May 16th, 2009 fmorgan
You mean I gotta take another bath!?
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When I lived in the USA, I was always conscious of what month it was because each month in the northeast is for me strongly associated with a certain weather pattern.
In Costa Rica, although I am rarely sure what month it is, I do know which season it is. It’s so obvious. Costa Rica only has two seasons: mud and dust.
The mud season. For eight months of the year, I walk out the door and put on my rubber boots (after shaking them in case something crawled in there during the night). Unlike when we lived in the USA, I don’t check outside to see how many layers to wear. Temperature really doesn’t change that much year round, so what you wear is pretty much the same everyday, except for what you put on your feet.
When the rainy season starts, we generally have two weeks of sogginess. There is daily rain, sometimes very heavy and at times with lightening. We get the same thing when the rainy season ends. During the rest of the seven months, at the Monte Cristo plantation where we live, generally there is a big rain twice a day, at about 4:00 in the morning and again in the afternoon. Inside the La Garita plantation, the rain comes every other day. This would seem to make for better living conditions at La Garita, but it really doesn’t, because the sunny day heats the soil, and the previous day’s rain creates a sauna. For living, I prefer a daily rain, but the trees don’t care.
The dust season. Activities change drastically during the dry season. We have more visitors and it is easier to do changes to infrastructure, like road and bridge building, etc. Construction is much, much easier when you aren’t ankle deep, or more, in mud. You can nearly double your time in construction if you do it during the wet season compared to the dry.
One very nice thing about the dry season is it coincides with the coolest time of the year. So the increased sun is offset by the cool winds that come from the North.
When the temperature may vary no more than 10 degrees Farenheit for the entire year, even a change of 5 degrees seems like a lot. So we all act like we’re freezing any time we have to put on socks.
The dry season is great for swimming in our river, as the water is low and crystal clear. Not so good for fishing though. A rain makes the water a little more murky and so helps hide me from the fish. Most of the Ticos go fishing during the dry season because there are places that are accessible no other time of the year except by horse.
We do the heavy pruning of the trees in the dry season. Mainly because bark is slippery and when we are pruning large trees, it is important that nothing is moving around. We can prune for form all year round.
This is good because the grass isn’t growing as much, so workers who would have been working at keeping the grass cleared around the trees can switch to pruning.
For tree owners, the best time to visit is during the dry season, which is also peak tourist time. This is because getting into the plantations is much easier. During the dry season, we can almost drive up to the individual trees. Otherwise, it can require quite a walk to get to the trees.
For riding a mountain bike, I prefer the rainy season, but after things have dried just a little. Just enough to keep the dust down, but not so much that all the rock is loose. One really nice thing about the dry season is you can ride on the pure dirt roads, which are nearly impassible even with a bike for much of the year. They come through with a grader and clean them up during the beginning of the dry season, giving a great opportunity to ride on hard-packed dry clay.
The truth is, I like both seasons. And the end of each, I am eager for the next. When the dust is everywhere, a nice rain is very welcome, and when you can’t seem to find a dry place anywhere, three months of no rain cures that feeling very well indeed.
Posted in clothes, cycling, finca, forestry, mud, nursery, roads, tree owners, trees | No Comments »
March 16th, 2009 fmorgan
One of the many big surprises to me when we moved down to Costa Rica was how primitive the wood business was. Here you have a country with hardware stores, tools, etc. but if you want wood, you go to the sawmill and buy green! There are also depositos de madera, or lumberyards, but they usually sell green wood, too. Of course, you can’t install it green, so you have to dry it yourself.
Many people who are building their own home in Costa Rica are surprised to find that you can’t just go down to something like Home Depot and buy a 2×4; nope, you have to find it. Then, after you find it, make sure to get more than you need, because some of them are going to warp, especially if you don’t know how to dry it properly.
