RAJKOT: Strawberry, a fruit traditionally flourishing in cold and hilly places, has wonderfully adapted itself even to the harsh and arid terrains of Kutch.
A farmer in Bhuj taluka of Kutch district was hugely surprised last week when he saw sweet success budding in the plants that he had planted on a trial mode.
What helped his efforts was the fact that strawberry requires very less water compared to other fruits.
While driving past the vast Kutch strawberry fields in Reldi village, barely 20km off Bhuj town, will surely remind you of Beatles’ glorious number, ‘Strawberry fields forever’.
While you hum your way through Anjar highway from Bhuj, here’s who you need to meet — Haresh Thacker.
He brought 30,000 plants from Lonavala in Maharashtra and planted them in two acre land.
“I wanted this fruit in my farm despite knowing it grows in a cold area. But the winter in Kutch is cold and I believed I will be able to do it,” said Thacker who harvested the first samples last week.
“What we need is proper fertilizer and should not allow evaporation of water. I used Israeli model of drip irrigation of cultivation,” said Thacker, one of the pioneers in cultivation of dragon fruit. He learned his farming from Youtube also.
Many other farmers are also waiting for Thacker to get successful so that they too can start cultivation from next year.