Eco-Ecuador

Collaboration for a Long-Term Sustainable City

The greenhouse is overflowing.

By Clay Plager-Unger | October 12, 2007

October 8-12, 2007 Summary: This week we were blessed with some natural rain to help the watering efforts of the revegetation sites. The rains were a little unusual for this time of year. This is typically the driest time, but we are expecting a wetter than usual rainy season, so it was not entirely surprising. It was an opportunity to refocus efforts on work in the […]

2007 Advanced Bioregional Class: Relationships between living beings and the environment.

By Ramon Cedeño Loor | October 5, 2007

Ramon’s Weekly Report #1 Advanced Bioregionalism EducationAutumn Session 2007 October 3rd & 5th Wednesday the class met up in the park to begin the new advanced Bioregionalism classes.  All of the students were excited about the gifts that visiting Planet Drum staffers had left for them (notepads and colored pencils).  The theme of the day was the relationship between living beings and the environment.  The students split into two […]

Planet Drum meets up with Bioregionalistas for an interactive class in the greenhouse.

By Clay Plager-Unger | October 5, 2007

October 1-5, 2007 This week marked a turning point in volunteer presence. For the past two months we’ve been getting by with one, two or at most three steady volunteers, but that’s all changing as of now. For some reason August and September have been the slowest so far. But this week, four new volunteers showed up, and we’re scheduled to be more or less […]

1000 copies of the first green-city newsletter in Bahia, Econoticias in print.

By Clay Plager-Unger | September 28, 2007

September 24-28, 2007   Summary: The last week with only a couple volunteers; soon more will be arriving and the house will fill up again for the first time in over two months. The routine of watering continued and other projects are mixed in to keep things interesting. It’s almost October and the trees planted in February and March are doing very well. There’s been a less […]

September News from Judy

By Judy Goldhaft | September 22, 2007

Hola, The following is a report excerpted from letters by Judy Goldhaft that may be the closest we get to the usual Dispatch before leaving early Wednesday morning.  P & J Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador Subject: News from Ecuador 9/12/07 Yesterday Ecuador’s President Correa  came down to do a presentation of some federal funding and a ribbon -cutting ceremony for a new bridge that will cross the […]

More seed collection, site maintenance and municipal collaboration.

By Clay Plager-Unger | September 21, 2007

September 17-21, 2007   On Monday we got a ride into El Toro and watered the revegetation site, then walked back out to the main road and caught the bus to the greenhouse. At the greenhouse the plants were watered and some weeding was done.  More Guachapeli seeds were collected from full-sized trees nearby that are dropping seed pods.  Tuesday we were back at the El Toro […]

Tips and tricks for saplings on a slope.

By Clay Plager-Unger | September 14, 2007

September 10-14, 2007 The week started off with going bottle hunting in Leonidas Plaza. Judy joined Patrick and me as we scoured the suburb of Bahia picking up empty three-liter plasticsoda bottles. We talked to some fishermen about the possibility of using old nets to cover young trees to protect them from insects and animals during the dry season. As it turns out, the fishermen […]

San Francisco Planet Drum folks arrived.

By Clay Plager-Unger | September 7, 2007

September 3-7, 2007 On Monday we watered Maria Dolores and Don Pepe. Some neighborhood kids came out to help us carry the water at Maria Dolores. From there to the greenhouse where we watered and turned the compost. In the morning on Tuesday we watered La Cruz and then caught the bus to the greenhouse to do some general cleaning up.  Some benches were built […]

Feeding Algarobo seeds to Ricardito’s pigs, to see if they will germinate in the fertilizer.

By Clay Plager-Unger | August 31, 2007

August 27-31, 2007 Summary: This week was still somewhat low on staff and it was a bit of a struggle to cover the watering of the sites, but we were able to take care of them, and even had some time to work in the greenhouse. On Monday compost was picked up from our friend Don Luis Dueñas and taken to the greenhouse, where we […]

Biology class to identify species in the Bosque en Medio de las Ruinas.

By Clay Plager-Unger | August 24, 2007

August 20-24, 2007 Summary: This was another week with only one volunteer, and thankfully plenty of help from our Ecuadorian friends, and even a little rain to make the watering possible. Since Brian left last Friday, there was only me and Lindsey left. On Monday we went to the greenhouse to check in on things, watered the plants and seed beds, turned compost and did some […]