News from the Khandroling Cooperative

[Photo by JGens:: Joe Zurylo, Yuchen Namkkai, and Nary Mitchel]

The Khandroling Cooperative team would like to give credit to Yuchen Namkhai
for her enthusiastic vision to create sustainability at Khandroling. She has actively supported all efforts to bring to fruition projects that will benefit the well-being of the
community well into the future. She's a great inspiration!

Last Sunday we met to check out the used equipment we recently purchased to make sure it fits to the tractor. The farm is still snowed in which will soon morph into 'mud season' but as soon as we can we will start to planting process. For now we are in the planning stages and  making preparations, purchasing seeds and concocting additives for soil nutrition. 

To this aim we plan on cultivating about 2 acres on the farm at Khandroling.

One acre will be devoted to an orchard primarily along the steeper slopes which

are not suitable for crops. The rest will be divided into 4 plots containing Flax

and flowers for the paper making project, barley for the eventual use in Chudlen along with our own honey, medicinal herbs for medicine program. The largest plot will contain

a community garden for vegetable production.

To this end we decided to purchase some real farm machinery to minimize our labor, we now own a set of second hand disk harrows which are used to level  the furrows left after plowing, a hiller which constructs raised beds used for row crops and a tiller  (picture below) which cultivates the soil between the rows keeping the weeds down. Once the veggies begin to come into season we will send ou notices to every one and folks can come and "pick your own" at a nominal cost per pound.

 The Harrow Slices Deep

                                         through the thick sod

                                   its noise and scent a call

                                         for the crows

                                   a feast in the making

                                        sushi wrapped in field grass

                                   the crows come, strut and caw

                                        like a teenage homey

                                        bopping out on a Saturday night

                                   they strut and they caw

                                        no discourse on the virtues of veganism

                                        no singing or chanting mystical words

                                        from places and times past

                                    the crows just are

                                          in the place of the great what is  

poem and article  by Joe Zurylo


If you would like to participate and join the cooperative team to develop lower Khandroling, contact team leader Paula Barry at paulabarry108@gmail.com. We meet irregularly but anticipate meeting more frequently as the Cooperative evolves.