After checking out the beautiful rice terraces at Tegalalang, we drove by these farmers hand-harvesting rice, which was pretty cool. I hadn't seen it up close yet, and I don't think the girls had either.
Apparently harvesting occurs when the rice plants are a meter tall and turning yellow (check out this link for a brief description of the steps in growing rice on Bali and this link for a more in-depth description):
Women traditionally do the harvesting on Bali, cutting down the stalks with a small hand
knife, thrashing the stalks in a bag to shake loose the grains of rice,
and then tossing the rice in woven palm baskets to shake out rocks and bugs (I think... unless they're dehusking the rice on site?):
Here's a little slideshow of the women tossing the rice grains in the baskets:
Afterwards, the rice is carried out of the field for dehusking:
I just liked these palm trees all in a row:
A few meters down the road in another rice paddy we caught sight of this gaggle of ducks (geese?) being herded along the barrier walls separating the wet paddies:
According to USGS, a group of ducks: A brace, flock (in flight), raft (on water) team, paddling (on water), badling. http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/about/faqs/animals/names.htm
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