2009 Bona Fide Seed Exchange

On Sunday, May 11, the annual “Intercambio de Semillas” – Bona Fide Seed Exchange – took place on the streets of Balgue. With the help of countless hands, from Javier hauling a truckload of plants from the farm to town in his vintage 80s Toyota 4x4 to the grandmotherly Doña Ines blasting Nica pop to attract people in the heat of the afternoon, everything went off well. Key to the show were Nevis, Maria and Aleyda of Escuela de Campo, who prepared numerous treelings, seedling medicinal plants, and packets of seeds to exchange for bags of rice, mangos, cacao beans, and most interesting of all, a freshly caught fish!

Every year the seed exchange offers us a direct opportunity to share some of the research and work we are doing on the farm with local communities. Posters and flyers placed in key towns on the island advertise the event – though quite a few of the people who come are those simply walking down the street who stop by to see what is going on. From the nursery, we share both locally popular fruits like nispero and mamey, as well as new varieties that are doing well on the farm and hold potential to be good food resources and opportunities to improve plant diversity in the area, like jackfruit and pitanga. As many people are unfamiliar with these plants, we explain to them how they are grown and how their fruits can be used – for example in juices, which are extraordinarily popular in the hot days of summer. From the garden, we share a variety of legumes that grow easily here and add nitrogen to depleted soils, in addition to different herbs and vegetables that we have grown and collected seeds from. And from the medicinal garden, we share plants that broaden the selection of natural remedies available and can be used to combat common illnesses.

While we hope eventually to attract crowds of people eager to discover the latest varieties of plants and trees coming from Bona Fide, the highlights of last Sunday came in small doses. Watching a 12-year-old girl come in search of a specific plant and then go down the line of trees and name almost every one of them – something not even I could do at the beginning of the day – is inspiring. Or seeing the delighted smile as a gentleman walked off with four trees he had come specifically seeking in a bucket on his shoulder. Or best of all, spending the day managing the various exchanges while out of the corner of one’s eye catching continuous glimpses of the breadfruit tree Doña Ines traded for three years ago, now rising above the roof of her house and producing fruit that, she happily explains, is “ricissimo” – absolutely delicious!

This blog contribution was written by Catherine McGill our garden co-manager and attache to the Escuela de Campo. Thanks to Cat for all her hard work. Much appreciated.

New additions to BF!!!

Greetings Bona Fide friends and supporters,

Well I have been back in Nicaragua for about one and half weeks, and yes the internet world is SLOW again. Everything else though is moving quickly. Whilst I was away our diligent crew of interns and volunteers under the careful tutelage of David Ortiz finished our new bread/pizza oven with a tiled finish to the pizza prep table, we re-used broken tiles from my house construction to eliminate building waste. This project was carried out as an exercise in design/build of bread ovens with natural materials to a high end finish, my for profit venture, Living Ssytems Solutions provided the funding in hopes that the skills gained by local folks and the showpiece space of having the oven at BF will attract future clients and create more well paid local employment on the island. Well at the very least we will eat lots of pizza with our friends. Same can be said for the worm bin which is the zinc roofed long narrow structure featured in another foto in this week's update. We just put over 3 pounds of worms in there and Nevis made a bed of dried manure and finished compost. Those wormies are happy!! We are hoping to use the black gold produced by our new friends to take the food gardens and medicinal production to another level. Nice work all!

One of the last two fotos feature the final tile roofing of my porch on my soon to complete home at BF and hopefully a new sense of peace to come along with it as I finally move into my new digs after living, camping, and sleeping all over the farm for over 7 years. Yeah seven. The small thatch structure with a black plastic finish is our new mini solar barn for wood drying and storage, no more moist wood winters for BF!! Congrats to Hector, our new local project leader and volunteer MC. Same to be said for Martha Fuchs our current volunteer coordinator who helped Hector knock out this new much needed additions.

Well folks new additions to our growing project. Come eat pizza and we will throw the scraps to the wormies. One big cycle. Sweet.

Best to all and thanks for your support,

Chris Shanks
Co-director, Project Bona Fide

Updates, Collecting and More!!

Greetings Project Bona Fide Friends and Supporters,

One important development in communications in Nicaragua as of a week or so ago. If you are calling Nicaragua for whatever reason (hopefully to send us love) you must now dial an '8' before the 7 digit mobile number and a '2' before whichever land line number you call. Just so you know.

Since my last post I have traveled down to Florida to spend time with my family. In my 4 days here I have visited 3 botanical institutions: The Fairchild Botanical Garden, The Montgomery Botanical Garden, and The Fruit and Spice Park of Homestead FL. I have been collecting plant material for ex-situ conservation and newcrops/food systems development for Bona Fide at 2 of these sites for over half a decade. My visit to the Montgomery Botanical Garden (http://www.montgomerybotanical.org) was my first. The MBG is invite only, it is a former estate which is now a NGO dedicated in great part to the preservation of palms and cycads. they have the largest collection of cycads in the entire world, a huge part of the worlds genetics for cycads as well as the safeguards for the continuance of these species is being caried out by MBG and its allies. I was fortunate enough to spend a half day with the Manager of Collections, Chad Husby PHD. Chad was extremely gracious and I thank him wholeheartedly for his time and energy. This visit has begun what we hope is a long collaboration with MBG and other allied institutions. This newfound affiliation is a great 'leg up' for Bona Fide in terms of our work in ex-situ conservation and Newcrops development.

