The season is now lively, with the Japanese bush warblers practicing their song "Hoo, hokekyo!", the spring thunder beginning to rumble, and insects crawling out of their slumber and flying around.
The cherry trees in the garden are in full bloom, and the nearby Jindai cherry tree, the oldest in Japan, is about to bloom.
This year, the annual preparation of the stepping hotbed (a seedbed kept warm by fermentation heat to grow summer vegetable seedlings) once again led to connections with many people.
Perhaps because we have been spreading the word on social media, we have received requests to come and see the project, and a farmer from Kofu came to try it out for himself. We have also been able to help a farmer in Hokuto City who wants to try making greenhouses this year. We are very grateful that our number of friends is steadily increasing.
Work on the greenhouse begins in the winter when the leaves start to fall. We go into the nearby mountains and rake up the huge amount of fallen leaves.
Next, we cut the rice straw. We use an old tool called an oshikiri to cut the rice straw harvested last year into three equal parts.
We receive large amounts of rice husks from nearby rice farmers who are having trouble disposing of them, and we also get large amounts of rice bran from a nearby coin-operated rice mill and the agricultural cooperative's direct sales store. We are conscious of using local resources as much as possible.
The mixture of fallen leaves, straw, rice husks, and rice bran is kept the same every year, with the ratio of fallen leaves, straw, rice husks, and rice bran being 10:10:1:1.
The greenhouse frame is made from plywood and timber and will last for several years. Holes are drilled into the ground at the bottom of the frame to prevent water from accumulating, and bamboo is laid down to create an air layer. If water accumulates, the temperature will not be maintained.
In March, the greenhouse preparation begins! It takes four days to complete.
On the first day, we mixed all the ingredients. We poured a lot of water over 400L of fallen leaves and 400L of straw, and took our time to mix them evenly with the rice bran and rice husks.
When you pile up the mixed materials, it looks like an ohm. In fact, it's a mass of countless microorganisms, so it might as well be a single living organism.
If you leave it like this with the sheet on overnight, fermentation will begin and heat will be generated by microbial activity. After about three days, microbial activity will reach its peak, and a thermometer inserted will read over 70°C. Fermentation in this state is called aerobic fermentation, and oxygen-loving microorganisms work explosively, eating the ingredients and generating heat through metabolism.
A temperature of 70°C is too hot to keep warm, and the decomposition proceeds all at once, causing the temperature to plummet once the decomposition is complete. Therefore, to lower the temperature to the desired level, the material is placed in a frame and pressed down firmly with the feet. Pressing the frame creates just the right amount of oxygen, allowing the microbial activity to continue for just the right amount of time.
Once all the ingredients have been pressed in, cover with soil and you're done.
The fermentation heat, which continues slowly with just the right amount of oxygen, lasts for about three months, and the temperature can be maintained at just under 20 degrees even on cold nights during the summer vegetable seedling growing period from March to May.
What's so great about this stepping hotbed is that there's absolutely no waste and it's all good!
Collecting tons of fallen leaves from the mountains, cutting tons of rice straw, collecting tons of rice husks and rice bran, mixing it all together, letting it ferment, and then stepping into wooden crates. It seems like a lot of work!
However, once you decide to do it, you will be making use of the resources of the Satoyama that are no longer in use, and by getting the help of many people who are in desperate need, you will be able to make unexpected connections and expand your circle of people.
It is a truly off-grid heated carpet that can be heated without relying on electricity or oil.
After fermenting as a hotbed, the fallen leaves and straw will eventually turn into soil and can be used to sow seeds, nurturing new life.
There are so many more examples I could list. I sincerely hope that this circle will continue to expand in the future. And then, just as this big spring event was over, I came down with a cold lol. It was just when it was snowing a lot and I couldn't do anything, so I stayed in bed for four days and somehow managed to recover. It's easy to get sick in the spring, so try to eat foods that are easy on the body, eat seasonal foods, and flush out the toxins that have accumulated over the winter ♪
