The end of a month

Hey guys!

Today was another great day here at EARTH!

Since Kilian missed the bus to go to the FIO so he helped me out in the finca pecuaria with some of my research. We loaded milk into the back of the truck, watched the cows walk into the corral, observed their behaviors while feeding, and took pictures of the cow's udders, feet, and ear tags when they were being milked.

We worked in the finca until 11 and I headed back to my room to shower, record some of the data collected, and grab a study sheet for my spanish test! I ate lunch with Kilian and some of the girls I've become friends with. We talked and they helped me study for the test. It was on simple preterite and preterite imperfect which are my two worst enemies. After lunch I took the test in Profe Emilia's office. I think I did ok, but I know that I struggled with a few of the sections. Once I finished the test I went to help out in an english class. I learn a lot of spanish by sitting in and helping out with english classes. Things have to be explained in both languages so I get to hear direct translations and explanations. I also get to help out my friends, which is a big plus!

After english class ended I took a walk behind our building. I've been trying to find a sloth and I've started to look around the woods more. I couldn't find a sloth, but I did stumble upon these little critters! There were about 10 of these Cotis forraging for food. I thought they were the cutest things!

That's it for today guys! Thanks for reading!

-Allie

The moment I've been waiting for

Hey guys!

It finally happened! I learned about AI and palpitated a cow! It started out as a rough day though.

I had a headache last night so I took some medicine before I went to sleep. Apparently I forgot that naproxen knocks me out, so much so that not even the thunder or my alarm woke me up. You know how I'm supposed to get to the farm at 6:30? I woke up at 7. I jumped out of bed, threw on my work clothes, grabbed my stuff, brushed my teeth, and rushed to the farm. I ended up being an hour late, but Profe understood. I felt so bad, I don't usually do stuff like this.

Anyways, I didn't do a full dairy protocol assessment today since we already have information from 4 days. I took notes on 8 cows and then organized some of my paperwork. I had to give a presentation on my work in front of everyone too, so I drew charts and tried to compose fluent spanish sentences in my head in the hope that it would be good enough. Profe gave a brief overview of my project to the students and once he was done I got up in front of everyone and tried to explain my data in broken spanish. When I slipped up Profe helped me, the visuals were pretty clear, and students initiated discussions about my data, so I believe it was an overall success. Profe said I did a good job and I hope it's true!

After my presentation, Profe led 4 other students and I to the circular corral. There were 5 cows lined up and the table in the center of the ring had the semen tank, gloves, oil, and aprons ready to go. Profe explained AI procedure to us, showing us how hot the water has to be to thaw the semen, how to load the gun, and how to put the plastic case over the needle. Profe helped me suit up and I was ready to go, armed with a weirdly constructed yellow apron and a plastic glove that went up to my shoulder. I wasn't going to perform AI so I spent my time trying to find the cervix. It was confusing at first because I didn't know what I was touching. The other students knew what they were feeling for whereas I was kinda standing there, waiting for Profe to tell me if I found the cervix. I found it and Profe explained to me what would happen if I was administering AI. I palpitated 4 other cows just to make sure that I knew where to look and it got easier each time I practiced. It was so cool! I feel like I'm a real animal science student now!

That was the highlight of my day (and quite possibly my internship) and I'm so thankful that I got the chance to do this.

It's really late guys, sorry this post is so short! Thanks for reading!

-Allie

Live and Learn: Future Interns, Take Notes

Hey guys!

Although I didn't have work today it was still an eventful day!

Last night I stayed up really late with a few of my friends, Kalem, Jhoselyn, and Fabricio, and watched some movies in my room. It was a lot of fun because I switched the language to spanish and I turned off the captions. The others asked me if I wanted subtitles but I need to learn spanish somehow. Life doesn't have subtitles. I can proudly say that I understood 70% or more of the dialogue of each movie. Every once in a while they would ask me if I understood what was going on and if I didn't understand they would explain it to me. Fabricio speaks english extremely well, so he played translator every once in a while. One interesting thing I noticed was that humor doesn't always transcend languages. Some things were funny to them that I didn't think were funny and vice versa. It was intriguing to me!

After the second movie ended everyone went home and I got to sleep. When I woke up (about 5 and 1/2 hours later) I was about to go to the cafeteria when I looked at the bike rack in front of my door and realized that there was something off. Ladies and gentlemen, someone took my bike the one day I forgot to lock it. I never ride it so it was locked to that spot for weeks, that is until I rode my bike with Jhoselyn last night and forgot to lock it. Apparently this happens often at EARTH, so often that when I told some people in my hall that my bike was stolen they laughed and said, "Welcome to EARTH". I've been told to wait a day to see if the bike is returned, but if it isn't back by tomorrow I'm going to look around and find it. Lesson learned.
FUTURE INTERNS: LOCK YOUR BIKES. ALWAYS.

After breakfast I went to have my weekly meeting with Profe Moro.

Now the second learning moment of the day happened during lunch. Usually I'm pretty easygoing when it comes to tico food. I'm not too picky and I've become accustomed to trying new things. So when I got to the lunch line and realized that I didn't know what the meat being served was I figured to just go with it. I got rice and beans (surprise) and a dish called mondongo. When I asked the cafeteria lady what was in it she just said "vaca' which is cow, so I assumes it was a safe bet.

I have never been so wrong in my entire life.

A picture I took before it all went downhill

The first bite was really weird. It didn't taste like beef at all. It was rubbery and reminded me vaguely of bad pasta. It took a while for me to even chew one piece. I gave up on it after the first bite and focused on my rice and beans. Soon Kalem came over and sat with me. Once she sat down we talked for a little bit and I finally asked,"Cual es este comida?" Kalem smirked mischievously and asked me if I ate some of it and if I liked it. I told her that it wasn't really my thing and that I didn't want to eat any more of it. After a minute or so of asking her to tell me what it was, Kalem gave me the bad news.

Mondongo is a stew with cow stomach in it. I ate the rumen of a cow. 

I thought she was joking with me and insisted that she was lying. I didn't believe her until Kalem brought one of the cafeteria ladies over to validate that it was, indeed, cow stomach. At least now I know to ask what,specifically, is in what I'm eating.

