Best Field Trip Ever

I seem to be saying the best something ever a lot these days. But it's true! Just got back from a three day excursion with my Forestry class to Sarapaqui Costa Rica, located in the eastern central zone. We focused on GMO's in forestry, plantations, and natural forest management.
Day 1: Bus ride past the gorgeous views of Arenal volcano to UCR Technological Institute where we talked with the head of genetic modification in forestry. We saw samples of cloned plants and learned how and why their methods are believed to be effective. The project is still in its early stages, but they are working on creating trees with higher rates of carbon fixation, higher quality, faster growing, and with less branches so that the wood is more valuable. Controversial, but fascinating. We headed out into the field to look at plantations with cloned trees, and ended up trucking through mud and cow poop in our flip flops for about 20 minutes. One girl was even wearing heels. There was river crossing via piggy back rides as well as leaping competitions. Full of mud, we headed on to the hotel, complete with an awesome pool!



Day 2: Fundecor, and NGO in CR working with payment for environmental services, picked us up at 8 and took us to their nursery where they work on reforestation in the surrounding communities. Then we looked at plantations and talked about the value of forests, cost benefit analysis, and opportunity costs in relation to PES systems. We took a hike into the woods to see how quickly a forest can recover from sustainable management. The goal was to show us how a logged forest looked just like a natural one 5 years later....which means that we were trucking through the deep woods, up and down steep slopes. Just in time for the rain! The torrential downpour made the steep forest slopes, without trails, all the more fun to hike up and down! It was awesome.



We also saw lots of pineapple fields. In the last 2 years, pineapple went from hardly being produced in CR to having 40,000hectars. And it was cloned, so they are all the same pineapple!! And the amount of pesticides used are outta control! There are serious problems being caused with local water supplies and biodiversity. Anyways, our muddy group headed back to the hotel for out wrap up session in the pool! And then watched the VP debates over some boxed wine.


(walking through pineapple plants!!)

Day 3: Fundecor took us to a hydroelectric plant which pumps water out of two rivers, generates electricity, and then pumps the water back in. The project was fascinating, and we all got to wear real cool hard hats on the site. Finally, we stopped by La Paz Waterfall gardens. Freakin Sweet.



We got back to CC just in time for my early bday party! More pics up here!
Next stop.....PANAMA!!!!