San Miguel is full of roaming animals, from lizards to dogs to chickens. The chickens roam around the yards and constantly jet across the streets. They are one of the main sources of protein in San Miguel, and are served and sold everywhere in town. Eggs can be purchased at the local Chino for only 15 cents an egg!! Makes for a great breakfast!
One of Kalu Yala’s goals is to have its own flock of chickens. This goal will eventually be tied in to the livestock program, a new program being created for next semester. Just recently Johnny Marriot, Anne Walker Harrison, and I, Brigitte Desvaux, purchased some pollitos (baby chicks) to kick off the start of the program. For now, they are just babies, but our housekeeps in San Miguel, Aura and Belkis, said it won’t be long until these chicks grow from fitting in your palm to full size. As a matter of fact, they said it only takes about 1.5 months before they reach full size.
This said, the little box that they currently reside in won’t suit for much longer! One of our upcoming projects (within the next month) will be to build a chicken coop where our little chickens can roam around, do what they do, and hopefully start producing eggs! Even though eggs are only 15 cents at the Chinito, they will soon become free!
We are starting off with three little chickies as a test trial, but eventually the company hopes to expand this number so that there will be a constant supply of eggs for the members!
I believe we will be building the coop at casa Llena in San Miguel for now, but once the valley property becomes more occupied, these chickens will most likely make their way out to a new home in the jungle landscape of the valley.
Each and everyday, you can see our small chickens getting just a little bit larger. Soon they will go from furry little babies to full grown, ground-pecking chickens. We hope that within their coop they will have small den-like houses to pawn eggs, with a little outdoor area where they can roam around free range. I am excited to see these creatures grow, and happy to give them a wonderful life at Kalu Yala.