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TREE OWNERS FUND RESEARCH INTO PRESERVING NATIVE TREE SPECIES

Finca Leola has always consulted with an experienced forestry engineer, but tree sales have gone so well that we've hired as a full-time forester a specialist in Costa Rican native tropical hardwood trees. For several years, Lucía Rodríguez Sánchez was  responsible for the hands-on experimentation in and the collection of research data for domesticating and adapting native species of the North Zone of Costa Rica for plantation use.

In our plan,  we bring pastureland into use as tree plantations, and as we harvest the trees over 25 years, we will leave some native trees standing that will be the base of a perpetual forest. To do this well, we want to know how best to propagate as many native species as possible. This research in our location had been set aside due to dwindling public funds. By bringing Lucía on board, Finca Leola and our tree owners have made it possible for her to restart the investigations that are so valuable to us and to other tropical hardwood plantations and reforestation projects.

Lucía has already written articles for our website, so you should check out our expanded Tree Information section. We've always wanted this section to be an in-depth repository of data accessible by anybody. We're starting with general articles about the varieties we're growing this year and will add more. Each of these articles will eventually link to scientific and technical information pages. Lucía has data on the native Costa Rican tropical hardwood species she researched for the bilingual book she coauthored, Árboles Maderables de Costa Rica: Ecología y Silvicultura / Timber Trees of Costa Rica: Ecology and Silvaculture, so expect to read about all of them and more in the future. She has also been published in Tropical Trees Seed Manual, by the USDA Forest Service.

Should you pay us a visit, you'll probably be able to buy a copy of the Timber Trees book here. We have been told that it should be available at www.inbio.ac.cr/editorial after November 2005 for shipment to the USA. If not, we encourage you to e-mail the site and request it, as it is a beautiful and informative book. The representative page here shows the tree, foliage, and wood of Dipteryx panamensis, the tree so important to the endangered great green macaw (Ara ambigua). These birds mainly nest in cavities of Dipteryx panamensis, or almendro trees, and feed almost exclusively on the tree's fruit.

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CATCH THESE ARTICLES

An e-mail that Finca Leola gets several times a month goes something like this: "I am interested in either purchasing a plantation that is already started, or starting one myself. I would like to do reforestation. Can you help me? I have seen the numbers, and it looks like a good way to make some money, help the environment, and have a nice vacation spot-maybe even a place to retire to." The number of e-mails we get about this prompted us to write an article called "Three Secrets to Owning a Plantation in Costa Rica." Click here to read it.

Finca Leola brought Ed Ring, owner of EcoWorld online magazine, to Costa Rica to research articles on biological corridors, including what our reforestation project does to augment them. If habitat is broken up by open farmland or towns, animals can't move in their natural patterns. They need unbroken forest cover to access better food supplies and expand their gene pool for the health of their species. Click here to read Ed's article, "Profitable Reforesting," about how buying trees with us funds new, protected forest areas.

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FORESTATION FORUM HAS NEW HOST

It's now called the Reforesting Forum, and it's hosted on the EcoWorld website.  Participate in or just follow discussions about many reforestation-related topics. Click here to join the forum--you don't have to reveal your e-mail address to the world.

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NEW HUMOR STORIES AND PHOTOS

Our photo gallery has additions in these categories.

There are two new Life in the Campo stories, Verbal Quicksand and For the Love of Bossy.

With this year's planting of over 14,000 trees, our plantings total 30,000 trees. They cover 91 acres (37 hectares) that will ultimately become second-growth rainforest. About two-thirds are teak and one-third rare native Costa Rican species.

Here are some of the species we've planted so far. Click the name of each for more detailed descriptions and photos of these delectable woods.

Almendro - as durable as it is beautiful

Pilón - very heavy, chocolate-colored wood

Roble coral - as warm a color as the name suggests

Surá - strong, handsome construction lumber

Laurel - a soft beige and very workable for furniture

Coming soon to the Tree Information section:Ron ron - sometimes called tigerwood because of its streaks

All of the 2005 native trees were sold before they went in the ground, so get in your preorder for the 2006 natives.

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CARE AND FEEDING OF BABY TREES

by Christina Ramírez

Can anything be simple about caring for the young of any species? As a mother or father of a child, we may prepare and read literature as much as we can, and when we finally feel like we get the hang of parenting, our child grows into a new phase of development. Luckily, "parenting" a tree is not nearly as complex as parenting a child (trees aren't mobile!), but it does take a tremendous amount of focused work, experience, and knowledge. In our trees' case, as with most parents' progeny, we have the benefit of working with professionals in the field and experienced workers who really care for the well-being of their charges.

When we talk about feeding, building a balanced diet for our trees was a one-time decision: At the point when we purchased the farm, we chose the best quality soil for our trees to grow on, the correct elevation, and the optimum climate. Mother Nature takes care of daily feedings with water and sun.

With feeding comes maintenance, and instead of changing diapers, we are pruning and trimming back weeds and vines to make sure each tree grows up straight and beautiful. Unlike in a child's life, we can cut out our young trees' competition. During the first couple of years we may prune as many as six times a year, or every 2 months, depending on growth. We guide them with a firm yet gentle hand, and when they begin to grow out of bounds we are quick to prune them back into form.

When they're a tender age, you can't leave them alone very long. Maintaining fences and gates to prevent prospective dangers (like the next door neighbor's pig) to baby trees is akin to a parent's keeping a young child from cold drafts, falling down, or too much stimulation. When we aren't watching over them, the trees have a "nanny": the farm manager who lives on each farm with his family. Martín, our farm manager on Finca #1, checks on all 30,000 trees at least once a week to make sure that they are growing with vigor and reports to us when he notices anything out of the ordinary. We do all this to provide that stable, nurturing environment that's so important during the formative years.

You know that having young children requires building close relationships with doctors, dentists, and teachers. Our young trees also require that we build relationships with professionals. We have an experienced forestry engineer on staff who provides guidance in maximizing our trees' potential and preventing risks to development, and we continuously investigate ways to provide better care for our young ones. We consult with the Ministry of the Environment when we have questions about our trees' upbringing. When we want to consult about our trees' future potential, we consult with the Ministry of Forestry.

Every child is different. When we do our research on caring for our trees, we make note of our species' differences and work on bringing out the best in each one. For example, teak likes to grow in areas with a grade of less than 20 percent. We appreciate this difference and plant different species in those areas with a higher pendant, because we want the best for each unique variety.

As the trees get into their "teenage" years, they begin to "help us out with chores." When the trees were smaller, and a big rainfall was close, the only warning was the crash of the streams and rivers filling up (which you may or may not hear from inside the house). Now, with the trees being older, taller, and stronger, they help us by warning us when a storm is coming. You can hear the sheet of rain coming across the plantation as it splatters against the leaves of all the trees, letting us know just in time to rush outside and bring the clothes in that are drying on the line.

The goal we have for us and our children is to leave the world a better place because we lived. The trees are also good citizens, giving back more than they take.