Boquete Coffee
  • HOME
  • BLOG
  • BUY OUR COFFEE
  • PLANTATION
  • COFFEE RESOURCES
  • ABOUT US
  • PRIVACY POLICY

First and last meal on the coffee farm will likely be banana

5/25/2012

0 Comments

 
Picture
The truth is that this entire country is pretty much made of banana and perhaps some rice as well.  Sobering thought.   

No matter what your genetics, there is an environmental common thread.  

Here horses eat bananas not carrots.  Fruit bats, all manner of insects, squirrels, dogs, mice and all things with fur and most things with feathers eat banana.   

This picture is a classic.  I have even attracted a crake from the creek with a bunch of bananas.  A bird that is supposed to be so shy it is only heard and rarely seen.

Just hang out the bananas and see who comes to get them.  Now it is the baby birds coming.  Their first meal banana.


0 Comments

Getting a little frenzied: 3 days to go until Christmas on the Coffee farm

12/21/2011

0 Comments

 
Still picking coffee and we will be going on well into January.  My main worker is even coming 'off' vacation to wear my bee suit tomorrow and pick around the hives.   Good for him.  I am otherwise occupied with just 3 days left to Christmas.

The orange harvest will be over soon, probably in about 2-3 weeks.   So a final push to candy oranges.  My maid peeled about 300 or so for extra Christmas money over the last couple of days........kitchen is full of rind steeping in syrup and in various stages of processing. Fridge jam packed with juice.

We have done most of the workers food baskets.  Another trip to David today for things to finish them off.   This year, we are going to help out a family who used to live on the farm.   A single mother with three children who is making around $26 every two weeks ($52 a month) working full time.  Yes, it is not legal but it happens.

Christmas shopping trip in close 100 degree weather down the mountain in David is tough.  On the other hand, here you get service.   You do not have to carry your bags around the shop or to your car and people are there to help you find what you need.  There is also excellent wrapping services in most shops.  All you have to do is find the shop (not as easy as it sounds); Find parking (even harder);  check over all merchandise more than once and thoroughly (Here there is a very high incidence of returns, not quite right things and wonky parts) and then stagger in and out in the extreme heat.  

Then bananas - yes, what happened to all my bananas? Not just my bananas but all the bananas in this banana rich town.  I like to have a supply by the terrace so we can watch birds when we relax out there - something I am looking forward to over the holiday.

Well, the coffee pickers have an appetite for them.   I would love to know how much of the diet is banana, but I bet it is somewhere between 10-30% if you include plantains.  There must be 5-10 thousand Indigenous camping out in Boquete for the coffee harvest and that amounts to a lot of bananas.   So, my birds are not getting so many these days, the horse is getting carrots, the rabbit has been eating grass and I have not had one for breakfast for nearly a month.... 

Lastly, what is all that sound of gunfire?  Sounds like someone is firing rounds day and night in the Barrio above me.  I feel like I'm under attack.  Well, it turns out it is fireworks.  It is normal.  It will last until the New Year.





0 Comments

Inspecting my cherries on a Sunday afternoon!

8/7/2011

0 Comments

 
Do love walking the farm on a Sunday afternoon.   Enjoyed the last few warm sunny hours of the day outside.   This is what I found:  Quite a few early cherries.  They are low quality beans and we need to get them picked and sold probably for local consumption.    Have fungal problems too, fairly normal but never good.  Baby tipica plants doing well and in general yields look much better than last year.  It has been a drier rainy season.   

Now it is raining hard.  About to light a fire out on the terrace and enjoying a steaming cup of .....................not coffee............Yorkshire Gold tea.  It is tea time.
0 Comments

Banana economics: Starbucks $1 per banana; Emily 1cent

8/4/2011

0 Comments

 
Picture
We have several types of banana here on the farm.  They are all out of this world good, the most delicious balance of fruit, acidity and sweetness.  A flavor you only ever get when you cut them fresh from the bunch. 