The evolving Bona Fide website. The BF website has grown in the last few weeks and we thank Matthew Homeijer, our web ninja wizard for his time and creative energy to make this happen. Mat is a busy man working in the big city, NYC. He is also a father of a very rambunctious 2 year old, Silas. We have named Silas our 'manager' for website updates, his picture is featured this week. Usually we do the updates while he naps.

Other photos features: the yummy looking fruit is a Pakistani Mulberry, a cultivar of Morus nigra that can have fruits up to 4" long. They taste amazing. Not really a lowland tropical fruit but for the tropics at elevation, the sub tropics and other climates they are incredible. Traditionally in Pakistan and Afghanistan they were dried for eating whilst traveling. The photo of seed drying shows the spoils from collecting in the last 3 days. The aerial shot is a view of MBG and its grounds which is 120 acres.

Hope everyone is well, thanks for your support,

Chris Shanks

Community Center Fence, RAIN, and thanks.

Greetings Bona Fide friends and supporters,

I write you from a balmy New York city, having sated myself on temperate spring flowering displays in both the Brookyln botanical garden and the NYBG in the Bronx. Both amazing, two great days full of trees and learning. I have spent the last 2 weeks on the east coast seeing family, meeting with Michael Judd our co-director and strategically planning BF's direction for the rest of the year and the coming year. Bona Fide's website has some new faces, with a brand new 'Escuela de Campo' page and updated FAQ pages plus a new FAQ page and NEW intern pages. Please check them out. Our web NINJA master, Mat Homeijer has been busting his butt between a full time job, childcare, life, and helping BF. THANKS MAT!!

Now a big thanks also to The University of Vermont's Service Learning Program or CUPS for the GRANT we received to fund and maintain a native timber coppice system for polewood and firewood production. This is a first step of many of Bona Fide's foray intoo thr grant world and larger co-operation with other organizations. Many thanks to Michael Blazewicz for co-authoring the grant with yours truly. THANKS MIKE!

RAIN. Yes RAIN. It is the driest period of the dry season yet we received signifcant showers last week for durations of one half hour or more. This coming wet season could be very interesting. We shall see.

The Community fence project at our community center is slowly shaping up with Vienel, an assistant mason from Chris' team leading a group of community volunteers in erecting the fence. Vienel has been working for over 6 weeks on forming and curing the nearly 60 (8 foot) concrete posts with various community supporters, now we are putting them in the ground
. We hope to have the fencing in in a few weeks and to begin planting the garden, shade trees for the playground and medicinal plants for the community when the rain becomes steady in about 3 weeks.

Best to all and thanks for your support,

Chris Shanks
Co-Director, Project Bona Fide

Costa COllecting, new OVEN and more!!!

Greetings Bona Fide friends and supporters,

I salute you all from the good old US of A, here in the great Garden State of New Jersey. Spring has sprung here and tree are budding out, willows have leaves, and flowers are beginning to abound and are in full bloom in NYC and other heat island affected sites in this zone. I just saw my twin nephews a few days ago, it certainly put me in a daze. Children surely are one of the best reasons to plant trees and cultivate abundance.

Well now for some reporting on BF doings, of which there are many. BF agro-forestry research and trials efforts were bolstered in this past week with my quick trip to Costa Rica to find the elusive pili nut (Canarium ovatum and communis) These species are only found in one botanical garden in all of Nicaragua and Costa Rica to the best of my knowledge and basing my calculations of ripeness and seed availability from the January CR trip I was correct and my travels yielded close to 60 viable seeds. This high fat and protein nut was once tested side by side by USDA with the Macadamia nut for commercial suitability. Guess who won? This nut though is grown and sold on a commercial scale in South East Asia. We have high hopes here for its success on a home/community scale at the very least. Orchard trials should begin in July-August of 2009.

Well wind farms. Cool. Local wind farms, even cooler. Amayo SA wind project, a collaborative project between US and Canadian investors along with Nicaraguan backers, stalled for over 2 years by antiquated MARENA regulations, but persistence pays off, a over 40 mega watt project that will provide thousands of homes with green juice as well as:

• Located in one of the best wind resources in the North American continent.
• Amayo will reduce 120,000 tonnes of carbon emissions each year.
• Arctas secured $72 million in project finance debt from regional development bank.
• Erection complete and will be fully commissioned by March 2009.
• When commissioned, plant will be nearly twice as large as next largest wind project in Central America or the Caribbean.
• With 2.1MW per unit turbines, Amayo has only MW-class turbines currently installed in region.

