Cushioning Climate Change with Farm Water Catchments

KUdesign said 10 months ago

Hello, we are students in the 2009/10 Industrial Design class at Kansas University in Lawrence Kansas USA. We are interested in applying socially directed design to make meaningful contributions to solving everyday problems faced by the majority of people in our world today. We are offering our collaboration as design students to contribute to this IDEA and assist in advancing its presentation or implementation in some way. Inspired by the problem statement posted we have ideas and questions we hope can be clarified by collaborative input from those of you who are experts in your field or have lived or observed the condition the IDEA intends to resolve. Here are some of the initial questions we would like some help with:

How is the flow of water for irrigation controlled? Does it need to be?
How long can the water be stored?
How can the insect problem be mitigated... can the reservoir be more contained?

roosenberg said 10 months ago

Thanks so much for your interest.

The flow of water from the reservoir to the field would be determined by the topography of each site.
Drip irrigation only requires low pressure which can be accomplished by having about 2 meters of elevation between the water source and the field. This could be accomplished by gravity in the best of siting. The treadle pumps distributed by Kickstart could lift a fair volume of water a meter or two if needed. Greater lifts would probably need animal power or an internal combustion engine power. Ditching water to furrows between the crop rows could be practical with some attention to grading the slope of the fields. This requires matching to the soil type and a rapid rate of flow.
2) During the height of the dry season in each year, the evaporation rate becomes fairly high. We think the starting point is working on irrigation that will fill-in during draughts in the rainy season or to extend the season for a few months.
3) Tillers International has limited expertese in insect control and would want to bring in some expertese. Fish might be part of the solution if a system could be devised to keep them alive through the dryest part of the year or easily restock them with the first rains.
The expertese of Tillers is in excavating with animal power and preparing the fields. We are most open to added research and observations.
Thanks so much and check the website of Tillers International for more background.

Victoria said 10 months ago

Drip tape is widely used by produce growers in northern Ohio for irrigation from ponds. It is gravity powered when possible, or small gas engines operate pumps. Amish farmers use horsepower to lay driptape, which is usually taken up and relaid annually. We could get input/collaboration from growers and extension agents here if you think it would be valuable, or schedule farm visits.

roosenberg said 10 months ago

Drip tape should be available in Eastern Africa from India. The Acumen Fund has provided "patient capital" to KB enterprise to make it in India. We should be encourage Acumen Fund to support manufacturing drip tape in Africa as well. Drip tape is such an efficient method of delivering water, especially in porous soils in the semi arid tropics where evaporation is so great. When funding is available, it would be good to get an Amish tape and mulch laying implement over to Africa for critiquing and potential down-sizing to the animal power available. Do you have any idea of the draft required to pull the driptape laying tool? Is it the same tool as demonstrated at Horse Progress Days?

Thanks. We would enjoy bringing East Africans to discuss techniques with the Amish farmers. Budgets may require that we settle for video footage of their tools and practices.

KUdesign said 10 months ago

Over the last couple weeks our group has been working to try to better understand and contribute to this idea. One of the big issues we grappled with understanding was the scale of this project. We have made several slides to share/explain this project to our class including a scale drawing comparing the land and water volume. Here's a link to a pdf of our slides: http://bit.ly/4nAh0h

We've included some additional questions that we are going to investigate. Thank you very much for sharing your idea. I hope that you find our input helpful.

roosenberg said 10 months ago

The measurements used for the typical reservoir were 50 meters by 40 meters at the surface of a pond 4 meters deep. The volume was estimated with side slopes of about 40%. Our estimate was 4,800 cubic meter volume.

As to your Additional Questions on the Googles Doc .pdf,

1) The likelihood of retaining water is always a funtion of how the bottom is lined. We would work to find a decent local clay and to compact it with animal feet (literal sheeps' foot compactors).

2) I have not calculated the evaporation loss. During the growing season the humidity is fairly high. I would appreciate seeing what might be lost in 2 months.

3) Tillers does not have experts in tropical fish survival. Tilapia are probably the easiest to stock in Northern Uganda. It would be good to have research on the the survival characteristics of several species.

4) It would be great if a simply maintained culture would precipitate sedimentation. Any information you can find would help.

5) Salination of the soil is the most common damage done to soil by irrigation. Since this project proposes gathering rain runoff rather than ground water, it should not add much to the soil. Further, the problem is much less when irrigating in higher humidity growing seasons rather than in the height of the dry season. The possibiltiy of using conservation tillage by planting into a rolled down mat of cover crop would help reverse any damage.

Isaiahchah said 10 months ago

Isaiah F. C., Box 242 Bamenda
OLAW CIG Cameroon
While endorsing the idea I wish to know if this idea has been generated by this certain community in Nothern Uganda? Has it been acertained that this community will 'own' the idea and the project?
I have been working with projects in rural areas that do not sustain because they were developed for the farmers