Say hello to Manuela. She is one of my dear friends and a powerful leader in Barichara, Colombia. It is largely thanks to her that syntropic agroforestry has arrived in our local community as a powerful way to grow food, restore soils, and bring native forest back to degraded lands.
In this brief article, I would like to share how Manuela is applying syntropic agroforestry techniques to restore a dry stream in one of the important drainages of our territory. Yesterday we walked the land with her and were blown away by all that she has set in motion throughout the last 15 months.
Have a look at this way of planting below an established adult tree. The basic idea is to let the adult tree serve as a nursery for baby forest — by planting in a circle with dense clusters of diverse plants that are in harmony with each other. There are cactus and succulents for holding water that reside next to nitrogen-fixing leguminous plants, with fruit-bearing and structural plants for growing the future canopy of forest.
This specific planting was done about five months ago. Nearly all of it from seed. And just look at how it is thriving as we enter the dry season today. There is shade, lush greenery, and growing biomass for accumulation of healthy soils. And it is also storing water in the land with a concentration of interactions above and below the ground.
Here is one of the many contour swales where lines of syntropy have been put in place with a diversity of plant life. The swales are parallel to the water drainages so that as water enters the shape of the land, some of it is held in the root structures and growing soil matrix where forest is being reestablished.
This is land where native forest was cut down for monoculture crops and later used for livestock such as cattle or goats. The soils have been compacted and dried out. There are large open areas where sunlight bakes the earth. By establishing these lines of diverse reforestation, the process is being reversed. Shade arrives. Water cycles below the tree canopy. Biomass accumulates in the root structures below ground.
Here is another area on the land where the same idea was applied. Plant a line of diversity on the side of the stream bed to help restore the water table and protect the area when rainwaters flow.
The mulch you see here is from cycling the growth of the plants in the line by actively pruning them. Cut branches off of plants that were selected for rapid growth and drop them at the base of the contour swale. In a matter of months (here in the tropics), this accumulates a lot of healthy decomposition for speeding up the soil and plant growth.
Another technique for the open areas is to plant clusters around a baby tree so that the diversity-effect is still present. Notice how different this is from just planting the tree alone. By densely placing several kinds of plants in the same spot, a synergistic relationship takes hold that helps the tree survive while supporting interactions that accumulate in the system as a whole.
Here is a new contour swale that was just established about a month ago. It runs for 200 meters along the hillside. These swales are parallel to each other in a way that behaves as if there were terraces — meaning that Manuela has established several lines of reforestation as you move up the hillside from the stream bed below. As water runs down the hill during a rain event, more of it is absorbed into the ground to slowly restore the stream through subterranean drainage.
At the same time, patterns of forest are taking hold in the land. Pretty amazing isn’t it? I hope this short tour of Manuela’s project is inspiring for you. If you’d like to follow along, she has an Instagram account here.
