In the Failing New York Times yesterday was the sad story of a Venezuelan farmer who had to plow his crop of carrots under because of economic disorder in his country.
Why bother? There was no way to take the carrots to market, but what good does plowing them under do?
Easier than harvesting them and throwing them away. Plus, returns the nutrients to the soil as the carrot plants decompose.
It stops the ones that haven’t spoiled yet from growing. It breaks up the spoiled crop and loosens the dirt to aid them in decomposing. Once the crop is spoiled the best you can do is try to transition to fertilizer as efficiently as possible.
Thank you. I am a city boy.
Anything growing in the soil will take nutrients from the soil, at the very least, water.
As for carrots specifically: they grow in rows. Weeds will grow between the rows. If left uncontrolled, they will set seeds and sprout even more next year. Carrots also send down roots, which means they, too, will try to come back, even if the farmer wants to grow a different crop.
The only benefit from leaving an unharvested crop in the field is to provide ground cover against erosion. The amount of residue left over from plowing differs immensely depending on what type of “plow” is used.
In this case, I am sorry to say, an actual ox-plow. Venezuela is running out of fuel for tractors. Horrible.
If you expect to plant anything there next year, you’re going to have to plow it anyway. So if the crop isn’t worth harvesting, you’re going to end up plowing it under now or later. For reasons outlined it will be better to do it once you decide not to harvest it.
It’s also a good idea to stop the crop from growing in order to reduce future pests.
A lot of bugs burrow into the growing plants, overwinter, and then emerge the next year. If the plants are plowed under they die, start rotting and the pests lose their happy little abode. (Harvesting can also do this in many cases.)
It can also help with some diseases.
One of the best control methods for boll weevil in cotton is to plow the plants under after harvest. If for some reason you can’t harvest the cotton (it has an an infection or some such you don’t want to spread), then you plow it under without harvesting.
Makes it into fertilizer.
To go a little further on why you might not want to harvest it…
There’s a non-trivial cost involved with harvesting your crop- you have to get it out of the ground, and transport it to the sale point. From what I’ve heard about Venezuela, there’s a big chance that the cost to harvest & transport may well be higher than what the farmer could get for his crop for whatever reason (low prices, no market, no transport from sale point, etc…).
So at that point, the most economic decision is to plow it under, in hopes of at least retaining those nutrients in the soil for the next growing season.
I hadn’t heard of this publication before.
(Seriously, what’s with the crack against your own cite?)
There are crops that are grown specifically to be plowed under. Legumes are a good example. They fix nitrogen from the atmosphere. Clover is particularly beneficial when used as green manure and plowed under prior to planting a crop of wheat or corn.
In Spain clover is used for feed. The fuzz (can’t remember the proper name) that’s left over after harvesting is plowed under, but this is true in general.
Some crops are planted for overwinter erosion control. Cover crops. Typically annual grasses or legumes planted too late to seed and that die off when frozen.
It’s obviously a joke.
Also, if you’re earning -1 cent per pound on carrots and +2 cents per pound on beets, you might plow under the carrots because you don’t want people stealing them and eating them in place of beets. And if your growing season is long enough, you might be able to plant more beets on the carrot patch.
It’s a joking reference to the way that President Trump refers to the paper as the “failing New York Times” in his tweets.
[Moderating]
The dig at Trump really wasn’t needed.
[Not moderating]
Similarly, the most effective means of controlling bean beetles is to plant beans late. Around here, if you wait to plant beans until at least the summer solstice, the beetles will all have died off over the winter, and so the local community garden has that as one of its rules (any beans planted before that will be pulled, because it only takes a few to keep the beetles around to re-infest the rest of the plots).
The other benefit is feed for your animals. Even without harvesting, carrot greens are quite tasty to herbivores.
So why couldn’t he have dug up some of the carrots, to use as fuel for his ox? Horses (and other equines) love carrots; cattle & oxen should also.
This whole thing sounds like a possible publicity stunt to me.
Now this is interesting. I haven’t been bothered by Colorado bean beetles this year. The only thing different: I planted a bit later than usual.
How late do I have to plant to get rid of deer and rabbits? :o