Archive for February, 2008
February 29, 2008 – Melon Farm
All about melons! Here’s one of the few photos of the two of us together on the trip. This melon farm was on a floodplain adjacent to a river. Across the river (which isn’t visible in this photo,) is a national park. It was a stunning place for a farm field. These melons are ready ...Read more.
February 28, 2008 – Mango Farm
The first stop this day was at a mango farm and packing plant. Again, this was a large expanse of mangoes, several hundreds of acres. Some mangoes hanging on the tree. The perimeter of the orchard is lined with this wall of recycled plastic to protect the orchard from wind. The mangoes that cannot be ...Read more.
February 27, 2008 – Sugar Cane
Sugar cane day was one of the most interesting days of the trip. They used to burn the canes before harvesting, but at this farm, they use this giant chopping machine. It has a chopper arm that stays about 6 feet above the ground to chop off the top of the canes, and a chopper ...Read more.
February 26, 2008 – Ferns, Strawberries and Coffee
The first stop today was at a fern farm. It is one of the largest fern farms in the world. The ferns are background for flower bouquets – the stuff that’s left weeks after the roses die! The farm has a lab that has done extensive research on fern diseases and they do some top-notch ...Read more.
February 25, 2008 – Banana and Pineapple Production
We visited a couple of banana locations. The first was a banana germplasm preservation center where they were growing many varieties of bananas to save and use for possible future breeding. The standard Cavendish banana for export teeters on extermination because of devastating disease problems. They have not yet been able to develop another variety ...Read more.
February 24, 2008 – San Jose Farmer’s Market and Poas Volcano
Since most farms/factories are closed on Sunday, today was a less intense learning day. The Farmer’s Market was open, so we spent the morning there. It seemed like it was about 10-12 blocks long – full of strange fruits and vegetables, noisy vendors, and people hawking lottery tickets like ticket scalpers. Linda tries some coconut ...Read more.
February 23, 2008 – InBIO Park/Group
Today we visited InBIO park, kind of a rainforest research theme park in San Jose. Lots of different concepts going on, and I’m not sure it all works together, but it is certainly worth a try. Here are some beetles. They even had samples of the pupae you could look at in jars. A part ...Read more.
February 22, 2008 – Organic Farm Tour/Wal-Mart Brokers
Our first tour was to an organic farm. The farm was located up in the mountains outside of San Jose, the capital city. The man in the white hat is the farm operator and the woman is the daughter of one of the professors at the University of Costa Rica who came along as the ...Read more.
February 21, 2008 – Arrival in Costa Rica
After a 10 day absence we are back! We’ve been in Costa Rica and just returned. As I get time, I will have about 10 days worth of photos from an agricultural tour of Costa Rica. We were invited to trek to Costa Rica by a group at Iowa State that is the beneficiary of ...Read more.
February 20, 2008 – Attic Progress
A bit of a milestone has passed in the attic. All of the beadboard is up on the walls and most of the fixtures are up. We just have the trim, painting the floor, the built-in bookshelves and closet and storage doors to build/do. This is the view to the south out the new dormer. Although ...Read more.
February 19, 2008 – Things Are Better for Our Kids!
As parents, we’d like our kids to have it as good or better than we did as kids. While going through some old photos, we ran across this photo of the champions of the Danny Hauer Tournament Feb 15, 1973. So this week is the 35th anniversary of that team!  Everybody in my family seems to ...Read more.
February 18, 2008 – Same Story, Different Day
Still no snow plow. The snow stopped and the sun came out, but the wind is howling again! This morning a pickup truck and blade tried to punch through, but gave up in front of our place. The plow came and punched a path later in the afternoon, but with the 7 ft high banks ...Read more.
February 17, 2008 – This is Getting Redundant!
OK, I know you are getting sick of snow pictures, but its only fair to share some of the winter pain with all of you, if even vicariously. The storm was much less than advertised. The forecasters predicted 1/3 to a 1/2 inch of ice, followed by 8 inches of snow, topped off with 50 mph winds ...Read more.
February 16, 2008 – Thinking Ahead to Spring…
After a few years of planting “safe” trees, this year it time to go out on a limb in a manner of speaking and try some more unusual varieties. It was prudent to start with native trees for the bulk of the planting, but now it’s time to experiment a bit a push the growing ...Read more.