I downed 2 cups of coffee to take my mind of the stomach within my stomach and prepared a slideshow presentation for my spanish class on EARTH's Periurbana, the urban agriculture farm. I wrote a post all about that a few days back if you want to read it over. I think I did really well with my presentation! I'm more comfortable speaking spanish thanks to my friends. When I hang around them I absolutely have to talk in spanish, so it pushes me out of my comfort zone. I'm so grateful for all of my friends here at EARTH. I've learned so much from them and I hope I have helped them as well.

At night I watched and tried to help Kalem and Jhoselyn with their business project. Each student at EARTH has to complete a group business project within their 4 years at EARTH. So much effort is put into these projects and it's really interesting to see these projects come to life and succeed. I hope Kalem, Jhoselyn, and Fabricio's group does well. I helped them pick the meaning for one of their business's colors (yellow), helped them come up with a business slogan (Amistad con empresa, agricultura, y el mundo), and helped them with their logo. I'm learning all about these projects and I kinda wished that these types of projects were encouraged in US schools. The schools give students loans to start these projects and the students have to pay them back (with interest) but the students keep whatever's leftover. It's a great way to gain business skills.

Throughout this experience I have learned something new everyday. My time here is coming to an end but I know that I'll still learn new things while I am here.

Thanks for reading you guys!

-Allie 

I'm milking all of these dairy puns

Hey guys!

Since today is a monday I spent all of my time working on my internship project and the paperwork it entails. I know I've complained about it in the past, especially the excel stuff, but I'm really proud that I've gotten a lot of it done. The biggest part that I've been working on is the dairy protocol analysis, or dairy protocol assessment.

I've mentioned dairy protocol assessment a lot but I don't think I explained it too well in the past. Here's a quick crash course in dairy protocol 101.

Dairy protocol is the system used to milk the cows. This system has several parts that ensure that the process is sanitary, safe, and productive. These steps include:

1. Forestripping (quickly milking the cows by hand to stimulate milk production)
2. California Mastitis Test (testing the milk to see if the cow has mastitis. This infection is not only painful for the cow but it also makes the milk unusable)
3. Suckling (allowing the calves to drink some milk which stimulates milk production again)
4. Pre-dipping (sanitizing the teats after the calves have suckled)
5. Drying (quickly drying the teats)
6. Unit connection (connecting the milking unit to the udder)
7. Unit disconnection (disconnection the unit from the udder)

The first 5 steps should take no longer than 2 minutes to complete. The more time we spend on this part of the milking the less milk will be produced. As for the unit connection and disconnection, that time should be no longer than 6 minutes. This saves some milk for the calves, keeps teat structures intact, and is less painful for the cows. We see if we follow these advised times by recording when each step takes place on this rubric.

After we fill out this rubric, I go back to my computer and enter the times in a excel spreadsheet (yes, the ones I have been spending so much time on). 

Isn't it pretty?

Once I've filled in the spreadsheet I make histograms of the time from forestripping to unit connection, the time from unit connection to unit disconnection, and the comparison of milk yield to the time spent milking. These charts are really good visuals and they really hit home.

These are the charts from July 26th 

As you can see, we only followed the recommended time with 2 cows. The majority of the cows took 6 minutes to connect and 1 took as long as 9 minutes! These times are so high because the workers try to work on 4 different cows at once, which sounds like it would make the process quicker when in reality it only lengthens the time spent on each cow. This is one of the biggest problems we have at the lecheria. 

On this chart you can see that we only milk 19 cows within the recommended time limit. The most time we spent milking a cow this day was 12 minutes, which is twice the recommended time limit. We've even had one of the cows milked for 13 minutes! This is extremely painful for the cows, it ruins their teats, and makes them vulnerable to mastitis. We had 6 cases of mastitis within the past week and only 1 of those cows was milked within the recommended milking time. This is the biggest problem we have at the lecheria. 

This one shows the correlation between the time spent milking and the amount of milk produced. The milk yield is usually  higher the longer the cow is milked, however, this isn't good in the long run. The longer we milk the cows the less they'll be able to produce in the future. It would be a better investment to spend less time milking, get less milk now, and preserve the milk glands than over milk the cow now and prevent it from producing more milk in the future. 

I hope I did a better job of explaining what I've been doing lately. This is a big part of my welfare assessment project since dairy cows are kept to produce milk. If we make this process quicker and painless for the cows they better their emotional, physical, and mental state will be.

If you want to learn more about this system, let me know in the comments or message me on facebook!

Thanks for reading you guys!

-Allie

You know you're at EARTH when...

Hey guys!

So t-minus 2 weeks until I come home to the states! It's really bittersweet. I'm excited to come home for a week and then start my adventure at ISU, I can't wait to see my family and friends again, and of course I'm excited to have some old fashioned american food.  I'm excited about all of this stuff, but I'm going to miss EARTH University and all of its quirks and oddities. There are a few things that really set EARTH apart from other places

You know you're at EARTH when people cut the line to get a cup of coffee. Nobody cares, just do it quickly, say "Perdon", and smile.

You know you're at EARTH when a gecko falls from the ceiling onto your table during a meal. Yea, that happened today.

You know you're at EARTH when people call their roommates doña (regardless of whether they're a guy or a girl).

You know you're at EARTH when you address the cafeteria ladies as "madre".

You know you're at EARTH when you join in on the glass hitting and cheering that occurs when a guy and girl sit together.

You know you're at EARTH when people put your laundry in the dryer for you when you don't wash your clothes quick enough.

You know you're at EARTH when gallo pinto becomes a major part of your daily diet.

You know you're at EARTH when you see 3 different soccer jerseys from 3 different countries.

You know you're at EARTH when someone tries to sell you malanga, yucca, or plantain chips.

You know you're at EARTH when your friend goes to the kitchen and comes back with a huge block of cheese they made. The first time this happened I started laughing hysterically and nobody understood why. Apparently it's completely natural for people to do this.

You know you're at EARTH when there's a long line for breakfast at 5:30 in the morning. Most college students wouldn't even think about getting up that early.