Cool. Beautiful. Independence rides the wind. Word. Palabra.

The new BF oven has been fired and it is SUPER!!!. Thanks to Darif, Kim, Dee, Martha, David, Ryan and everyone else for their efforts. Special big thanks to David Ortiz and Martha, our tireless insulating cob layer cobbers!!!

Well a few other references, the rack of greenish red fruit is a full mature rack of pejibaje fruit (Bactris gasipaes) a prominent species fo interest for BF for trials, BF has already fruited this species and is making selections, this is an off season rack that was purchased at a market in CR for a song, halved and had its seed removed, this will provide valuable genetics for future projects.

The killer orange flower is Brownea macrophylla from the legume family, a beautiful flower found on our more serious collecting mission. Enjoy.

Last but not least. I am not sure who this guy is. Definitely a hippie!!!

Well its me, circa 4 years ago, collecting durian in flavour anticipation in Vancouver, Canada.

Durian is being trialed on the farm for the future alongside greywater trials. If you do not know why do some homework on durian you all.

Thanks for everyone's attention.

Best,

Chris Shanks

Co Director, Project Bona Fide

Las Cuchillas clothing and BASEBALL GEAR intercambio!!

Greetings Bona Fide friends and supporters,

Chris here reporting from the isla in the midst of the 'Dry' season. It rained last night, now when I say this I do not mean a few drops or a tease, I mean a true 25 minute plus rain with 1" of soil penetration, in my 7 years here this has been the weirdest and most extaño dry season or verano EVER, and seems to me quite strange for the elders i have spoke to as well about this, the lake is finally down enough for fishing and local fisherfolk are out once again plying their trade.

Well, here is to Sam, Ryan, Darif and Sally from BF and the whole West Van crew from West Vancouver Canada that brought baseball equipment and clothing to the isla. The BF crew hauled the lot of that gear up to Las Cuchillas, a small cloud forest community of 300 hardy folks living 300 plus meters up on the volcano w/o electricity. There was a baseball gear and clothing exchange and BF received eggs, coconuts, cut pictures from kids as well as some songs, poems and BIG THANKS. Anf BIG THANKS TO ALL who participated.

As for this weeks shameless fruit shot, we have what I believe to be Annona reticulata or custard apple or anon as it is know here, a tasty relative of the sugar apple and soursop or guanabana as it is known here.

As for the other shots we a a new post sleeve/post base interface shot as a advance in Bona Fide appropriate technology, essentially what we have is a moat that keeps termites from crawling up the post, this allows us to use ast growing termite susceptible soft woods for building instead of slow growing hardwoods, ongoing testing is a must as is a small drip system that will fill each moat all at once. We gotta a new oven, thanks to David Ortiz our master builder plus Tom Watts Nielsen, Darif, and many others who contributed in brick carrying and mud mixing, THANKS!!!!! The new oven should do 4-5 pizzas at once and up to 15 loaves of bread. Bona Fide!!! Well the last shot is a shameless promo of my new house going up, I wanted to share the afternoon light on my porch as we get ready to put tile on the roof, thanks to my builders: David, Norman, Loco, Vienel, and everyone else helping me make my home here.

Best to all,

Chris Shanks
Co-Director, Project Bona Fide
Chris@projectbonafide.com

Painted playground, post madness, OAKS!

Greetings Bona Fide friends and supporters,


Chris here saying a big 'Hello' to all. The last week or so since my previous posting has been full of a lot of good work and a lot of comings and goings. The farm has been very full with a lot of eager and helpful volunteers and we are happy to have them.

In the series of fotos featured this week we share (finally sorry all) a bunch of images of the 'West Vancouver High school' or West Van as they are known that has come to visit and support community projects in Balgüe for five years. In the last two years these intrepid students and their group leader, Greg Cormier have been very supportive in the development of the the community center the Bona Fide has in our local town. This year the group focused on helping us to begin our Pueboltel homestay program, raised money to build a VERY STURDY fence around the community center to discourage livestock from destroying all plants planted as well as support our Cafe Infantil and of course paint our new playground all sorts of cool colors with lots of local kids helping a long the way. Local kids and West Van students found out quickly how sticky oil based enamel really is. Nice handprints everyone!! As for the following fotos apart from our super cute kidz painting montage we have a pink flower and fuzzy looking fruit that is of all things, PEACH, yes real peach 'Prunus persica' I saw it at about 5500' (1600 meters) in Miraflor reserve in the cloud forests of Northern Nicaragua, ditto for the oaks leaves shown (1 of 4-5 species, true Quercus) And of course the mango featured is a early bearing variety that BF has identified as a under utilized local species with a lot of promise. Plant it up!!
Next week we will despedir some long time staff and show some PIZZA fotos of our new oven.

Best to all,

Chris Shanks
Co-director, Project Bona Fide