Barnyard Millet Cultivation on Slash-and-Burn Fields in the Shiba Village,
Miyazaki Prefecture, the Kyushu Island
OBATA Hiroki
(Archaeological Operation Center, University of Kumamoto)
1. Location of the Shiba Village and history of slash-and-burn agriculture
The Shiba village is located on the high mountain district with altitude more 800m. The administrative
district belongs to Miyazaki Prefecture. In the area of Miyazaki the Shiba Village is situated at the most
western side bordering on Kumamoto Prefecture. The 96% of area is occupied by mountains covered with
deep forest. Comparing the annual average temperature with other areas in Japan it is almost similar with
East Northern District, Akuta and Aomori Prefecture. In winter it is very cold and in summer there are only
ten days in which the day’s maximum temperature rises up to 25 degrees. These climatic conditions keep
suitable humidity in field soil good for growth of summer crops. And the geographical features of mountain
slanting surface are relatively gentle. These natural conditions have brought up the development of slashand-burn agriculture in this region.
Although we can not make clear correctly when slash-and-burn farming began in this region, the first
article of slash-and-burn agriculture in this region is seen in the historical record written in 1746. At that
time there were 5375 inhabitants consisted of 588 families and one family had fields (garden) of 560
square meter area and the slash-and-burn field of 5500 square meter area which is about ten times area
as much as fields (SASAKI 1998).
In Modern time there were so many families occupied with slash-and-burn farming in the 1950s. The
policy forestation propulsion began in 1960 created many converts to forestation worker and changed
slash-and-burn fields to conifer forest. Accompanied with development of market economy the number of
occupants to slash-and-burn fields have decreased gradually and then almost lapsed in the 1960s.
Shiba Kuniko, this time informer, and her husband have continued to cultivation of crops on slashand-burn fields for 60 years on Mukoyama district in the Shiba Village. They are the last slash-and-burn
farmers in Japan keeping the traditional farming style. Recently slash-and-burn cultivation revives and
increases at many places in Japan. But they are not real occupations but leisure or commercialism activities.
On these points we can say they are the real last slash-and-burn farmers. However scale of their farming
on slash-and-burn field is reduced now because of financial problems. Since several years ago their son
and his wife have kept farming and made effort to keep cereals seeds cultivated on slash-and-burn field as
a part time work instead of them.
Therefore now is a turning time when we notice an importance of slash-and-burn agriculture complex
in historical context and rethink it as one of the most ecologically harmonious and sophisticated methods of
cultivation. It is a just reason why I introduce slash-and-burn agriculture in the Shiba Village this time.
2. Cycle of farming in the Shiba and the Mera region
Seeing typological divisions of slash-and burn in world wide scale, the slash-and-burn in this region is in a
category of ” millet cultivation type” under which mainly millet, for example, foxtail, barnyard one,
buckwheat and beans are cultivated for self consumption.
Slash-and-burn in this region is classified two types by the season of burning field. One has a burning
time in summer called “Natsuyaki Yabo”, “Okiyaki Yabo” or “Jika Yabo”, and the other has a burning time in
late spring called “Haruyaki Yabo”. “Natuyaki Yabo” is done after summer solstice day. A field in objective
area for slash-and-burn is cleared cutting the trees to dry from late autumn to middle winter in the previous
year of burning. The work of clearing field is called “Yabo Harai” and work of cutting trees is called “Ki
Oroshi”.
In the first year after burning cut trees and bushes, soon seeds of buckwheat and turnip called “Heike
Kabu” are sowed. Growth time of buckwheat is very short less than 80 days, therefore farmers can eat
them at the beginning of early autumn same year. The reason of sowing turnip seeds in same field with
buckwheat is to reduce the work for weeding.
In the second year after weeding the field farmers sow barnyard millet seeds, then tills the field
lightly with hoe at the later half of May.
In the third year farmer sows the seeds of red beans, Azuki, at the beginning of summer. Azuki
struggles against disturbance of weeds and grows up over the height of weeds.
In the last year farmer plants soybeans, Daizu. Sprout of soybeans is very delicate to weeds therefore
it needs weeding and cleaning the field. The last year’s slash-and-burn soil is not fertile enough to grow up
cereals millet but has suitable condition to grow up beans producing nitrogen (Fig.1).
In the case of “Haruyaki Yabo”, farmers clean field cutting trees in the previous autumn and burn it
next May and then sow barnyard millet seeds. In the second year they plant barnyard millet too or foxtail
millet. And in the third year they plant soybeans. In the forth (last) year they plant barnyard millet again
(Fig.1). The style of planting on slash-and-burn field is observed the Mera region, neighborhood of the
Shiba Village, 20km away from the Shiba.
After four times planting the field is abandoned as fertility declines and weeds invade. The recovery of
forest may take decades (SASAKI 1998).
3. Instruments for slash-and-burn agriculture
1) Cleaning of forest
To cut stems and branches of trees the farmers use machetes. The labor of cutting trees is one of the
hardest work in slash-and-burn agriculture. Not to loss time they move from tree to tree using special
instrument called “Tsuku”. With this method they can spend all day time on the trees working, resting, and
lunching without claming down on the ground.