You know you're at EARTH when you own at least one straw hat.

You know you're at EARTH when your boots are always clean. Costa Rican rain is mother nature's spin cycle.

You know you're at EARTH when you hear 3 different languages being spoken at the same time.

You know you're at EARTH when you hear the words "water buffalo" and "biodigestor" used regularly in conversations.

You know you're at EARTH when strangers are willing to go out of their way to help you.

I know I'm missing so many other things that make EARTH unique. I'll probably remember them once I'm back in the states. On the bright side, I have 2 more weeks to experience more weird EARTH things! I'm ready for this week and whatever it entails!

Thanks for reading you guys!

-Allie

Look ma, I sutured a cow!

Hey guys!

Saturdays are always exciting for me and today was no exception!

I woke up bright and early at 5:30 and headed to the cafeteria for breakfast (Gallo pinto! I've learned to love it).

I walked to the finca pecuaria and got there early at 6:25. I sat down and talked to some of the other students before we got to work. Once Profe Moro came to the farm everyone got split up into groups. 4 students or so go with a 4th year student to help them with their project. Jenny gets 3 students to work alongside her, Yamy, and Giver (He-ver) and I get to stand on the steps of the lecheria and record the information I need. After 2 hours, all of the cows were milked and lead back into the big corral. I wrote down all the time spent on each step, opened and shut doors to let the cows out, and tried to stay somewhat clean while standing around the cows.

Once I put my notes away I walked to the circular corral to see what the students were doing. Turns out they were doing a few surgeries! I lucked out and saw 2!

The first surgery involved cutting the genitalia of a male calf and moving it back towards the legs. This calf had an issue where his genitalia was close to where his navel was. This needed to be fixed in order to keep the cow healthy. We started off by giving the cow some local anesthesia to lessen the pain (poor little guy). The students made a foot long incision where the problem was and then proceeded to cut, push back, and re-wire the affected area. Once that was all said and done it was time to suture up. The suture needle wasn't like a sewing needle at all. It was this 4 inch curved needle that was about 1/4th of an inch thick. We used some thick suture material that was somewhat like cotton yarn and small plastic tubes to mend the skin together. I even got to do one of the last sutures! I had to put the needle through the skin from top to bottom (which was more difficult than I thought it would be. Cow skin is really thick, so I really needed to push down on the needle to get it through), slip a tube onto the needle, sew from the bottom to the top, slip another tube onto the needle, thread the needle through the starting point, tie it three times, and cut it. My old sewing skills helped me a lot.  Once we washed the area with bentadine and this aerosol disinfectant which looks like purple spray paint, some of the guys helped pull the calf up and moved it out of the center of the ring.

The next surgery was removing a tumor from the eye of a heifer. This cow was huge! It took Daniel, Mau (one of the farmhands), and 2 other students to pull the cow to the ground and tie it up. Once the cow was tied up, Daniel and the other boys sat on the cow to restrain it during the procedure. We held the head down and proceeded to cut the tumor out. We removed the extra tissue that came along with the tumor and let the cow go. There's a video of this procedure and pictures of the other surgery at the bottom of this post.

That was the highlight of my day! I love doing surgeries! I can't wait to do more things like this in college. I hope everyone had a good saturday! Thanks for reading!

-Allie



WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES ARE BELOW. IF YOU ARE AFRAID OF BLOOD OR SQUEAMISH IN ANY WAY, DON'T SCROLL DOWN.

Removing a tumor from a cow's eye

Late!

Hey guys!

I completely forgot to post this and I didn't do anything exciting today, so I guess it's a good thing that I'm combining these two things!

Thursday

I woke up at 5:30 (as usual) and worked on the farm from 6:30-11:00. I recorded the dairy protocol as usual, except I left a few parts blank because we don't do some procedures. We should be doing these procedures consistently, but the workers only do the full procedure when Jenny and the other students are there. Anyway, I got that information down and helped clean up afterwards. I've fallen into the routine of the farm and it's come to the point that I know what needs to be done next. It's really nice and I know I'm going to miss it a lot when I leave.

After the farm I went to my room to shower and type up the data I recorded into one of my many spreadsheets. I've learned to love microsoft excel even when I still don't know how to make a good histogram on it. Thankfully Profe Moro's been helping me out with that.

After that I ate a quick lunch and headed off to the library to meet with my spanish professor.She took Kilian and I on a field trip to the periurbana, which is the urban agriculture farm. It was amazing! We learned about hydroponics, aquaponics, and other forms of agriculture that could be used in urban areas.

A poster that describes some of the benefits of urban agriculture

A wind chime made out of recycled materials

One of the hydroponic beds

Beets! These are used to feed insects so they don't eat any of the other plants!

Some flat beds

Beds made of recycled materials like tires and washing machine parts

A biointensive bed fenced in by water bottles 

Raul talking to us about hydroponics and when to transplant seedlings into the hydroponic system

The aquaponics system

An aquaponic bed with Tilapia underneath. The water the fish live in are cycled through the plants, giving the plants nutrients and water while simultaneously cleaning the water.

It was a great tour and I hope that we start seeing more urban agriculture in the US. We need all the help we can get!

Friday

Today was a national Costa Rican holiday! We celebrated the annexation of Guanacaste, which was originally a part of Guatemala, by having the day off.

I slept in and had breakfast at 8:30 which was extremely weird. It's 3 hours earlier than my normal breakfast time so I've been a little thrown off. Whenever there's a holiday everything is pushed back by and hour or so.

I hung out most of the afternoon with my friends Kalem and Jhoselyn. We watched Frozen in spanish, talked about stuff that goes on here at EARTH, and we took a few unplanned naps. These girls are amazing. I learn a lot of spanish from them and I teach them english in return. I've even taught them how to say "Hey baby, how you doin'?".

That's about it! I'll be working on the farm tomorrow and that'll be interesting! I'll type that up (on time) tomorrow.

Bye!

-Allie

I'm running out of clever titles

Hey guys!

Today was a pretty average day for me so this is going to be pretty short.

