Cory's "house calls"

Yesterday Cory made a house call.

 Rosemary delivered an invitation to Cory from a lady in Port Margot to come photograph her wonderfully producing plantain bananas.

She received the original plant from a distribution at Port Margot church back in 2010.

Many of these hybrid plants from the Dominican Republic were already infected by a virus and the majority of the local gardens have poor soil and a type of burrowing nematode that eats up the roots of plantain so Cory had given up propagating plantain.

Cory was surprised on arrival to find THE friendly, aggressive vender that calls him from a distance to buy from her every time she sees him at the market.

He'd assumed she lived in Cap Haitian, where he'd also bought items from her in the past and traveled in for the big Port Margot market days.

She reported that the first bunch was even bigger. She turned down an offer for $9 dollars to later sell it for $12.

That big bunch needed to be brought to market via wheelbarrow due to its large size.

In addition to looking healthy and producing big bunches this plant also produced many offshoots allowing her to share with many others. Cory gave a banana offshoot and a request for the next plantain offshoot to propagate in his nursery.

Earlier in the week Cory also visited an impressive garden project headed by an OMS pastor and Brother Benjamin [on left].


They used some compost under the plants which probably really helped, and in keeping in line with our philosophy of sustainable agriculture Cory also recommended mulch with rice hulls from the local mill to protect the soil and improve the fertility and water holding capacity of the hard, rocky clay soil.

Watering a large area like this takes a lot of physical labor and mulching would help to conserve the water put on the plants, reducing the work of hauling irrigation water up from the river.

Tomato and egg plant at back of field.