize some farm visit?

Kluang... a bit far.

---

Vermiculture produces worm casting and worm, too bad we cant charge people for processing waste.

This post has been edited by rexis: Apr 3 2008, 09:53 AM

Perhaps we should look into controlling the vermi diet for the purpose of getting a more well balanced worm compost nutrient.

Like feeding them bone meal for P, if for K... whats is for K?

Or perhaps simply mix them into the vermicompost.

Or just use vermicompost as soil improvement

Froggy color ehh... later go nando see everyone wear green then how.

Must use something unique, like everyone put a frog on head.

Para, should really figure something out la, I suggest put a notice outside, sth like

Agri Gathering --> Table ##

and inform the counter if anyone come ask about Agri Gathering, they will point them to para.

----

Anyhow just in case, I will bring lots of AgriWorld Magazine and lay them out on table. Should you notice any table with lots(I will make sure its visible from far) of magazine cover with colorful fruits, crops, flowers, etc, that should be the one.

Basically english with a bit of cantonese finishing is the primary language

Oooo... property expert, we really need this kind of expertise, cant simply occupy land mah.

I have a friend with me too, hes just another plain office worker like myself with an outgoing will

---

Added on April 4, 2008, 10:53 amWhile "soils" cannot be exported, "sand" can be exported to singapore for them to make more land? Or they imported from somewhere else?

Not too sure about exporting, but i am pretty sure that we can Import "dungs" , theres a local mushroom planter(mat salleh come to invest in Malaysia) who importing tons of horse manure monthly from Holland to plant button mushroom.

Worm casting sure need more scientific explore as well rather then all those DIY at home product. Currently the worm casting market very home grown, nearly no technology involved.

So your worm condo will have night lightings, haha.

Ooo, basically vermiculture enable you to have both worm and worm casting, both are marketable. Just like you can buy compost as well as compost bacteria.

Apply worm compost you get faster effect, apply worms... they need time to settle down and might all die off to produce some quick and expensive N

(BTW, wahh para, 7-7.15pm u also consider urself early ahh, the appointment is 7pm )

This post has been edited by rexis: Apr 4 2008, 01:58 PM

Welcome vkeong.

Hey guys, look at how informative our new friend is:

Kopi Luwak LYN Post

It is the most expensive coffee in the world, CSI Las Vegas mentioned in(the killer drink this rare kopi), the 2nd most expensive is Blue Mountain coffee.

And according to MJ, we got parrot coffee too, work like kopi luwak, but just thru parrot only

Unbelievable? Believe it.

(Thanks for the "raw" kopi luwak pic )

This post has been edited by rexis: Apr 4 2008, 02:39 PM