Lychee growers in Luc Ngan boast many creative ways

Lychee is a specialty fruit of Luc Ngan district in particular and Bac Giang province in general. With their experience, many farmers have had unique ways to create beautiful, productive, and quality lychee gardens.

The lychee garden produces the most fruits

Most of the lychee farm of Vu Nguyen Binh's family in Quy Thinh village, Quy Son commune (Luc Ngan) is surrounded by Lang Thum Lake. Binh said that the 10-ha farm includes 7 hectares of lychee, with 1,200 trees, most of which are over 30 years old. Thanks to the good care, the trees develop well and produce high yield, nearly 10 tonnes per ha. The fruits are large, uniform, and good-looking.

During the main harvest, every day, Binh needs up to 25 workers to harvest lychees.

In this crop, the orchard turns out about 65 tonnes of fruit. According to statistics of the district Division of Agriculture and Rural Development, Binh's lychee garden is not the largest in the district, but its output is currently the highest in Luc Ngan and the whole province of Bac Giang.

Covering the orchard with plastic film

When we were still surprised by the "forest" of lychee being harvested, Binh took us to a lychee planting area covered with a closed plastic film.

According to Binh, this is the model of "covering lychees with plastic film" initiated by the district Division of Agriculture and Rural Development, on an area of 1,000sq.m. When participating in the model, he received 100 million VND (4,300 USD) in support to buy materials for installation and user manual.

It aims to limit insects, especially stem borers, making products qualified for export. By covering the plastic film, this crop, Binh's family saved nearly 3 million VND (130.8 USD) in pesticides and labor.

This is one of the measures to help farmers with sustainable agricultural production, towards organic production.

Making lychee trees bear fruit on trunk

This is the lychee garden of To Van Phu in Heo A village, Ho Dap commune. Phu said that in order to have bunches of fruit on the trunk, around July last year he had to create buds. The buds on the trunk and the treetops must be equal so that in the spring, the buds will flower simultaneously.

This approach has many benefits, with the yield increasing 50 percent. The fruits have nine appearances and are unlikely to fall off because they do not hit each other due to winds.

Phu shared: “In 2017, I applied the technique for lychee trees to produce fruit on the trunk. Before that, I saw a TV programme showing that a household in Giap Son commune (the same district) successfully implemented this new production method, so I was very excited and determined to do it”.

With his creative way, Phu's 200-tree lychee garden is estimated to turn out about 10 tonnes of fruit this crop. Some traders have come to purchase the whole garden at a price 15 percent higher than that in the market.

Unique way of carrying lychees

In Ho Dap commune as well as five other communes lying on the pass in Luc Ngan, lychees are often grown on steep mountain slopes, so it is very difficult to care for and harvest them. 

“People had to carry heavy bags of fertilizer through streams, deep ravines and slopes to reach the orchards. When harvesting, they had to carry each basket of lychees down the mountain. Sometimes they fell, and the lychees were crushed. When the flood came, they were unable to go to the gardens to take care of the trees and collect fruits," said Lang Van Yen from Nung ethnic group in Khuon Trang village, Ho Dap commune.

To improve production, Yen went to Huu Lung district (Lang Son province) to learn how to make and control pulleys and cable cars to transport custard apples of the local people. In 2020, he invested nearly 15 million VND (654 USD) to build a pulley system (using old motorbike engines) and a 150-meter long cable car system crossing streams and deep ravines to bring the lychees home.

This year, growers see a good harvest with large output, so many households in and outside Ho Dap commune want to learn Yen’s experience in making pulleys, especially amid the complicated developments of the Covid-19 epidemic, which results in a shortage of lychee harvesters.

The dynamism and creativity of lychee growers further have helped bring the trademark of "Luc Ngan lychee" farther and farther.