[1] By trapping solar radiation during the day, this raised field agricultural method also protected crops from freezing overnight.
[2] These raised planting beds were irrigated very efficiently by the adjacent canals which extended the growing season significantly, allowing for more food yield.
This technique is dated to around 300 B.C., and is most commonly associated with the Tiwanaku culture of the Lake Titicaca region in southern Bolivia, who used this method to grow crops like potatoes and quinoa.
The drainage aspect of this method makes it particularly useful in many areas subjected to risks of brutal floods, such as tropical parts of Bolivia and Peru where it emerged.
In the 1960s, geographers William Denevan, George Plafker, and Kenneth Lee found evidence of raised-field agriculture that had been utilized in the Llanos de Moxos region of Bolivia's Amazon basin, a region that was previously thought to have been unable to sustain large-scale agriculture because of what was believed to have been an unfavorable rainforest environment.
The indigenous community provided land for the project and the Inter-American Foundation paid them wages to build and maintain the plots, which successfully produced manioc and maize.
By utilizing this centuries-old technique, modern people in the region have been able to make use of the harsh altiplano landscape around Lake Titicaca.
Research was done at two raised-field sites by Diego Sanchez de Lozada et al. in the northern altiplano of Bolivia near Lake Titicaca in an effort to better understand the effects of frost on potato crops.
These dates provided from Andean sites suggest that this form of agriculture was a relatively early phenomenon in the area that slowly expanded throughout the region, and was utilized by various cultures during different time periods.