I didn't get to AI a cow today(boo), but I got to use my dairy protocol assessment again so now I have more data. I might assess the dairy protocol one more time. Some of the numbers were astounding. One cow was milked for 13 minutes straight! Now that we have this information we can easily monitor our time better and improve upon our system.

I had to give a group presentation for my Spanish class with another student named Newton about nomadic pastoralism. It was a little frightening! I had to explain everything in Spanish. Luckily I understand the basic words that are needed to explain the system. It wasn’t great but it was something! We all sat around in a group and talked about different systems of farming like industrial farming, integrated farming, etc. It was interesting!

Integrated farming is really stressed here at EARTH. Learn more about this system of farming here!

Thanks for reading you guys!

-Allie

Black out!

Hey guys!

So, in a surprising turn of events, it was raining and thunder storming all day today. I know, huge surprise right? Rain in Costa Rica? How strange!

Obviously the rain isn't what threw me off. The unusual part of today was the 5 1/2 hour long blackout. Usually the power is pretty sturdy when it comes to storms. There's the 5 minute or so power outage, but today from 6:30 to 12 we lost power. There was no internet, no operating fans (it wasn't that bad since the rain cooled everything down, but still), and no working outlets. I planned on working on a paper Profe Moro and I discussed but my laptop died about an hour into the power outage. Basically I sat around in my room writing stuff down and playing music on my phone waiting for the power to come back on. Eventually it came back on and I got most of my work done on paper, so I decided to go to lunch.

Today there was a EARTH University special event that was being celebrated during lunch. We were celebrating the annexation of the Guanacaste campus on the pacific side of the country. There was a buffet, there were tablecloths, centerpieces, and even a mariachi band! I was a little confused because I originally thought that we were celebrating the actual annexation of the town Guanacaste, but one of the cafeteria ladies (we call her Madre) filled me in. God bless these cafeteria ladies, they always explain what the food is to me and they're so nice. We laugh about my horrible accent and I always ask them how their days are. They're basically the guidance counselors of the school. The food was great, as always, and I sat with a few Ecuadorian friends of mine. It was a lot of fun!

After lunch I watched some youtube videos on artificially inseminating cows (which is not something to watch if you get queasy). Tomorrow's the day you guys! I'm really excited but at the same time I'm really nervous. What if I hurt the cow? What if I break my arm (it's happened to people before)? What if? Luckily Profe Moro will be there to help me and the other students, but I'm still worried about screwing this up. Most veterinarians do AI often and it's an important skill to know. It's my first time so I know I'll learn from my mistakes, I just hope I don't screw up monumentally.

Once dinner came around I ate with a few of the girls from my hall and one of their friends from Mexico. I was helping them with their English and they helped me with my Spanish during most of our conversation, so it was really helpful. Everyone's been telling me that I'm improving, and I would hope that after a month here I would improve somewhat, so hopefully by the time I leave I'll be somewhat fluent (or at least more competent). We talked about Lord of the Rings (I had my copy with me), cultural differences, and dancing.

Oh, speaking of dancing, I went to Bachata club with them afterwards! I'm certainly no ballroom dancer like half the people here, but I'm getting better.  Bachata is pretty simple and the steps are easy to follow, I just get thrown off because I focus too much or I lose track of the beat. I always feel bad for the person I'm dancing with. I danced with a few of my friends, Jhoselyn and Estefany, and they helped me more than anyone else. Well, Wladamir (one of the guys) does his best to help me out, but in the end he's just far too advanced for me. The guys here really dance which is extremely weird for me! I'm used to guys just kinda standing there and swaying to the beat. Here they do the fancy twirls and dips, which is intimidating. I had a lot of fun though! Dancing here is a big part of the culture and I think it's a lot of fun, even though I am really bad at it.

That was my day! Wish me luck with tomorrow's AI! I'm gonna need it!

-Allie

The Lazy Gringo

Hey guys!

It's really late and I don't feel like anything I did was really interesting (it was basically reading and making histograms) so here's a video about EARTH University.

Have a good one guys!

-Allie

Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost

Hey guys!

Today I wandered around campus on my own and I kinda had a few hours to contemplate some things that have been on my mind lately. I walked around the forests here, checked out the church, and I walked around a little at night. I took some pictures of some of the things I saw, and I only took a few pictures because sometimes there are things that you can't take pictures of.

Basically this is just going to be a post where I ramble on about nature and how we don't give it the attention and respect that it deserves.

Here we go.



One of the biggest pitfalls of my generation, specifically those of us in the US, is our inability to be patient and observe what's around us in a peaceful manner. While I was walking around the forest I had one headphone in my ear that cancelled out some of the sounds around me. I couldn't even spend 10 minutes listening to the sounds around me. Tonight I spent 30 minutes in silence, no headphones or music, and looked at the stars. There aren't that many stars here since there's a lot of cloud coverage, but the few stars that were there were worth the effort.

That's another thing. Nature is really noisy. When most people think of silence or quietness, a forest or another nature landscape comes to mind. It's a little worrying that we think nature is silent, that it doesn't make itself known in our minds. One of the books I read in Arnoldo's office a while back had this quote that really stuck out and made me think about our perception of nature.

"The transformation of the perception of nature during the industrial and scientific revolution illustrates how 'nature' was transformed in the European mind from a self organizing, living system to a mere raw material for human exploitation, needing management and control."

-Vandana Shiva

Sometimes we ignore nature and push it to the edge. We're constantly trying to fight against nature, to fight against this thing that always seems to bring us down, when in reality we need to allow it to take over our lives. I'm not saying that we should all go out an live in the forest, Ralph Waldo Emerson style, I'm just saying that we need to know when to stop and re-evaluate what we're doing to nature. We need to treat nature better than we would treat ourselves. We call it "Mother Nature" but if we treated our mothers the same way we treat nature, well, we would be in deep trouble. 

I think that EARTH University and the people who live here do a good job of acknowledging nature. There are small paths all around campus for people to walk on so they don't ruin any plant life by walking through the forest. Everything here has the environment in mind. We recycle, compost, and make sure that waste is minimized in an efficient and nature friendly way. Most buildings here have solar panels to collect energy in a safe and sustainable. Most importantly, EARTH teaches students to become one with nature and to work with it rather than against it. We're taught that we need to use what is given to us in a wise and sustainable way in order to live good lives. We're here to learn this information and spread it once we go into communities, whether they're our own community or another community.

