Take a look at the 1st Prize winner - Danny with
his robot; a robot made entirely from stuff destined for recycling/throwing. Pretty Cool, huh? The village school in El Rodeo gave the
students an assignment to make something useful or artistic out of discarded
materials. The concept is that we can
not only recycle but also reuse things in creative and functional ways, things
that we used to just throw away. The
students came up with all sorts of clever and creative objects. The choices for
the top three prizes were very difficult for the judges – so many clever ideas.
Well, Danny made this robot - and it won
First Prize!! We were so proud and thrilled. Now all he has to do is wire up his robot and
program it to muck out the horse stalls…
I can just see Hugo with the control…
Secondly, we are also very happy and grateful to the famous
Italian architect, Renzo Piano, for choosing the village of El Rodeo to build a
model school for eco-sustainable learning.
This new school will feature solar panels; septic gases collected for
cooking in the kitchen; a modern, forest-friendly design with permanent
ventilation; recycling; and, of course, a small vegetable garden. Jose will help the school with the garden. The students will have a new, airy,
comfortable, forward-thinking learning environment, and we are all grateful to Maestro
Piano and his Foundation for supporting the future of our youth in Costa Rica. You can read about Renzo Piano and his work
in an excellent review in the Ancora Section of La Nacion today, June 17, 2012.
I joined Armando, the kids and several dogs for a hike down
to the waterfalls at the edge of our Finca; the waterfall hike is my favorite
hike anywhere. Here you see Danny and
Norbert sliding down one of the waterfalls into a deep, natural pool of
water. I think they went swimming in at
least a half dozen different cascades as we made our way back up the
mountain. You get totally wet and need
to be relaxed and agile to hike the waterfalls:
kids are naturally both. And
everyone who goes, young or old, has an exhilarating experience. You feel totally alive and invigorated, and all
your troubles and tensions just melt away.
Sometimes you feel scared when climbing up huge boulders but everyone
helps each other. I remember helping the
kids when they were younger. Now, as they
have grown older and more confident, they help us old people in the group! The waterfall hike at Reserva El Tigre is definitely
an advanced hike.
The waterfalls teach you courage and balance, and your
spirit feels joy and awe. The towering forest
all around gives you much to see and experience. There really is nothing more magical than the
tropical forest. Many come here to just
marvel, and many to study - birds, amphibians, insects, relationships between
the animal and plant kingdoms - it’s all there.
You just have to pause occasionally and take a look around and, if you
wait, soon the birds and other animals make their presence known – provided you
are quiet. Nobody talks much while
hiking the waterfalls because the rushing water is so noisy – like a big
whooooooooosh - that it puts you into a kind of ‘alpha zone’ – a kind of
relaxed and happy concentration, moving loose-limbed, without falling too much…
We all returned from the hike without any mishaps – just
lots of smiles and a bag full of avocados we picked on the way back. There is much to eat right now in the forest
gardens – pitangas, granadillos, papayas, mangas, bananas, moras, manzanas de
agua, mimbros (smaller than carambola -tastes like a gooseberry) - much to find
and take home or just eat! We always
hike with oranges to eat and a piece of papaya.
Apart from being tasty, papaya is also useful if you wander too close to
a bee hive and get stung (apply it directly to the area, and you will get
immediate relief). Nothing works
better! You can research why on the
internet, if interested. If you ever do
get stung, glance around rapidly, locate the hive and move quietly and quickly
away. However, it could have been ants
that got you! Did you stop and yack
underneath an Acacia tree? Then the
symbiotic Acacia ants probably dive-bombed you, to get you moving… If you
can’t spot the source, just keep hiking along the trail. Usually a hive just sends out three or four
warrior bees to move you on. If you do
see the hive, don’t get mad and throw branches or stones at it – the bees will
swarm you and you might have a fatal adventure.
Now, who would do such an insane thing?
Schoolboys would, that’s who!
Recently, while sitting at a Costa Rican Pro-Nativa Conference, the guy
sitting next to me told me how, as a kid, he once threw a rock at a beehive and,
in response, the hive sent out four warrior bees. He killed two of them but the other two stung
him before he could kill them. So I
asked him, “Well, did you learn your lesson?”
He just laughed and said, “No.
Que va, fui un muchacho!”
