September Pictures

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Here are some pictures from September:

Backyard garden of corn, peanuts, and beans 
Fields of tall corn abound in village at this time of year



A view down the road during rainy season. It is almost hard to remember what this looked like a few months ago when there was no green

My host dad's peanut fields next to the road

My host dad cooking corn to lay inside his fish nets as bait. This is the first time I have seen even touch a pot; men do not cook meals in village

A flowering baobob tree

Look closely in between the rocks and you will see a small cashew tree

Rocks temporarily protecting a young cashew tree until my work partner has time to build individual tree fences

Another innovative temporary cashew tree protector

Yet another cashew tree tucked inside big rocks

My favorite of the tree protectors

Awesome cloud formations in my village. A storm is brewing

More awesome clouds

Grazing on beans from my backyard garden

I had to look in my field crop manual to know if cowpeas (black-eyed peas) could be eaten green. They taste a lot like sugar snap peas in the states!


I am a farmer! Beans are ripe, corn is just days away, and peanuts are close to being ready to harvest (photo from Sept 5)

Self-care day at the Kedougou house after the last day of camp. I haven't applied the body scrub yet in this picture, but the face mask and hair scrub are in

Self-care day appetizers of bread, cheese and fruit with honey and mustard for dipping. Dinner was fried chicken, mac and cheese, salad, caramelized onions, and mashed potatoes

Flowers growing on a fence. These were not planted, the just sprung up during the rainy season

Jabare (a bitter root vegetable somewhat similar to a potato) growing in field by the river. Many are over 4 feet tall

The water in the river has risen to the level of the bamboo bridge. The areas where my host mom and other women garden are now completely underwater

Another view of the flooded river

The river. Hard to believe it was dry in April

The beans in my backyard made my corn stalks very heavy. They fell over in a subsequent rain/wind storm

A Leucaena tree planted by my anciens--it is growing a crazy amount of seed pods


Some corn from my backyard. I picked one of them a bit early, but the ear on the left is bigger than any ear I have seen yet in Senegal. It may be due to my soil amendments, intercropping with beans, and/or thinning my corn plants
A storm front coming in

Another view of the storm front

Corn from my garden and kungee, a delicious bush fruit that I foraged for breakfast one morning. Kungee kind of tastes like a tart pear

My mango grafts are thriving!

A giant spider (whip scorpion?) on my back porch last week. The picture does not do it justice

I went to a baptism in Kedougou for the first child of my host sister!

Me with the new baby--two weeks old

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