The photos in this section were all taken in April 2006, near the end of the dry season. This is the best time of year to tour the Monchon rice plains since the roads are dry and the stubble from rice and grasses has been burned off. As you review the photos, make careful note of the very flat terrain and its relationship to the the canal system.
This is one of my favorite photos since it illustrates the flat, expansive nature of the Monchon rice plains. The farm is about seven miles long and roughly three miles wide. Everything in this photo is a part of the Monchon property.
This is a typical field border road adjacent to the principle canal just before it joins a second supply canal from the right. Local villagers sometimes seine for fish in these canals. Not much to catch, but I guess every little bit helps.
Nice view of a primary artery leading from the main canal. This canal services about 1,200 acres with irrigation water and drainage. The farm's northwest border is about where the distant tree line is located.
This field is just a bit higher in elevation than most. It would make a dandy corn field once the field is graded and irrigation pumps are installed.
Nice view of the flat terrain. Makes for a rice farmer's dream.
Junction of main and minor canal arteries. Water travels on the level for miles throughout the canal system, illustrating the near-flat terrain. The Russian engineers did a splendid job designing and installing the canal network.
It is standard procedure to burn off the previous year's rice and grass stubble each February or March.
This is the junction point mentioned in other sections. There is a large dam in the main canal here, as well as two smaller dams in major arteries leading off on either side. The crossing point over the main canal makes this a natural meeting place. I can envision a small concession stand operated from a shipping container with refrigeration and lighting supplied by a small generator. This would be a nice business for a local villager with some entreprenurial skills.
A minor canal draining into a major artery. Amerigui Plantation will keep the water level low enough in the major canals to drain the fields all year round. Irrigation water will be delivered to the top side of each field through 15" underground PVC pipe supplied by diesel-powered pumps drawing from major canals.
Nice view of the overall farm looking from southwest to northeast. The headquarters site is just behind the most distant trees.
The land pictured here will likely be the first area targeted for landgrading and planting. Amerigui's operations here can be carried out in such a way as to minimize effects on the villagers' activities. A few cattle are brought to this area each dry season from the mountainous interior in search of better grazing opportunities. This practice will be disallowed once Amerigui's cropping operations commence.
Nice perspective of the land.
One challenge to farming here is providing economical ways to move large farm machinery and articulated grain trucks from one side of the canals to the other.
The soils at Monchon appear to be predominately clay, but do have a distinctive fine sand content as well. Higher elevations seem to have mixed soils more suitable to corn production. In any event, all fields will be rotated between rice and corn in order to prevent red and indigenous rice varieties from germinating and competing with pure rice varieties.
The rice fields are currently divided into 2-3 acre fields defined by field levees. It appears that the Russian engineers used a typical levee plow to mark off all the fields, and these levees remain today after 25 years.
Nomadic ranchers move cattle to the coastal areas in the dry season. Enforcing a no-grazing zone around Monchon will be a challenge, but I am told that the local villagers also prefer the cattle to be kept elsewhere.