Agriculture, in the larger Americas was a prominent tool that contributed to the civilization of many societies. The development of agriculture meant that people moved away from hunting and gathering to embrace a more organized lifestyle of planting crops for food. They would start preparing and anticipating for the seasons, especially places that did not have regular rainfall. Nevertheless, agriculture in the Americas mainly developed in highland regions as well as regions close to rivers or other water bodies. The reason was obvious; people needed water for the growth of their crops. People in the Americas created a wide range of agricultural systems, which were suited to different environments; all the way from southern Canada to southern America as well as from the highlands of the Andes to the low elevations of the Amazon River (Nair, 2019). In particular, agriculture gained prominence in three main regions: eastern North America, Mesoamerica, and South America.
People in the Americas had diverse indigenous animals but none of the animals had the appropriate size to be used as draft animals. In many ancient societies, the domestication of animals such as oxen and donkeys triggered the development of the plow or carts. The plow would be drawn by the animals to cultivate the land while carts would be predominantly used to transport farm produce (Price, 2009). The lack of these tools in the Americas as well as other technology means that agriculture developed slowly. It may be accurate to speculate that the ancient agrarian societies in the Americas might have used primitive tools such as sticks or other iron tools to sow seeds and to get rid of weeds.
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Agrarian societies in the temperate North America to the tropical lowlands of South America practiced what was known as swidden production. Simply, it was a slash-and-burn type of agriculture (Nair, 2019). People would burn shrubs or thickets to get rid of vegetation to plant their crops. On the same note, if they wanted to plant in the same farms they had planted before, they would simply burn the dry vegetation. The fertility of the soil in the swidden system was derived from the burnt vegetation. Once the productivity of the land declined or firewood was in low supply, the communities would move to better places. The relocation was easy because land was communally owned unlike today where individuals own land privately. It can also be argued that the discovery and practice of agriculture contributed to the movement of people and exploitation of natural resources. It is because when people realized that they could grow food, they explored options of growing crops on a large scale or moving to better places where they could achieve better yields.
The Maya and the Aztec of Central America practiced swidden agriculture at some point before embracing elaborate irrigation techniques and tropical ecosystem management practices. The rising population made it necessary for the two societies to embrace better techniques of producing food. It is likely that the abundance of food and better organized lifestyles encouraged reproduction. The Inca of Peru created terraced fields on the steep slopes of the Andes. The Inca used hoes and foot plows to prepare the terraced fields. Besides, they used the alpaca and llama dung, as well as human waste for fertilizer. The terraced field techniques were also used in northern Mexico.
Corn or maize, was the most popular crop that was grown in the Americas. In fact, Mexico remains one of the largest producers of corn in the world. Nevertheless, other crops such as potatoes, squash, amaranth, avocado, common bean and scarlet runner beans were grown.
References
Nair, K. (2019). How Agriculture and Domestication Began: The Americas. Encyclopedia Britannica . https://www.britannica.com/topic/agriculture/The-Americas
Price, D. (2009). Ancient farming in eastern North America. https://www.pnas.org/content/106/16/6427
