Hello there....can i play too?

[matty]

i was only looking for a jam recipe....but could not resist joining this thing! very nice. am writingto u from a small farm in ghana...experiment, demonstration. only just starting, and trying! good fun though. look forward to being of help and getting help! someone once said that we have to learn from other people's mistakes as we have not got the time to make them all ourselves....i would drink to that....wouldn't u?
self sufficient would b nice....Brendan Grimshaw ring a bell to anyone?go on then, look it up! have just heard of him recently, and well, an inspiration to us all...

[Magpie]

Hi Matty, welcome to the site.

I must admit to knowing not much about Ghana - what sort of things can you farm there?

[Wombat]

Wow Matty, Ghana!

Don't know Brendan Grimshaw, will have to look him up.

Who are you demonstrating to? are you developing sustainable practices to teach the loal populace? Have you seen any of the stuff put out by VITA or IDTG?

Tell us more about what you are up to.....

Nev

[Andy Hamilton]

Hello there Matty and welcome from west Africa, I think you are the first person here to represent the African continent. What sort of things do you farm? The growing conditions must be very different to ours in the UK

I looked up Mr Grimshaw, the real treasure Island guy sounds like an interesting character.

Tend to make enough mistakes of my own to learn by

look forward to reading your posts

[greenbean]

Hello Matty,
Welcome.
Never been to Ghana, but have covered a bit of Central and Southern Africa. Do you have prickly pears? (That's a fruit tree not a personal irritation by the way ). I recall a great jam made from pp's, if you want I will try and find the recipe.

[couscous]

Hi Matty and welcome.
It sounds really interesting in Ghana. Are you demonstrating the practice of farming etc?
What sort of jam recipe were you looking for. I've got lots of great jam recipes - but do you have the same sort of fruit in Ghana as we do here.
Do you get imported fruit. If I want to make mamalade I have to get the imported fruit from Spain. They make a prickly-pear jam in spain which is nice - very similar to orange mamalade only without the rind.

[matty]

well. i can see this forum stealing more of my time than i thought it would. but that is "quite okay". Mr. Wombat....thank you for the VITA mention. had not heard of them before. interesting. i am hoping to use the Gyapa for the boys to cook lunch on, stir up some interest in it. and the demosntrating will b for local poplace, yes. sustainable development. two big words. trying to demonstrate that good crops dont need white men, fertiliser and tractors. donkeys, compost, praying mantid, variety and good seed do the job. mulching, rain harvesting, mulitpurpose trees, drip irrigation do just as well! abit more work though. and making all this in an available way is a little harder. if anyone knows how to make drip irrigation tubes from scratch, by the way, then ideasare welcomed! but allthis needs to be seen to be believed. already, have had some succes with growing maize on tie-ridges next to the local way. we have had bad rains, and many crops have been lost! at the momnet, the concentration is on using adapted seed. u can try growing moneymaker tomatoes here, but under the sun, well. interesting. and again, seeing is believing. "local" tomatoes are cropping good if they have 3fruits....so then to have a better harvest, u need better seed. but where do get the money from for better seed?vicious is it not?
ona lighter note, prickyl pears? have looked it up, nad never seen them here. will try and find some seed thou. from somewhere! but i made good jam in the end. i just wish a knew what the fruit is. it is a small berry just under 3cm wide, growing a bsuh with thorn 8cmlong...so picking is interesting, but the jam worked! when i find the name, i was post up a recipe for it, as i managed to the sugar right too. somehow! and well, in answer to another question, here, cash crops growing are cocoa (wondered where that cadbury chocolate comes from? look on the back!)pineapples, pawpaw. some bananas. local foods, plantain, yam, cassava, maize. vegetable- not many! tomatoes, onoin, eggplant, some beans. what works best. but mulching, and compost sort most things out, some bit of shading added in, and you cna just about grow anything. they grow strawberries in burkina faso u know! but i think that is a project for next year here. biggest problem i have had with growing stuff is lettuce...bitter....tough! so some simplified hydroponics are goign to be needed soon! but anyone who has tried to make drip irrigationtubes fromscratch might have some interesting ideas for me! i think car inner tubes or bike inner tubes could work, but pricey!

[couscous]

What about a hosepipe with holes pierced in?

[Wombat]

G'Day Matty,

Glad to be of service. Would it be possible or make sense for me to send you some seed from Aus? If you PM me with your address and the sort of seeds that you are looking fo I will see what I can do.

Sorry, I don't have much experience with drip irrigation!

Good luck and I hope you get better rains soon.

Nev

[couscous]

I can to the same for you too from England. My e-mail address is on my profile.