Projects
September 5 – 11, 2005 We have been going into rainy season prep mode by preparing seeds (hulling, soaking) and sowing in the greenhouse. This week we hulled some more of our barbaso-algarrobo-seca store, and sowed zapote de perro and algarrobo. We mixed some more sand and compost into the seed beds before sowing, as it seemed that the soil was getting too compacted with […]
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador When I met a journalist on the street who told me she was now working at a pharmacy I didn’t immediately register what a contrast that was. It wasn’t surprising then because people in Bahia change jobs fairly frequently. I walked on thinking that her upbeat personality was suited to either position. Later I thought more deeply about how often they […]
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador Yesterday (Sun.) was a breakthrough for our revegetation project. Pedro Otero, who although an agro-forestry professor previously seemed reluctant to permit non-commercial planting on his land, finally agreed to let us explore El Toro Basin for any sites where we wish to plant native trees. The problem with Otero had been that the land wasn’t formally divided between five brothers who […]
August 29 to September 4, 2005 This week two new volunteers arrived – Briana and Stephanie, which puts us to 4 people living in the house. Both speak Spanish. We were able to retire one of the compost piles at the greenhouse and move it over into the storage area. We also repaired the fence around the compost area, and put up a new section. […]
Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador Planet Drum Foundation’s efforts to assist in transforming Bahia into an ecological city have taken a progressively more educational bent. We have had a full-time staff member as Bioregional Educational Program Manager, Kristen Lansdale, for nearly half a year. Her reports on the progress of the first twenty-five high school age students have been a continuous revelation of expanding possibilities for […]
August 22 to 28, 2005 This week we repaired and reinforced the greenhouse (the dogs had broken in through a weak spot), did the usual greenhouse chores, and sowed seeds – aguia and cedro amargo. We also continued hulling seeds (seca and algarrobo), and even collected more algarrobo seeds from the Cherry Tree site. I discovered that seca seeds can also be collected there, but […]
August 15 to 21, 2005 (I forgot to say in my last report that we also watered and picked up trash at El Bosque last week, and I worked on a tree ID sheet and quiz for Genesis School as we will be taking them on a tour there soon.) Well, no more burning at the Cherry Tree site. David and I had a hard day […]
August 8-14, 2005 The Planet Drum House is not the same anymore. The summer chapter of girls has closed and we are in transition to a mixed bag of fall volunteers. Right now there is only one volunteer, David, who arrived Thursday, and the next volunteers will be arriving about the end of August. Jaime (“Flaco”) and Thea (Peace Corps) each helped out one day […]
On Tuesday we had a very interesting day of class. The gas station Repsol has been leaking gas into the estuary for what seems to be about eight years, or since the earthquake. It became such a problem that they could no longer turn the blind eye and have had to close the gas station and do some major clean up. So Friends of the […]
August 1-7, 2005 Well, this week the house went from being full to empty as we had the three Canadians leave on one day. Now it’s just Jackie and me until David gets here next week, which is Jackie’s last. She has been sick with a stomach virus type thing and wasn’t able to work for a few days. It will be just David and […]