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Hani and Yi technique of irrigation has always been a secret since their rice terraced fields were built from mountain top to deep valley. Many friends also wrote me asking for the Hani & Yi method of rice cultivation but not until recently I was lucky to locate a valuable field survey by Adachi Shimpei. I hope his work helpful to all of us who are willing to learn. Today text is continued from previous post.

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Terraced Rice Cultivation

5. Farming Works in Shanlaoqing Village

The importance of irrigation and drainage for terraced rice cultivation has been discussed in the previous section. However, with the close relationship with year-round irrigation practices, the farming works of the terraced paddy fields, especially those carried out during the dry season, also play an important role in the maintenance of the physical structure of the terraced field. In this section, I describe the agricultural technologies observed in the farming works and their multifaceted role in terraced rice cultivation with special emphasis on the relationship with year-round irrigation.

Nearly all the farming works are carried out under flooded condition. Water is only partly drained during the transplanting, harvesting and land preparation for ease of farming works. Water is drained out thoroughly only at sowing (in nursery only), but even in this case, the soil must be kept wet.

Sowing and Nursery Culture

The villagers are well aware of the coming of the rice sowing season (around early March) when they see sopuja trees (Docynia indica) bloom with white flowers. Seeds for sowing (cheshu) are soaked in water for two days. The seeds are then pulled up from the water and left in a plastic bag for 3-6 days. Seeds with primary root sprouts of about 0.5-1.0 cm are used for sowing. The series of tasks in nursery (cheshumi) preparation is carried out one month before the land preparation of the main field. The details of the land preparation in nurseries are the same as in the main field, and have been described later in this section. The only exception is that the leveling of soil surface is conducted more carefully in the nursery, using a bamboo bar or the side edge of the hoe blade, just before sowing. Each household prepares nurseries in the fields that have most fertile soils and have good access to irrigation water and drainage paths. On the lower slopes in the village, nurseries are made in different fields every year to prevent declines in fertility. No manure is applied. In the fields of the upper slopes, on the other hand, suitable fields for nurseries are limited due to low fertility. Therefore, the best fields are reserved for nurseries every year, with manure (chimo) application about one week after sowing.

Immediately before sowing, the water of the nursery is drained through the spillway (yima) or drainage conduit (yirudu). The seeds are sowed by men, usually the household head. Standing on the dike, he scatters a handful of seeds evenly on the mud. Water in the nursery is controlled very carefully. For about 10 days after sowing, mud should be kept in moderately wet conditions with no standing water. After that, water level is gradually increased as the seedling grows. Even then, it is recommended to drain water during the daytime in order to promote the growth of the seedlings, but keep flooded at night in order to prevent rodent attack.

Uprooting and Transplanting

When the sopuja trees begin to bear edible sour fruits in the middle of April, the transplanting season comes to the village. The rice seedlings that have been grown in nursery beds (cheshumi) are transplanted soon after the completion of the land preparation, starting from the terraced fields on the lower slopes and proceeding towards the upper slopes. The transplanting lasts about one month until transplanting in mifa on the higher slope is completed. After transplanting, the water of the paddy fields is carefully controlled in order to protect the young rice seedlings from lodging (falling down fl at). The water level is gradually increased as the rice grows, reaching a maximum level of 20-30 cm toward the end of June, the maximum tillering stage. Because this is just in the transition period from dry season to wet season, young seedlings that have just transplanted often suffer from drought when the onset of wet season is delayed.

Weeding and Stalk Bundling

Weeding is carried out once or twice during the growing season. Not only are weeds on the dikes and field surface pulled up (each weeding is called gebesuta and depang, respectively), but weeds on the dike wall are also hacked away (depade) by swinging a 2 m-long bamboo pole (depa). Weeding is carried out throughout all the paddy fields except for mifa, where the growth of weeds is slow due to infertile soil. No herbicides are applied, and pesticides are applied only when there is an outbreak of serious disease.

After the rice has headed, 10 or more piles of rice stalks are tied up into one bundle to protect the plants from lodging due to strong wind or rain. This work is required only for the traditional varieties, which have longer culms and more susceptible to lodging than improved varieties.

Harvesting

During harvesting, the culms are cut off with a sickle (bale) about 100 cm from the ear, leaving stubble 20 to 60 cm from the ground. The harvested rice crops are quickly bundled and threshed on the spot. Because the terraced fields are kept flooded even in the harvest period, a boat-shaped wooden threshing implement (jala) is used. The farmers hold the harvested stalks over their heads and beat them down onto the threshing boat floating in the flooded rice terrace. The threshed rice is put into a jute bag or fertilizer bag, and carried up to the village on their shoulders. Men can carry about 60 kg of rice at a time. From the furthest fields, it takes one hour to carry a rice bag up to the village.

Harvested rice crops are threshed before drying in the Ailao Mountains. There seem to be three reasons for this immediate threshing:

1) It is difficult to find the place for drying harvested crops because there is water in the field.
2) Because of high shattering habit of the traditional varieties, immediate threshing can minimize the loss of rice grain during carrying and drying.
3) Immediate threshing can reduce the labor of carrying harvested rice up to the village.

Harvested rice grains are spread over the rooftop (toku) of each house for drying. After drying for 2-4 days, rice grains are stored in a wooden box in the storage room. After the harvest, the terraced fields except mifa are kept fully inundated, but no crops are grown until transplanting takes place in the following year. During this dry season, however, various kinds of farming works take place.

By Adachi Shimpei, ASAFAS, Kyoto University

(To be continued)

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