Growing Food in a Hotter, Drier Land by Gary Paul Nabhan

Author:Gary Paul Nabhan [Nabhan, Gary Paul]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Building Soil Means Building Moisture: Trapping Silt and Organic Matter Along Dry Washes in Sudan

I would be remiss if I left you with the impression that only indigenous farmers in the Sonoran Desert have found effective means to harvest flood-washed soil and composted organic matter along with rainwater. In the Red Sea Hills of northern Sudan, farmers of the Beja culture have accomplished virtually the same process of soil renewal and water retention. They build silt traps in and near the millet and sorghum fields placed along the usually dry wadi or khor streambeds in narrow valleys that are naturally vegetated by two acacias known as samer and sayal. These two nitrogen-fixing legumes not only protect the streambanks from erosion, but generate the organic matter that gently floods into Beja fields after being slowed by the careful placement of low-lying crescent-shaped embankments immediately above the grain fields. Not only is water delivered to the crops, but silt and organic matter are deposited in a manner that renews and improves soil texture and moisture-holding capacity.8

Of course, the Beja culture is not the only community in the Old World to harvest organic matter along with the stormwaters that occasional course down ephemeral waterways. It is presumed that the ancient Nabatean culture of the Negev Desert in present-day Jordan, Palestine, and Israel had similar means of capturing and utilizing flood-washed detritus in their fields and orchards. The acacias and other shrubs that sparsely cover the upland soils of the Negev were undoubtedly allies to the Nabateans in successfully building soil moisture-holding capacity in their arid region between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea.

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