 This week, I learned that we had been selling spare bananas to the local mini-mart for $2 for a bunch of 200 bananas or more to retail them to locals here.  That would be about a cent a banana or one hundred times less than the ones in Starbucks.    Similar story for our coffee.   Such is life as a producer in the tropics!
0 Comments
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    Archives

    May 2013
    February 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011

    Follow this blog

    Categories

    All
    9/11
    Accounts
    African Bees
    Al Jazeera
    Amaryllis
    Ambassador
    Armadillo
    Baby Coffee
    Banana
    Bananas
    Banoffee Pie
    Beatles
    Bees
    Bees Wax
    Beneficio
    Best Of Panama
    Bird
    Birds
    Blackberries
    Blossom
    Blue-grey Tanager
    Body Language
    Boquete
    Boquete. Panama
    Bouquet
    Bouquete
    Britain
    Bugs
    Bus
    Bushes
    Butterfly
    Cabalgata
    Calcium Carbonate
    Carnival
    Cataui
    Catepillar
    Catepillars
    Catuai
    Caturra
    Cherries
    Chickens
    Christian
    Christmas
    Cock Fighting
    Coffee
    Coffee Farm
    Coffeegeek
    Coffee Pickers
    Coffee Picking
    Coffee Planting
    Coffee Processing
    Coffee Pruning
    Coffee Sorting
    Container Living
    Cooking
    Coral Snake
    Costa Rica
    Cowboy
    Culture
    Cupping
    Curd
    Dance
    David
    Dia De Campesino
    Drunk
    Drying Coffee
    Dry Process
    Dry Stone Walls
    Easter
    Egg Nog
    Ekees
    Estrella
    Eucalyptus
    Exercise Class
    Farm
    Farming
    Farming Maths
    Fathers Day
    Fertilizers
    Festivals
    Finca Lerida
    Fine Coffee
    Flowers
    Foklore
    Folk Dancing
    Food
    Frogs
    Fungicide
    Garden
    Gardenia
    Gardening
    Gardens
    Geisha
    Geisha Coffee
    Gourmet
    Graphic Design
    Graveyards
    Green Beans
    Guava
    Halloween
    Hand Creme
    Harvest
    Herbs
    Hibiscus
    Highland Wetlands
    Hiking
    Honey
    Horse
    Horses
    Horse Tack
    Humidity
    Hummingbird
    Hummingbirds
    Independence Day
    Indigenous
    Indigeous
    Kotowa
    Language
    Latin Dance
    Lemons
    Life In Boquete
    Limoncello
    Living In Boquete
    Living In Boquete Panama
    Logo
    Mandarin
    Mangosteen
    Marmalade
    Medicinal Herbs
    Milk
    Molasses
    Mondays
    Moon
    Moth
    Mountain Oak
    Mulberries
    Mulch
    National Holidays
    Nature
    New Year
    Ngobe
    November 28th Panama
    Orange
    Orange Juice
    Oranges
    Orchids
    Organic
    Organic Farming
    Organic Fungicide
    Packaging
    Palmira
    Panama
    Panama.
    Panama. Ngobe
    Panamanian Culture
    Paso
    Passion Fruit
    Payday
    Peaches
    People In Boquete
    Picking
    Pictures
    Pigs
    Planting
    Planting Coffee
    Plants
    Poinsettia
    Poisonous Snakes
    Politics
    Pony
    Postal Service
    Protestant
    Pulping Coffee
    Rains
    Rainy Season
    Re-cycling
    Rescue
    Rescue Horse
    Riding
    Roasting
    Rocks
    Rose
    Roses
    Rustic House
    Scap
    Shoes
    Shopping
    Snake
    Snakes
    Soil Testing
    Specialty Coffee Association Of Panama
    Spider
    Spiders
    Spring
    Starbucks
    Strawberries
    Sunday
    Sunday Reflection
    Sunset
    Tamarillo
    Tarantula
    Thanksgiving
    Tin House
    Tomatoes
    Torch Ginger
    Trade
    Tree Tomatoes
    Typica
    Uk
    Urraca
    Usa
    Uv
    Vacuum Packing
    Volcan Baru
    Volcano
    Voltage
    Wabi-Sabi
    Weather
    Welding
    Wellington Boots
    Wildlife
    Wood
    Workers Housing
    Yellow Cataui


    RSS Feed


    Website counter

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.