goats and rabbits and worms oh my!

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I am back in Estelí. For the night. Maybe for tomorrow night, too.

So I just got back from a 4 days of IST.. or In Service Training, for all Ag volunteers. We went to this farm in the department of Masaya, south of Managua.

We started with chores every morning from 6-9. I worked in the rabbit cages the first morning. They have a lot of rabbits. Like a lot. I watered all of them for an hour. While others fed them. Then we learned all about how the farm runs and how they keep track of all of them and where they sell the meat and how much a rabbit costs to buy and the different breeds. Interesting. A grown rabbit costs between 120-400 cords, or $6-$20 USD depending on the breed.

Yesterday I worked in the massive worm cultures. Like one meter by 14 meter wide raised beds. About 20 of them. Full of worms and shit. Literally. I also watered them, as the dirt-crap-worm humitidy level has to be kept at 80% humidity for the worms to turn the dirt-crap into organic fertilizer and for them to reproduce at the fastest rate. A kilo of worms costs $25 USD. A sacko, or 100 lb sack of the fertilizer costs $7 USD.

This morning I worked with the goats... specifically, milking the goats. That was fun.

Also this week we....

-watched pigs be born
-castrated pigs - hands on

-caught every chicken, guinea fowl, duck, rooster, and turkey in the place to give them vaccinations - hands on. i hate fowl.

-milked goats
-clipped goat hooves
-gave antiparasite injections to the young goats - all goat stuff hands on

-watered and shoveled shit in the worm boxes

-watched baby rabbits be born
-practiced telling the sex of the rabbits
-slaughtered three rabbits. i skinned one! and gutted another!

It was a full 4 days. With lots of socializing in the evening. We also ate very well. The place can cook.

However, now it is back to Moropoto... and I´m not gonna lie, I am soooo ready to be back home and finally get back into the groove of things... clean my room, wash my clothes, teach english, wait for the rains to come, visit families, haul water, watch baseball, did i mention clean my room and do laundry?

But for now I am in Estelí. And it is nice. I will return tomorrow or Sunday.

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Comments

[mom]

well,........
while all of the above 'goats and rabbits and worms' sounds like a very, very "interesting" week,...um....makes teaching English sound p.r.e.t.t.y darned good, huh? Ha! Your Dad loved it! Said that it sounds like they're teaching you everything you need to know to come back and live in our Ozark Hills back home!! Ha! You've certainly had a "varied" life so far, haven't you?!! Any of this helped you with decisions on what to do for Nica back at your site? (or what NOT to get into??). XOXOXO Chree's kittens are SO darned CUTE; still have their eyes closed, but held them today for just a second!