Wandering through campus really made me appreciate the world I've been blessed with and the life I've been given. It's a gift to be living consciously and an even greater gift to have the opportunity to explore. I like this world and the things that inhabit it. I love the trees here, the little armadillos running around, the flowers, the mountains, and every other natural part of EARTH. I also love and miss parts of New Jersey and New York where nature rules. I love Island Beach State Park, I love the Long Island Sound, I love Alexandria Bay, I love the Adirondacks, I love the fields in the north country, and I even love the small parts of Howell where nature is left in peace. I love all of these places and I want to keep them the way they are. I want to be a vet and work with animals, but I also want to do my best to keep nature safe and preserved. I think we can all do this, you don't have to be an agronomist to recycle or keep the planet in mind while you're living. If we can all be conscious of the world around us and respect nature, I genuinely think that we could at least maintain what we have.

Well, that's what I thought about today. Do you guys ever think about stuff like this? Do you think that we need to work with nature or against it? Do you agree with me or am I turning into a sentimental hippie? Comment and let me know what you think.

Thanks for reading!

-Allie

Adventures in English and Nature

What's up guys?

So I know things haven't been exciting these past few days and I haven't really done anything but talk about spreadsheets, but today was different!

I had a late night so I was so happy when I woke up to an email from Profe Moro saying that I could either go to the farm or stay in for the day and finish up some spreadsheets. I got to go back to sleep and got up again at 7 for breakfast. It was a little rainy this morning too, so not only did I get to sleep in, but I also didn't have to walk in the rain. Pretty great morning if you ask me.

After breakfast I edited the spreadsheet that has the data from wednesday's milking. I calculated the time it took from the forestripping to the unit connection, unit connection to unit disconnection, and the overall time it took to put the cow through the lecheria.Our average time from forestripping to unit connection is 5 minutes, our average time from connection to disconnection is 7 minutes, and our overall milking time is 12 minutes. We should only be spending 2 minutes on the forestripping to unit connection and we might want to lower the connection to disconnection time to 6 minutes. So with that information added and some other minor tweaks, I have finished my spreadsheets and protocols for now.

When lunch came around, I read some of the animal welfare book and took some notes. While I was eating I met up with one of my friends, Marcela, and she asked for help with English. Marcela's so sweet so I obviously said yes. I mentioned that I wanted to walk around campus since it was a beautiful day and then our adventure began. We got our bikes and spent the rest of the day exploring campus while teaching each other spanish and english.

EARTH's campus is huge and most of it is protected forest or farmland. I've only seen a fraction of its beauty, and even with today's excursion, there's still more to explore. Our first stop was this small gravel path behind the security and bank building. I had never seen this path before and I'm not exactly graceful on a bike, so naturally I was a little nervous. Marcela led us through the forest, over mud puddles, and swerved around potholes. After a minute or so into the woods, we stopped and found ourselves at a riverbank. People have told me about the river, but I had never seen it before. There's a lot of trees blocking the sun and casting nice shadows. There are birds nests all over the place, and there's even a little picnic area on a hill next to the river. It's really shallow, so Marcela and I took off our sneakers and socks and stood calve deep into the clear, cool water. We practiced english and spanish together and it really helped. We would point out an object or say the word in our native language and the other person would say it and try to spell it. We used words like bird (ave), river (rio), bird's nest (nido de ave), right (derecha), left (izquierda), rock (piedra), when (cuando), where (donde), wear (lleva), were (estaba), and other words. It was fun to go back and forth between english and spanish!

The river

A nice picnic area

After 10 minutes or so, we put our shoes back on and rode towards the front of the campus. Along the side of the road there's a farm area filled with a bunch of crops. We pulled over and Marcela gave me a tour. The first thing Marcy showed me was this vineyard composed of this citrus fruit that it a mixture between a lime, lemon, and orange. The flowers of this plant are absolutely gorgeous. They're one of the prettiest flowers I've seen here in Costa Rica. We looked around and pulled a few ripe ones off the branches. Marcela loves this fruit, so by the time we walked out from under the vines there were about 4 or 5 in her bag.

Marcela showing me a citrus fruit 

It's her favorite fruit!

The citrus was vine-line so the set up was similar to that of a vineyard 

The citrus flower

The papaya trees are right next to the citrus so we looked at that next. I didn't think papaya was from a tree! The fruit is so big that I just assumed that it grew from vines on the ground. These trees are really strong and flexible so they can easily hold the weight of the papayas. Papayas are regularly served in the cafeteria and we have an abundance of them.

A papaya tree!

On the other side of the citrus area was this big plot for some malanga. Malanga is a root similar to yucca, only bigger and with a different texture. People here use malanga and yucca the same way we use potatoes in the USA. 

A field of malanga

There's also a big area where pineapples are grown. In case you don't know, pineapples are grown from a bush and not a tree. Marcela and I walked along the rows looking for some ripe pineapples to take home. Most of the pineapples are harvested as soon as they're ripe, so we only found 2 semi-ripe ones. We plucked them out of their bushes, put them on our bikes, and rode off.

Pineapples

Our next stop was this big monument in the front of campus. It was dedicated to the man who created EARTH University, there's a big sign that explains it right next to the monument. Water flows through the monument and back into the river all day, so it's very peaceful and quiet here. Marcela and I sat down and talked for a while about cultural differences and our families. It was really nice to hang out and have a full conversation with her, all in spanish!

The water monument

After visiting the monument we headed back to campus. We rode through the recreational area and watched some of our friends play soccer in the open air gymnasium for a few minutes before we headed back to our residence hall. It was a great adventure and I'm glad that we both learned a lot about our different cultures while observing the beauty surrounding EARTH University.

That's about it for today you guys! I hope today's post made up for the past few that weren't very entertaining. Thanks for reading!

-Allie

So many numbers

Hey guys!