The Ticos are an interesting mix of planning and not planning. If they are building your home, it is hard to find someone who understands buying supplies ahead. I think I have finally figured out why. Most Ticos accumulate material and build in stages. Unlike we do in the USA, they don’t generally get a loan, but they store up money for labor and materials until they have enough to start. This means the wood they need for beams, etc. has probably been in the barn for a few years.
We, on the other hand, land here and want to build our home now, the sooner the better. Often the wood is not available except in a tree somewhere, which will require permits that take weeks to get. The wood will be rough cut, often by a chainsaw, then you will wait perhaps 3 months or more for it to dry (sort of). Since most construction people have nothing more than a power hand planer, the cost of planing and sanding can cost as much as the wood itself.
We paid our dues on this for sure. The first house we built was from trees to house using chainsaws with guides and a 15″ planer. It felt like the timeline for the construction was stretching out forever (we know those of you who live here can relate).
As we grew, so did our milling operation, and we got faster and faster — and more predictable. Now if we need a beam, it comes out of the factory dry, at the right dimensions, planed and sanded and ready to install. The cost of planing and sanding isn’t much when you have the equipment. It is a lot less than paying a construction person to do it by hand. In fact, the costs saved in having the wood ready almost pays for the wood itself when you deduct the labor cost of working with rough cut wood. And of course, the quality is better. We use specialty equipment that allows us to work with beautifully grained wood that would otherwise have a lot of tearouts. With our equipment, we are able to make gorgeous teak products that cost about the same as cedar.
Now we are in the process of educating the construction bosses from Guanacaste to the central valley that they can buy wood ready to install, which helps keep their clients happy. We not only sell the dimensional lumber, but also the tongue-end-groove wood for ceilings and walls (called tablilla here) and floors. In fact, just about anything that is wood in a house, from furniture to cabinets, to floors and doors, we make and sell. And that uses a lot of wood, which is good for our tree owners.
Posted in business in Costa Rica, cabinets, campo, construction, cultural adaptation, doors, drying wood, forestry, furniture, kiln, tablilla, teak, trees, wood | 1 Comment »
September 19th, 2008 fmorgan
Here in Costa Rica, there are about 2,000 different kinds of trees, at least 150 of them are good for lumber. You would think seeds would be easy to get.
Nope, not at all. Generally when we try to order seeds, we find 4 or 5 different types readily available. These would be teak, gmelina, mahogany, cocobolo, and acacia. Everything else is fairly unpredictable.
I personally am not fond of monocrop plantations. They are not very interesting and for native species, not very good. Native trees grow better mixed — like in nature.
The majority of the rare trees we plant are from seeds that we collect within our plantations. This year, the only way we were able to find almendro was from our own trees. All of our cebo was from our own trees as well. A big bonus this year was finding balsamo, a very rare tree with wood as valuable (if not moreso) than cocobolo.
When we first arrived in Costa Rica, I thought to grow trees would be as easy as calling up a tree nursery, ordering the seedlings, and planting them when they arrived. I figured some day we would have a nursery, but just because of volume. The truth is, the only way that we could get the seedlings we needed was to have our own nursery. Nothing else worked reliably.
I am sure it is frustrating for some of our clients that in January they might order, say, 500 cristobal trees and I have to say, “It depends on if there are seeds.” This really emphasizes that what we are doing is working in an area that requires the cooperation of nature, and nature at times will decide that this is not a good year to produce certain seeds.
A good example is our mango trees on our property this year. I was starting to wonder if the mango trees we had actually did produce fruit, because for two years there was none. But this year they more than made up for it and there were mangos everywhere! The same thing is true for seeds we need in the plantations — we can’t just plant whatever we would like, because at times, Mother Nature doesn’t give us any seeds.
Another thing we often do is collect seedlings, or as they are called in the USA, wildlings. Currently in the plantation where we live, there are lots and lots of seedlings that have sprouted in the last month or so. We will go out and carefully extract them from the ground and put into bags, to plant inside the farms. Often, these are the best possible seedlings because they have already shown their vigour in surviving.