2) Sowing seeds
Soon after burning dried branches and weeds they sows buckwheat seeds in the ash and sweep the ash to
encase seeds into ash and distribute seeds equally over the field using broom made of stems of
“Suzutake” which is one of the species of bamboo grass．
3) Harvesting crops
Recently farmers cut the bottom of stem of barnyard millet because of demands for fodder using
sickle comprised of a long curved blade attached to a long handle. After cutting the stems they tie up them
in a bundle and then cut the stem under part of ears again using harvesting knife recycled the blade of
sickle called “Hiechigiri Hocho”. Another type of “Hiechigiri Hocho” that we sow is made from a blade of big
scythe. Interestingly how to hold and use them is entirely same with that of prehistoric stone reaping knife.
4) Threshing of grains
Before threshing of grains farmer dry the ears of barnyard millet with special kits called “Amando”. To dry
the ears are put in the “Ama” and burned slightly with fire. Work of drying and bulling the ears is called
“Hie Koukashi”. Worker hits the dried ears on the straw mat with wooden hammer called “Donchi”. To sort
out grains of barnyard millet “Temi” and “Toshi” are used. After that they put sorted grains into mortar
and hull pounding kit called “Fumiusu” to remove the glumes. The work of removing glumes with
“Fumiuse” was so hard that workers created some songs of labor to endure hard work. In another case
for hulling or removing glumes farmers utilized a wooden mortar and mallet.
4. The main crops in the slash-and-burn cultivation
As we saw above, especially in the Mera region, the main crops of the slash-and-burn cultivation in this
region is barnyard millet. It is suggested that buckwheat, Azuki, soybean are not main but all additional
crops.
In the Shiba region there were 4 or 5 subspecies of barnyard millet about twenty years ago (Fig.2).
The farmers select and plant them according to the sowing time or an elevation of the field. The most early
fruit specie is Inobie. Inobie was cultivated on the field with the altitude of 1200m. Next early rice plant is
Shirobie. Shirobie was cultivated on the field with the altitude of 1000m. Kebie was on the field with the
altitude of 800m. Kurobie was on 600m. One another subspecies called Tamobie existed. Tamobie was not
edible for people, however was planted on slash-and-burn field with edible barnyard millets together. It had
an effect that edible crops were not eaten by sparrows. Inobie have vanished already (MATSUNAGA 2005).
In the region foxtail millet is also planted on the slash-and-burn field except barnyard millet. And the
farmers have cultivated rice on the paddy field in the valley or on the wet portion of slash-and-burn field
too. They, however, seem to depend on barnyard millet than foxtail one or rice. An old lady living in the
Shiba Village, whose father has experience of farming barnyard millet and rice, told me as his father’s story
that rice was more delicious than barnyard millet but not stronger than barnyard millet when cold weather
did severe damage to the millet harvest and that every years barnyard millet saved farmers lives surely.
Additionally to avoid crisis of extermination of crops in bad weather year the farmers sorted some
subspecies of barnyard millet and planted them on the slash-and-burn fields with different altitude. That
effected difference of harvesting time per subspecies. It seems a very excellent wisdom to save their lives.
5. What is an advantage of slash-and-burn comparing with a field?
The most important advantage making crops on the slash-and-burn field is an unnecessariness of
manuring which fertilizes the soil for several years and a continual planting with less labor on the farming
field than on the rice paddy fields. Surly the grain of barnyard millet cultivated on slash-and-burn field is
more delicious than the cultivated one on field or garden. However the harvest rate of barnyard millet on
slash-and-burn field is less 30% than on field or garden. Furthermore a labor of cutting big trees and
carrying heavy harvest from field to home is very hard.
However we should see them on another view point. Yokoyama (2005) stressed that secondary forest
appeared after abandonment of slash-and-burn bears abundant useful wild plants, for food, medicine, and
processing materials. A case study of slash-and-burn agriculture in Laos shows us that about 50% of 148
spices of useful wild plants in a mountain district in North Laos are yielded from secondary forests (fallow)
resulted by slash-and-burn agriculture, slash-and-burn field itself, or pathway to there. Therefore we should
pay attention not only to a productivity of slash-and-burn as a field for cultivated crops but also a
potentiality of that as a field producing useful wild plants.
Reference (in Japanese)
MATSUNAGA Atsushi 2005 “Kagura” and folklore of mountain district in Miyazaki Prefecture. University and service for
the area. pp.141-163. Miyazaki Municipal University.
YOKOYAMA Satoshi 2005 “Geographical approach to Agricultural villages in mountain districts in East South Asia –
Investigation of traditional slash-and-burn-. Summary of announcement in the Meeting on Oversea Research
Project, University of Kumamoto.
SASAKI Akira 1998 Story of seasonal works in a mountain village.
Fig.1 Two crop planting cycles of slash-and burn in the Shibe and Mera region (after SASAKI 1998, partly altered)
Shirobie
Kebie
Krobie
Tamobie
Fig.2 Some subspecies of barnyard millet cultivated on slash-and-burn in the Shiba Village (after MATSUNAGA 2005)