All about Oxlaju through the night burned huge fires, preparation for corn and rice plantings, by local peoples. Huge. Hundred acre fires out of control swept round the Inn.
Not certain whether is occurs to all the abnormally high heat (107°) daily also means abnormally low moisture.
The winds are constant in the thirty mile per hour range and dance about in terms of direction. Fire follows it.
Nearly over, the dry season, all will end this week with the new rains.
There is a commercial product called Liquid Smoke (not the meat seasoning) that can be applied to seeds to promote germination. I think it is made by passing vegetative smoke through water and soaking the circles of blotting paper in that liquid.
The air itself over the past week has had that much vegetative smoke in it, and the proof is in the Pudding. Date Palms and a few other hard to germinate seeds, part of the experimental Agriculture associated with Oxlaju suddenly began all at once to sprout. Thirty at a time, Dates and other fruit bearing palms have shot out their first growth. Seedling beds have been long prepared for the event, and months and months have past in anticipation of germination. (Date Palms are the example of the oldest known seeds to germinate, having been found and in the tombs of Egypt, subsequently grown) I knew they would sprout, but had no idea the full effect of -for lack of a better word- "Liquid Smoke"
The morning is spent planting and tagging the varieties recently sprouting.
Sun grown coffees, Dragon Fruits, Apple Cactus are already growing in their respective zones, and these Dates will join the sixteen types already growing.
