Gross

Yesterday I participated in a necessary but disgusting part of a working cattle ranch. Gustavo, Olman, Wilson, Samuel, Bartolo and I stole the manhood from about 20 young bulls. I actually cut and removed once! The men were excited though becuase apparently "huevos de toro" are a delicacy around here. They even ate some of the smaller ones raw- right there- with salt and lime juice.... dont you wish you had been there?
Molly

Being a Researcher….

The past two days I have been working on the ranch with Dylan and some others on the ranch to help them finish up the corn study that Dylan has been working on all summer. It was exciting to get to see the final product after helping to work on it some this summer. I got to help direct guys with machetes on which stalks of corn to cut down at random and carry them to where they would be counted and weighed and some would but put into the shredder and turned into feed. One of my favorite parts surprisingly was helping to shuck the corn because I never knew what I was going to find in each ear, some had odd deformities and some were beautiful shades or purple and yellow, it was just like opening presents at Christmas…well almost…haha. But it was also really neat to know that I have been able to a be a part of a much bigger project and idea that is going to eventually help the people of Las Palmas produce the best corn that they can to use and sell for cattle feed and for people to eat.

---Kenz

More Adventures on the Ranch….

This weekend I got a chance to have a lot of firsts on the ranch. On Saturday I went with Emily and Shanna to feed the baby calves. When we went up to collect the milk in the bottles for the babies they were milking the cows and they let me have a try at it. It was my first time ever and it was exciting for me because I have never been that close to a cow before this summer, much less milked a cow. It was fun, and it wasn’t too hard after you got the aiming thing down, but it was a bit of an arm workout. After getting to feed the baby calves we decided to go for a horse ride and then a picnic up to a place on the ranch called Pride Rock. The horse ride was a lot of fun because we got to take the river trail and certain parts of the trail that we rode through seemed like something straight from an old western movie. After our horse ride, we got to have our lunch up on Pride Rock. The view from it is stunning; it’s so high up that you can see almost the entire ranch. I wanted to take a picture of it of course, but because I couldn’t seem to capture the whole view in one picture, so I just didn’t take one at all. And after our rejuvenating lunch, we all took a nice refreshing walk back in the rain to wind down another adventurous day on the ranch.

--Kenz

Riding Horses

Saturday was my first time ever riding a horse. I have to say that I absolutely loved it! I was scared at first…the horses seemed so big compared to me. However, with a little help I got on the horse despite my fears. Once I was on the horse Emily taught me some basic ways to control him. After that we were on our way. We went through a wonderful trail. It had so many beautiful views and I was able to enjoy the beauty of the ranch. It was such a peaceful experience and I got to enjoy it with the great friends I have made!

~Christie

Corny Pictures (ahaaa!!)

Check out these sweet pics! This first picture is one of the butt-huge ears of corn that we saw and plucked, complete with a few little ears growing out of the same spot. They were some of the biggest ears of corn I've ever seen.

This second picture is one of the really beautiful views afforded one by being in the corn patch---the misty highlands of southern Honduras! Just about everywhere you turn on the ranch, there are breathtaking views! I've had many-a-moment where I felt like I was back home in Wyoming (minus the palm trees, of course). But my all-time favorite view spot of the summer is at the top of Pride Rock. Pride Rock is this big, tall rock escarpment close to the big house at the top of the ranch. It also happens to be one of the very few points on the ranch where you can see all down into the big valley down to the intern house, as well as all the way to the big valley on the other side of the mountains where the main highway to San Marcos is. Plus, there are huge, smooth rocks up there that aren't covered with a ton of thorny brush, and are perfect for chilling on and eating a picnic lunch. Nevertheless, this isn't a picture of Pride Rock, but it's still a pretty picture from where the corn plots are.

This next picture is a picture of the actual corn patch. You can see the different plots and how they are separated from one another by a little bit of space. At the top of the picture is where the little river is near the corn. The whole thing is nestled in a beautiful little valley, surrounded by verdant hills and mountains. There's also a little swinging wooden bridge that spans the river, and it was my favorite spot to eat a sack lunch, chilling out on the bridge and listening to the water trickling below. It's really relaxing and a nice break from measuring corn!

And finally, here's the ubiquitous corn guy---me decked out in all of my Honduras- and corn-etched glory, the utilitarian garb of the sun-drenched, the sweat-drenched, and the poop-drenched. Anyway, this is a picture I took as a size-comparison for my professor. Look how huge those corn stalks are! It's the tallest corn I've ever seen! So, I got a picture with it, of course. And, yes, I went on a safari after the picture was taken.

-- Dylan Wann

El Fin

The corn research is finished! Well, for the most part. Dr. Kent Gallaher and his dad, Raymond, came down this last Sunday to stay for a couple days and finish the rest of the data-collecting that needed to be done on the corn-only study. And, man, it was nice to see a familiar face, too! Dr. Gallaher (Dr. "G") is one of my professors in the Ag department at ACU, and was the one who set up all this entire research study with Mission Lazarus. And, his dad is a retired agronomist who taught at the University of Florida. So, they came out to the ranch and were all jacked up about the corn. Raymond was the one who had developed all of the different varieties of corn through years and years of experimentation with all different kinds of corn, in order to produce varieties that would produce higher yields in this climate than the local corn varieties. And according to our research, he was successful! We pulled off ears of corn that were almost as long as Dr. G's forearm (and he's butt-tall, so he's got some long forearms). They were, like, monster ears of corn! So, that was really exciting to see, even if it was just corn. That means that Mission Lazarus can start producing those kinds of corn in large quantities, and it will be very high-quality corn to boot.

Thus, the last couple of days, for me, have consisted of going through all that I had done already in the corn with the Gallahers, and then cutting a lot of corn down and weighing it. We ended up harvesting certain-numbered plants out of each variety of corn in all four plots (128 varieties in all, or 32 x 4), then counting the ears, and finally weighing them to get a weight for each variety for comparison. Then, we went back through and selected a few plants from each variety again from only one plot (32 in all), chopped them, then weighed the plants only (without the ears). After that, we weighed the ears with the plant matter. This gives us the weight of the actual ears of each plant compared to the weight of the plant by itself. From this comparison, we can figure out what percentage of the total plant consisted of just the ears. Now, all we have to do is wait for the samples we collected to be dried at Zamarano (an ag college close to Tegucigalpa), and then we will do the same weight measurements again for the dry-weights. Yeah!

Anyway, that probably is TMI for anyone who wasn't involved with the study. But, upon seeing the massive ears of corn coming off of some of those plants, it's exciting for anyone to know that those kinds of ears will be available very soon for Mission Lazarus to grow for human food and animal food. And it will soon be available for locals to grow for food, too, which is even more exciting! So, this is the most recent chronicle from the corn guy, who is excited to be finished with the research, but more excited to see what will come from it. Corn is cool! It's cornool!

-- Dylan Wann

Some Coffee and Jacobo

The other day, Jacobo decided to take us up to the coffee plantation. I would just like to say that it was a lot of fun. We moved a lot of coffee plants (about 500 I think) that needed to be planted, and got to hang out with Jake for a day. Also, Natosha got this super nasty cut right next to her eye due to the barbed wire that was above our heads. I'm really sad that he left. Jake was awesome with all the ranch stuff, and he did a ton of really great things while he was here. He just got a job in Iowa, and I hope that he enjoys every minute of it. I would like to thank him for teaching Natosha and me the entire coffee process and letting us see all the cool things that go on up there. This post is nowhere near profound in any way. It's just my simple experience with some coffee plants and a great guy named Jake. I can tell he'll really be missed here.

-Tristan McPherson