Generally, bees and wasps get more ornery during the windy,
dry season. A good friend of mine,
Rosemary, got stung down near the mines just this past March. I was stung last December while out
riding. In my case, I’ve noticed that
the odd bee sting, while painful, actually boosts my immune system. But beware if you are allergic. Carry epinephrine with you while out hiking,
especially during the dry, windy, sunny season. And remember, bees and wasps are very welcome
in nature. Bees pollinate all kinds of
plants, and many of the wasps – some so tiny you can’t even see them – are
effective predators and control many of the garden’s pests. I really enjoy observing bees and wasps; we
can learn much.
This time of year, however, we don’t have ornery bees so
much as lots of flying (and many of them biting…) insects that rise up from the
first rains. Oh! the joys of living in
the tropics. This is high season for butterflies and moths, which come in every
size, color and pattern - fascinating creatures that come from chomping
caterpillars, then dangling pupae, before they finally flutter free; they are
just everywhere! Sadly, however, so too
are the horse flies. My latest insect
repellant experiment for the horses is to fashion some dry citronella grass
into a brush, add sprigs of rosemary, allspice leaves, camphor basil and other
repellant herbs I have handy, and then rub the horses with it. They like the feel of getting brushed with
herby citronella, and the rubbing process leaves their coats with a nice
fragrance. But it’s very short acting -
I use it before riding. Luckily, the
horses have adapted to the forest seasons – they especially like rolling in the
spring-fed, mud baths. Only Vulcan has
problems sometimes with allergic reactions to a particular biting insect. I often see birds perched on the back of both
the horses and Coquetta, out in the grassy pastures, the birds feasting on the
insects. In the evening, they return to
the stables and Jose grooms them before they bed down for the night.
We are constantly learning new lessons, trying to live organically
in a tropical forest. However, the three
most important are: 1) Protect the
forest and the forest will protect you; 2) Polyculture is the only long-term
way to successfully grow things (plant small groups with a lot of variety to
totally confuse the pests); and 3) Permaculture is the natural, healthy way to
grow things (think healthy soil, healthy water, healthy biomass, healthy plants and healthy
animals - including humans!). Some years
back, we stopped using chemical, anti-parasitic products for the finca cows - I
first learned from reading Joel Salatin that cows that have been treated with these
chemicals have sterile manure; the chickens actually ignore it! We have also personally observed this at the
Finca – you can research on the internet the many studies showing the effect
that these products have on manure – and the surrounding forest. And an important point to add on manure is
that it gives crucial nutrients and microorganisms to compost. Don’t fight and destroy organisms in nature –
pests can be controlled by nature’s predators.
Let them all be! Every species in
the forest and forest-garden is part of a chain of predation, including
humans. Pathogens prey on humans. But remember, you can best combat pathogens
by staying healthy and understanding that many bacteria are also beneficial -
think yogurt- it’s all about balance.
When really necessary, however, there are many nature-based remedies to
prevent and treat parasites and pathogens – like citrus peel. Yes, the tropical world brings many
challenges to the garden. We have learned that the chickens are the best remedy
for parasite control, especially in the stable-yard. They feast on the larvae from the cow manure and
clean up after all the herbivores. Bambi,
the calf, is still too young to go out to the grassy pastures with Coquetta and
the horses. But the chickens keep him
company and groom him!
Joel Salatin told
Michael Pollan, in The Omnivore’s Dilemma, “In nature, health is the default. Pests and disease are nature’s way of telling
us farmers that we’re doing something wrong.”
And it makes sense! Give animals
fresh water; a healthy, varied diet; dry and secure bedding; plenty of space to
move around and graze and peck during the day, and they will thrive.
Kids and Dogs in the forest.
June in Costa Rica is rainy - the month for planting! We’ve planted guanabana, fruto de pan,
Jackfruit, avocado, chaya, yuca, chiles and more in the gardens; and, down in
the charrales, hardwood seedlings. Many
of these seedlings we started from seeds given to us by friends or that we collected
ourselves. The guys have also planted corn, beans, ayote, sugar cane and
numerous other edibles, as well as some tender, English, green bean seeds that
just happened, accidentally of course, to be in our luggage when we flew home
from England via the States (Heathrow to Dallas to New Orleans to Costa
Rica)... Jose has already germinated
them and they are doing very well! The
guys have also started several types of compost piles and I frequently see them
shoveling compost over everything – even the volunteer ayote popping up in the
orchard gets a shovelful of compost! It’s
good to be home.
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