: Engineer Spent 14 Years Growing 500 Rare Medicinal Plants Around His Kerala House #IndiaNEWS #Farming For Chottanikkara-native Ezekiel Paulose, his favourite thing to do is the collection and protection

Engineer Spent 14 Years Growing 500 Rare Medicinal Plants Around His Kerala House #IndiaNEWS #Farming
For Chottanikkara-native Ezekiel Paulose, his favourite thing to do is the collection and protection of rare medicinal plants.

But farming is not just a hobby for him. He hails from a farming family where his ancestors were full-time cultivators. “My father was a mechanical engineer but loved farming so much. It was he who first started collecting medicinal plants. That’s how I got interested too,�? says Ezekiel, who works as a systems architect in Bengaluru.

The medicinal herbs garden is put together on the four-acre land near his home. Here there are 500 varieties, including rudraksha, paarijatha, cluster fig, gurmar, Lakshmi taru and betadine plants. Other plants in his garden include shimshapa from Sri Lanka, which is tree turmeric proven to be effective for skin problems and anali vegam from Agasthyamalai used as an antidote for viper bites.

One portion of Ezekiels medicinal herbs garden.

Apart from medicinal plants, there’s a space reserved for some exotic plant species like the pitcher as well as duck, black fowl and fish farming. “I am practising an integrated farming method which is the maintenance of livestock, poultry and fish in the same place. One’s excreta becomes the other’s food. For example, fishes are kept in a 1,45,000 litre tank from which the sludge is collected to be used as the food for ducks and black fowls,�? explains the farmer.

Additionally, Ezekiel’s house in Kerala is equipped with a rainwater harvester and solar panels which takes care of the entire water and electricity needs of the family.

The medicine man

It was during 2007-2008 that Ezekiel kicked off his medicinal herbs collection. “This hobby requires effort and to a great extent, money too. When I got my first job and got to travel around the country as part of it, I took the plant collection seriously. Sometimes it is from fellow hobbyists in exchange for any other plant and otherwise, it is bought. I also became part of a community of medicinal plant collectors,�? shares the 39-year-old.

Ezekiel’s friends in Karnataka and Northern states usually help him in finding rare plants and send them across. “When people visit my garden in search of any plant or medicines, depending upon the availability, I sell them or even give them away for free,�? he says.

While the farmer was working in Bengaluru he used to visit his home in Ernakulam every weekend to make sure the plants were fine. After the lockdown and the subsequent work-from-home orders, he now finds time to look after the plants. “My family, including my wife and two children, are also engaged in these activities.