FARM LEGENDS - THE RISE AND FALL OF THE WATER APPLE

By Dr. R Sudarshan

The water apple is an extraordinary organism.

The plant grows rapidly and begins fruiting in 3 years, each plant bears hundreds of kilos of yield, and attracts hordes of birds and squirrels, but the whole merriment gets over in about a month, once a year. It is a rapid-fire existence. In doing that, the plant will have processed an enormous amount of soil nutrients, water, and sunlight all the time and the ton of fruits that hangs is nothing but a heap of color capsulated nutrition. And since it cannot be sold much, it is nature's way of fabricating a beautiful face for its own biogeochemical cycle.

In the first season of its enormous yield last year, we were perplexed about how to find a market for the bounty. Now in its second year of double bounty, we are very clear that the water apples have a roleplay in the farms, of hydrating the soil in summer and providing quickly assimilable nuggets of nutrition to the roots.

Every produce in an organic farm need not be sold well in the market. Some could just be legends that should live, die and make a difference to the system that bears them.

Water apples are one such. They perish as quickly as they ripen, just to be able to litter the farm floor and sustain other lives in summer.

For any relevant query, message 81051 12990.

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Padma Farms, Farmer's House, # 1A - 13th Cross, Kalidasa Road, VV Mohalla, Mysore.

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