I lucked out today and I could actually go to the farm. We started off the morning by pouring milk into the barrels and sending them off the farm to be pasteurized. Then we did our usual routine, I chopped up pineapple for the cows, we gave them sugarcane, and cleaned their water. When they were herding the cows in I took a video to see which cows were limping really badly and I realized that a few of our cows have slipper hoof which is a severe case of chronic laminitis. This is really bad for the cows and needs to be addressed.

I took down some data while we were milking today since I didn't have to write down the milk yields. I took pictures of the cows with chronic laminitis, wrote down their BCS, their behavior, and cleanliness. I got a lot of work done today and I even got to leave early!

After heading back for a shower and some lunch, I went to help with an English class. Everyone was learning about different nationalities and geography which was very interesting. Apparently they don't stress geography in latin american schools. I like helping with english classes! Everyone wants to learn and while teaching them I use spanish to explain things. It's beneficial for everyone.

Once english class ended, I went to the cafeteria to finish up my spreadsheets and rubrics. There are so many numbers whirling around my head and it's gotten to the point where I can tell you off the top of my head our average overall time for forestripping-unit connection. It's insane.

Well, that was my day! Sorry it's really short, things aren't that interesting today. Tomorrow will be more interesting though, I can feel it!

Bye!

-Allie

Even my spreadsheets are cool

Hello guys!

Today wasn't a really good day here at EARTH. It's been raining a lot for the past few days and every morning has been rough. I'm not a big fan of walking outside and getting completely soaked before I head off to work. Anyway, I got up at 5:29 and beat my alarm to the punch. I got dressed and had breakfast like usual, more gallo pinto and coffee! After I ate I walked towards the farm.

Now, when I say it was raining a lot  I mean it was raining a lot. The drainage ditches were overflowing, the entire front of my residence hall was flooded, and in a stunning turn of events the river I pass to get to work was flooded. Once again. Only this time it was worse.

Do you see the little white building? That's right next to the bridge that was underwater. You know when you look at something and think to yourself,"Not even gonna try it."? Well, I gave up on crossing that bridge about 2 steps into the water. I didn't feel comfortable trying to cross it on my own with nobody around to help me just in case anything happened, so I turned around and headed back to my room. I sent Profe Moro a quick email explaining why I wasn't going to the farm and then skyped with Abby and Ali. We talked about our projects, our research papers, and about some of the more interesting things about our internships.

Once I hung up with Abby and Ali I spent the rest of the day working on some spreadsheets and rubrics for my project. Now I know I said in the past that I hate microsoft excel with a burning passion, but I think I've gotten on better terms with the software and I'm now quite fond of it. I've organized my welfare assessment and separated it into 4 sheets, one for health, another for milking, another for environmental, and the last for behavioral. I've made scales to help measure how well a subject is handled in the farm. For example, I have people rate the milking area's cleanliness on a scale of 1 to 5.

1 (No manure, dirt, or other filth present)

2 (Small amount of manure, dirt, or other filth)

3 (Moderate amount of manure, dirt, or other filth)

4 (Mild amount of manure, dirt, or other filth)

5 (Severe filth and possible health risks present)

The more detailed you make the options, the more accurate the scoring will be. I need to be more specific on certain questions and make a completely different rubric for them. Turns out I really like making rubrics and spreadsheets. It's nice to have everything organized in front of you in a visual that's easy to read. You can pick out patterns easily and absorb more information. Also, I've started to color code some of the information I have. 

I'm also making some leeway on some of the books Profe Moro gave me. I'm 5 chapters into the book about laminitis and other causes of cattle lameness and I started reading the animal welfare book. Each of these books have taught me some interesting facts. A cow's diet could cause it to become lame and the ancient greeks were the first people to worry about animal welfare in a scientific sense. I've been taking detailed notes on each book, so it's taking me a little while to finish up and move on to new books.

Things are really starting to come together and I'm excited about getting to the nitty gritty part of my project. This data is really going to help me out.

Well, that's about it! Thanks for reading!

-Allie

Numbers and Notes

Hey guys!

I went to the farm today and got a lot of stuff done.

I woke up bright and early (5:30) and started my day off with breakfast and 2 cups of coffee (I really needed the second one).

The second year students were all out of town for their own mini one week internship, so it was just me, the 4th year students, and the farm staff. Profe Moro came and we got to work on filling out some of the stuff needed for my project. When some of the cows walked into the corral I wrote down the numbers of those who were limping. I didn't get the chance to assess every cow, so tomorrow I'm going to videotape the cows as they come in and look for any cows that I missed. I did the body condition scoring of the first set of cows that came into the lecheria and the majority of them were good. The lowest was a 1.5 and the highest was a solid 4, which is an amazing accomplishment for this herd.

After the BCS we started filling out my milking protocol rubric. It was a little difficult to keep track of everything that was going on all at once, but Profe and I split up and each filled out half of the information for each group of cows. We took down the time each process started and when the milking itself ended. We got most of the information and I've been making conclusions about it throughout the day.

Once we finished taking the data I wrote it down into another sheet for Jenny (a 4th year student I've been helping in the lecheria) and got to leave work early! I spent the rest of the day reading up on lameness in cattle and taking notes on the subject. Everything's starting to come together!

I ended the night by helping out one of the girls in my hall with her english homework. Marcela, the girl, is so sweet and nice so I had no problem helping her with her homework. We stayed up until 11 working on it, so we're both worn out but happy that we finished.

Sorry this post is so short guys, it's late and I'm really tired. i'll try to make tomorrow's post more interesting. See ya around!

-Allie

Ole!

Hey guys!

Today was more exciting and a lot more productive than yesterday, even though I had a really lazy start.

I accidentally slept in until 8 which caused me to panic until I realized that I wasn't going to the farm. I got to take a shower and work on some of my welfare assessment paper. I added in a few more parts and made categories such as health, environment, milking, and behavior. These categories will become their own pages filled with detailed questions that will determine how good the animal welfare is in a certain farm. I'm really proud of it!