Aside from the very popular plantation trees, we never know exactly what we are doing to have to plant, but, that keeps it interesting.
Posted in acacia, campo, cebo, finca, forest, forestry, mahogany, nursery, seedlings, teak, tree owners, trees, wood | No Comments »
June 20th, 2008 fmorgan
Due to our plantations, we are on a first name basis with MINAE, the ministry of environment. This can be an adventure in and of itself. MINAE has the responsibility to safeguard the forest and environment of Costa Rica. Like many government organizations, they are understaffed for the size of the job.
We truly try to follow all the rules of Costa Rica. This can be a real trial at times. Not because of the rules, but because of timetables.
Just to give an example, we recently hauled all of those great logs out of the river from the old bridge. Come to find out, before we could cut them, we had to have MINAE visit to verify - even though we sent them pictures. But we had to wait. We were already waiting for 13+ weeks for other permits! I thought we wouldn’t need permits for the bridge logs until it was time to transport the wood, but nope, before we cut it up too (Strange, the trees have been dead for years and years…).
Finally, MINAE notified us that they were ready to come and would meet us at the gas station in Monterrey. Our forestry engineer, Angie, and one of our wood experts went to meet with them and all went great. Angie asked, “What was the holdup?”
The answer, believe it or not, was that they didn’t have enough money for gas to come out and visit! Angie actually gave them some money for gas so they could return to their office, knowing that we would reimburse her.
I wish I had known so that we could have offered to pay expenses. MINAE has taken us up before on our offer to provide horses for them to inspect our properties, so why should this be any different?
Posted in MINAE, business in Costa Rica, forestry, resources, wood | No Comments »
March 29th, 2008 fmorgan
We had a visit from a tree owner and spent a full day with them. They have been with us for a while and we have had numerous conversations with them. I always appreciate their visits because we have so much in common.
The good news is that after reviewing their trees they told us that there wasn’t anything they felt was wrong at all with them and they were thrilled at the size and quality. This of course was wonderful to hear. We do try very hard to do a great job and be diligent in following through with people, but as with all things that are part of nature, there are imperfections. I worry about imperfections. It is probably true that I don’t see the forest for the trees at times. If I see 5% of the trees not doing well it bothers me (and we replace them), and I can forget that means we have 95% growing very well. Our tree owners are always less critical than I am.
I think one of the reasons they gave us such high marks was that they visited trees that they own with someone else (people they bought with before they knew about us) and were much less pleased. In fact, nearly 50% of their trees were replanted after 2 1/2 years and it was obvious that the care just wasn’t being done. It appeared that their trees were planted and then ignored. Also, some trees were planted in areas that were not appropriate for those trees.
Worse yet, when they arrived, it was obvious that the area had just been brushed out, i.e. all the undergrowth removed, and all nearby trees owned by other people had brush about six feet tall, which will choke out the trees. An example is their acacia. Their acacia with the other people after 2 1/2 years is the same size as ours after 6 months! If there was ever a good example of the difference between growing trees correctly or not, this is one.
The bad news for them, of course, is that they have to deal with this, but also it is sad because we in Costa Rica need every bit of lumber we can get. To plant and not try your best to produce the best trees you can just seems to me to be so short-sighted. After all, it isn’t like there isn’t a good market — no, correct that, a great market — for the wood after it is grown.
On top of that, it is hard enough for people to have the confidence to have people in a foreign land grow trees for them, and to not do the job hurts everyone, not just your own business. Thankfully, we have many people who have visited us (and some visit yearly) and so have seen the plantations for themselves and can attest to our quality.
After all, it really is about quality. The price of wood is shooting up as the supply dwindles. For us, to achieve our goal of reforesting a significant amount of land, we have to make sure to meet the obligations we have to those who have trusted us to grow trees for them.
I am happy to be able to say it appears that we are acheiving more than they expected.
