I'm new here and I'd love to be a part of this family too. Agriculture is one of the things I do with my spare time. I sometimes visit my home garden which is just beside our building block to check the conditions of my plants. I do this anytime i am at home or whenever i had some free time. I still went there this morning to take out weeds growing fast.
This year rainy season began so fast. it started in the month of April. Most farmers were happy because of the new weather which had improved better than last year.
Last year, the rain began in late June and stops in July. It didn't rain for about a month and half. Most crops were burnt by the harsh sunny weather. By the time it starts raining in early august last year, it was already late to plant some crops, however, some farners still took the risk and it worked.
This year, i can say that I'm one of the first farmers to clear the farm land for planting. I made sure our garden is totally covered to avoid goats and chickens eating up my plants.
My dad spray chemicals to kill off all the little grasses remaining in our garden. We waited for rain to fall for three more times before planting our maize.
Then the unexpected happens, after planting the rain stopped for about three weeks and when the maize began to grow, only few germinated. We thoughts birds and chickens flying into the garden must have eaten up all the maize grains.
Moreover, my dad planted again since its started raining properly now. The same thing repeated. We saw tiny holes dugged in the spot where we had planted each maize. It's absolutely clear that it's not bird nor hen but other animals we don't know.
Therefore, we decided to stop sowing for a while, we left the grown maize unattended to for few weeks too. The garden got bushy as you can see. We were working on hiring someone to clear the bushy part off, make strong heaps as suggested by other farmers who also made similar complains. They said, rodents are the ones destroying the maize that even the germinated ones are been cut off from the root as the creatures sucks the water out. How wicked those animals are!
We planted some again in one side and it's now gerninated fast, even though few of it was also attacked by this destroyers yet we didn't give up. We had hope since some of the newly okabted maize survived.
Other plants we sowed in the garden are doing so well especially the melon. We planted it on the outer side of our garden round about and it's already sprouting!.
We also have potatoes growing in one side of the garden as well. It stopped growing when the rain stopped last year. We thought its finally withered away but here is it spreading already.
All pictures are taken by me
Thanks for reading !