I went to Profe Moro and we discussed the game plan for the next few weeks.  We worked a little bit on my welfare paper and I sent him the rough draft later on. We talked about what aspects we need to pay attention to in order to get an accurate assessment of welfare. We added a section for lameness and made the cleanliness section more specific by putting it on a 1-5 scale (1 being the best and 5 being the worst). After this, Profe printed out some papers for me and we took some books out of the library about animal welfare and lameness in cattle. I'm going to try my best to read the books in a week, I don't want to be a lame duck about it! (I'm sorry, that last pun was so lame(I'm so sorry I can't stop)).

I see a Costa Rica shout out!

Claw (yes, it's called a claw) anatomy

More anatomy

I'm not that far into the lameness book but from what I've read so far it's really easy for a cow to become lame. If cows stand on concrete for too long it wears their claws (They call them claws in the book but I just keep the word hoof in the back of my head) down, injuring the sensitive tissue in that area. Sometimes acidosis, stomach problems, some hormones, and inflammatory processes can cause the tissue in the claw (HOOF) to weaken. It's all really complex and it's the biggest dairy cattle health problem, followed by mastitis. 

I read most of the day until I had my spanish class with Profe Emilia. We learned about different adjectives and what they end with that makes them adjectives. Verbs that end in -ar replace the -ar with -ado or -ada (depending on the gender of the subject), so for example the word enojar (to be mad) would be changed to enojado when describing a guy who's angry. It sounds easy enough, but when you have to conjugate other words and put them in a sentence it gets really hard really quickly. I'm starting to get better though, so it's ok.

I ended the night with a little glimpse of Spanish culture. A flamenco dancer all the way from Spain came to dance for all of us.  I've never seen flamenco before, so when someone told me about it I decided to go and watch. It was really entertaining! It's more than dancing, it's an artistic showcase. There was no music, the dancer sang and made the rhythm with her hands and feet by stomping, clapping, and snapping. I have never seen anything like it before.

Well, that was my day! Tomorrow's a farm day, so I'll talk all about that!

Bye guys!

-Allie

Oh mondays

Hey guys!

I didn't really do much today, so this is going to be a boring rundown of my day. I'd skip it.

I got to sleep in and got breakfast at 7:30 right as the kitchen was about to close. I ate breakfast with Mandy and Sam, who are from Colorado University and Mizzou, before they left for the trip with Killian. They rescheduled the trip I was supposed to go on for today and tomorrow. I decided not to go on the trip because I really want to focus more on my research here at EARTH. I only have a few weeks left here and I want to get everything done and ready to go for my research paper. I really don't want to procrastinate on this!

After breakfast I spent most of the day working on my welfare assessment rubric. I got really far with it and I'm proud with what I have so far! I added some more variables such as cow cleanliness, teat condition, percentage of miscarriages in a herd, and other variables. I'm not an avid user of microsoft excel, but I feel like this entire internship will bring us closer together and (hopefully) prepare me for using it the rest of my now adult-ish life. You never know when you're going to need a good spreadsheet.

So what else did I do after typing up this welfare assessment? Climb any mountains? Pet any cows? Find any sloths? Well...no. I worked on an analysis of body condition scores I took at the beginning of my internship. I didn't really have to do it, but I just wanted to type the information up just in case. I'm going to be working on the genetics part of my project soon, so I want to get some information organized and out of the way.

Once dinner came around I headed to the cafeteria and ate with Professor Kent, an english teacher from Texas. We had a good dinner filled with discussions about Tico culture, american politics, and our weirdest experiences here. I explained my goal was to find a sloth while I'm here in Costa Rica and Profe Kent pointed me in the right direction. Apparently there was a sloth in the rafters of the cafeteria a week ago and I didn't see it or hear about it until today. I was so close!! I need to find a sloth! Luckily Profe Kent told me that one sloth occasionally climbs up the tree in front of his office so I can always check the tree.

THEY'RE JUST SO CUTE AND I NEED TO SEE ONE

Well, that's about it. Sorry for the boring post guys, it's just been a slow day. Hopefully tomorrow will be more of an adventure!

-Allie

Things I miss about the USA and things I will miss about EARTH

Hey guys!

So since it's a sunday and I'm not doing anything interesting today other than writing stuff for my project, I thought I would write about stuff that I've been thinking about.

I'm halfway through my internship and I've been enjoying it a lot, but there are somethings that I really miss about home. Abby, Adam, Ali, and I have been talking about the differences between our host countries and our homes and we've talked a lot about things we miss.

One of the biggest things that we miss the most is food. Since we're in new countries with different cultures we have been introduced to some amazing food that we love ( for me it's gallo pinto, yucca chips, chalupas, and this pastry in the cafe) but we all miss food that we'd normally have in the US. Hotdogs, hamburgers, ice cream, chocolate chip cookies, and pie are just a few. I also miss good old italian food. I never realized how great New Jersey italian food is compared to italian food in other countries (well..other than Italy). New Jersey pizza, spaghetti and meatballs, ziti, garlic bread, and penne vodka are just a few things that I'm looking forward to have once I return to Jersey.

English is another thing that I miss. I like the spanish language, it's beautiful and interesting, but it's still a big struggle for me to understand people around here. It's frustrating when you can only speak to people on a 4th grade level when you have so much to say. Communicating ideas to other people is a struggle enough, doing it in a different language is even more difficult. Listening requires a lot of effort for me. I really need to concentrate to follow along with conversations, but even then I'm only understanding 30% of what's being said. It's like when the radio is static-y and you only understand every other word. It's hard to understand the story, you can't comprehend directions, and you're so frustrated that you can't get rid of the static or hear through it. I'm definitely trying to improve upon my spanish and use it more, but I still get excited when someone speaks english really well. I can't wait to come home and understand conversations fully.

Mostly I miss my family and friends. I've been in touch with a lot of you guys and I really appreciate it. Although I'm not physically seeing you, every message and text makes me know that you're still there and available. Sometimes it gets lonely here, so talking to friends and family really helps.

Well now that I've listed things I miss about the US, let's talk about things I'll miss about EARTH and Costa Rica in general.