Posted in acacia, business in Costa Rica, conservation, finca, forest, forestry, investing, tree owners, trees, wood | No Comments »
March 2nd, 2008 fmorgan
It occurred to me some time ago just how wasteful specialization is in the lumber business. In the traditional manner, a logger will find a group of trees to cut. He will not want to work with a single tree because he has to haul his equipment and get set up, is not something he makes money on. Loggers make money in the amount of wood they can process per day and the quality of that wood. Loggers who handle large volumes end up with a very large capital investment and speed is everything.
A logger will generally only take up to the first limbs. Furniture makers love figured wood, but sawmills hate wood with knots. They want clear trunks, because figured wood is hard to work with for the sawmills and dangerous, too. A large knot, for example where a limb connects, can catch in the saw and send the log flying. The other waste is that sawmills only want certain lengths, 8, 10, 12, 16, etc. The widths tend to be in standard sizes as well, based on even sizes.
Because of this efficiency, a tremendous amount of each tree goes to waste. Any pieces smaller around than 8 inches are considered scrap and so are segments of wood less than 8 feet long (really 99 inches to allow for checking on the ends of the wood).
Since we have our own furniture factory, we can use a lot more of the tree. Cabinet doors, a very good market for us, use many small pieces of wood. We also make spindles for chairs and banisters with a lathe. This uses limbs and other short pieces of wood. For even smaller pieces, we also have a market for wood crafts, bowls, coffee coasters, etc.
When we harvest a tree, we don’t leave much scrap out in the field. What little is left is used as mulch around the remaining trees. Because of this conservation of the resource, we can get up to 40% more out of every tree.
Because of our size, we can grow trees efficiently, and because of the wood factory, use more of the tree. This means every tree is used to its maximum potential, helping to ensure the plantation wood supply that takes pressure off the rainforest.
Posted in business in Costa Rica, conservation, forestry, furniture, resources, wood | No Comments »
January 24th, 2008 fmorgan
…everything looks like a nail. This is a phrase I think about a lot because it says that if our tool collection is small, we often “fix” things in a manner that doesn’t make sense.
After all these years, I am now seeing how often forestry practices are, quite frankly, very primative. It is almost as though forestry engineers are being brought kicking and screaming into the idea of maintaining existing ecosystems instead of just having a job identifying trees and marking them for harvest.
As an example, CATIE has been researching for 10 years here in Costa Rica how to grow mahogany without attracting a certain moth that lays its eggs in the tips of the young trees so that when they hatch, the larvae bore into the tip. CATIE now has results that look good, and we are using the methods they have researched. Since the damage to the tree occurs on the tip and only occurs twice a year, it works fine to prune after the damage. Also, planting inside brush helps a lot too, since the moth overflies the trees. After the mahogany tree is 6 meters tall, there is no more problem.
Various trials were done, but I was truly surprised that they didn’t try two that seem to be pretty safe bets. One would be to use a dormant spray to smother the eggs when first laid. You can predict almost to the week when the moths will lay their eggs, so a dormant spray could be very effective. Dormant spray is used in the North a lot for fruit trees. The other idea is to use bat houses to concentrate predators in the area. The photo below shows the type of bat houses we’re making. They will be mounted on rough posts that go all the way inside that the bats can climb up on.
I don’t know yet if these two approaches will work, but I really shouldn’t have been surprised that they weren’t tried. Forestry often resembles a horse with blinders, in that there is very little interaction with other fields, like growing fruit trees and organic farming. I do believe this is because forestry, up until recently, has been focused almost entirely on harvesting and managing existing forests, not in rebuilding forests.
It is so interesting to me that there are so many possibilities for learning inside our plantations and forest. A common question I get is how long do I think I will be interested in planting trees. The answer is probably forever, since there is so much to learn and so much to discover. You would think growing trees would be simple and in some ways it is, but there is so much room for improvement!
Posted in CATIE, bats, finca, forest, forestry, mahogany, pests | No Comments »