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This week my ongoing Kalu Yala adventure took me to a place in Panama called Boquete.  I went there with our Intern Director, Abraham Segovia, two current interns, James Walsh and John Cook, and Kalu Yala alumni, Jackson Hovis.  The excursion had two main goals on the agenda.  The first objective was to go check out a sustainable agriculture farm in Boquete.  The second objective was to get a quote on some horses and saddles for the summer program.

The farm in Boquete was an educational trip for future agriculture within the Biology Program.  The farm included its own chicken coup producing eggs every day, and an amazing greenhouse that is the prototype for a future greenhouse in Kalu Yala.  The farming experience was fantastic, and there is a lot to be learned about sustainable agriculture in Boquete.  The greenhouse we toured around was easily one hundered yards long by fifty yards wide, and included experimental plots as well as developed plots which had been growing for quite some time.  It also included its own irrigation system which was highly advanced, using multiple pumps to circulate all of the water throughout the entire greenhouse feeding all of the crops.  The main crops being grown within the greenhouse were cabbage, lettuce and tomatoes.  These are basic and essential crops for us to be growing in the Valley come this summer.  The other educational parts of the farming experience that Abraham wanted us to take away from the tour included composting and the chicken coup. 

The composting part is very basic. There were men tending to the piles of compost while we were there so that we could see firsthand how organic composting is done on a large scale.  At the farm they compost everything organic using animal feces and worms, which in turn create great fertilizer for the rest of the farm.  The chicken coup was more intricate, and there are a lot of other things that need to be done in this respect to produce a usable product.   There was an area for chickens to lay their eggs and take shelter from the weather, and there was also a more free-range side to the coup that was a large fenced in area for the chickens to get out and enjoy life.  The trip was extremely educational for all of us, and I now have a better idea of exactly what Kalu Yala will be expecting in the future from an agricultural standpoint.

The second objective was a little bit more complicated, because you cannot just go anywhere to find healthy horses in Panama.  We are looking for horses whose breeds can be traced back, and can be examined by a veterinarian for any possible diseases or defects.  While we were in Boquete we ended up not going to find the horses we were looking for, but we did get some excellent contacts that we can follow up with to find the horses we want.  The next step is to follow up with the contacts, and hopefully go find and test ride some horses for the future programs.