I'll definitely miss the beautiful scenery that surrounds EARTH University and the landscape of Costa Rica. Some people say you get used to beauty after a while, but I haven't gotten used to seeing the beautiful green mountains in the distance or the lush forests around here. The towns outside of EARTH are colorful and interesting. You see these brightly colored houses on the hills and think about what it would be like to wake up every day and see what the homeowner sees. I want to see more of Costa Rica before I leave EARTH so I can see some more of the beauty it has to offer.

I'll miss the people here who are so nice and helpful. I often feel like a burden due to my lack of spanish and cultural knowledge, but people here understand and are willing to work with me through this. People here are very happy and are often smiling or joking around with their friends.

I'm going to definitely miss the farms. I love waking up everyday to go to the animal farm, even though I don't love waking up at 5:40. Walking to the farm is so relaxing and beautiful. As you walk these pebble paths you hear the birds chirping, see the fauna, and just enjoy a few moments of peace before you work. The farm itself is fantastic. The animals are great to work with and I learn so much from them. The farmhands teach me a lot about dairy farming and how the system works. When students come onto the farm, they help me learn new things too. We're all learning as we go along, but these guys are ahead of me so it really helps when they explain things to me when I don't understand.

I'm going to miss the adventures I experience everyday. Every day can be an adventure if you try hard enough and look in the right places, especially when you're in a foreign country. I got this great opportunity to live out an adventure in a completely new environment for 2 months and I've been trying to take advantage of it. I get to try new food, meet new people, learn new words, learn about different cultures, and so much more. I'm going to miss learning these new things, but I know that I'm going to learn more new things throughout my lifetime. This is just one of the many adventures I will have, but I will miss this adventure in particular because it was my first adventure alone.

Well, that's about it you guys! I hope you all had a great weekend!

-Allie

Just a change in plans, don't flip!

Hey guys!

So you know how I was supposed to go on a 4 day fieldtrip with Kilian and a group of college kids? Well that trip is cancelled/ postponed until further notice. Even though this happened, it was a really great day overall.

I accidentally woke up late (6:06) and hurried down to the farm through the rain. The river was still flooded, but it wasn't as bad as yesterday and people just walked through. Everyone was sitting in the outdoor kitchen and getting ready to split into groups and tackle the farm work.

For today's activity I got to castrate and vaccinate some calves with Daniel! It was so exciting. We all pilled into the back of one of the EARTH trucks and drove up to the commercial farm. I had never been that far back before and it was really beautiful. We drove through the forest in the back of the truck. It was like a videogame in the sense that we had to dodge branches, duck at the right times, and hold on when we hit a pothole. It was really fun! The farm was pretty small, only a little bigger than the lecheria, but it had a lot of acreage. There were big fields all around us and you could see some of the mountains in the distance. We hopped out of the truck, pulled out our supplies, and set up shop.

We had to round up calves with a certain number, so Daniel and the other boys lassoed 2 or 3 calves at a time and brought them in to castrate. These calves ran all over the place so it was a little scary at first. They would run away from the person holding the lasso and occasionally run towards you or run into the feeding buckets. The guys had to flip the calves onto their backs and tie them up so we could safely castrate and vaccinate them. I had never seen anything like this before. Daniel, Mau, and all the other students helped me out with the first castration and first set of vaccinations. I was nervous because these calves weren't as docile (or secured) as the pigs. The calves were a lot bigger and even when they were tied down they rolled around and tried to jump up. Castrating them was tougher too. I didn't cut deep enough and my hands were shaking so it only made it harder. Eventually I got the hang of it and castrated a 2 or 3 calves successfully.  Vaccinations were pretty easy, I had to give intramuscular for the majority of the time and there was only one subcutaneous shot. You give the intramuscular injections into the neck where it's softer and you do the subcutaneous by pulling some skin around the armpit and injecting it in between the fold.

At the end of our time at the farm I even got to flip a calf! Here's a video of someone calf flipping. They used a different technique than us, we grab the ear with our left hand, the muzzle with our right, and twist the head so the calf loses it's balance and falls to the ground. You want to get the calf on the ground quickly so you can tie up the legs and immobilize it. We were in a small pen and we only had one calf left. This little guy backed himself up into a corner of the fenced in area. His mom was on the other side of the fence, so that was scary. Daniel climbed over the calf and got him into the main area of the pen where I could try and catch him. Now, I just want you all to take a second and picture me, covered in mud, in a small pen, with other people on the ground castrating calves, trying to wrestle a 200lb or so calf to the ground. It was hard and I was nervous about screwing up and hurting someone else, the calf, or myself. Once the calf entered the main area I got a good grip on him and pulled him down to the ground, but I fell back as well and let the calf go. The second time I tried to get the calf he started to run away and head towards the other people. After my second attempt, Daniel helped me get a hold of the calf and told me what to do. I grabbed the ear as hard as I could, wrapped my hand around the muzzle, twisted the head, and pulled the calf down. It was so cool, it was an adrenaline rush that I had never had before. He tried to get up a few times while the boys were tying the legs, but I was not going to let that calf up again. I kept my knee on his neck and held down his chest until he was tied up and ready to be castrated.

After all of the calves were taken care of we sat together, washed our hands, and waited for the truck to come back. I was covered in mud and manure (well I was on the ground trying to hold a calf down, plus the floors where we first castrated weren't clean) and exhausted. We washed our hands and talked a little bit about EARTH and some of the experiences on the farm. Daniel was the only person in our group who speaks english really well, so we talked a lot. He's a senior and plans to work in the USA once he graduates. He already has a few job opportunities lines up, and after seeing him rope calves, teach us how to castrate, and helping me flip a calf, I know he'll succeed in any ag related business in the US. Soon the truck came back and we all piled in the back to start the ride back to the finca pecuaria. We were all tired, but the rain cleared up and we made a game out of dodging branches. Once we got back everyone grabbed their bags and headed back to the campus.

Once I got back to my room I took a quick (but cold) shower and had the rest of the day to relax. I really enjoyed working on the commercial farm with the calves. Daniel was telling me that there'll be a rodeo before I leave and that he'll have a team that will flip calves and do all the other rodeo things. I can't wait to see it! Maybe one day I'll be roping and flipping calves like Daniel and all the other students here at EARTH.

Well, that's it for today guys! Have a good rest of the weekend!

-Allie