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Originally I was to leave La Guacima with another breeder on Monday morning. It didn’t play out that way so instead, Tuesday morning Joris and I headed out to an area near Guapiles where there are a number of breeders, many of whom are related. Joris had not visited with some of them in quite a while and took this opportunity to pay them a call and to drop me off at the home of Billo and Marisol where I would spend the rest of the week. The day quickly passed and before Joris left, he asked me to hold a class for all of the breeders in the neighborhood. The primary subject was sanitation as pupa mortality has been high in this area. |
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By now, butterfly rearing operations are beginning to all look pretty much the same—one or more viveros, (shade houses for butterflies and plants) and a ramada with cages for rearing caterpillars. Billo’s was pretty much the same. It was in this small lab where I demonstrated how to mix Cloro at 10% and 1% solutions and how each should be used for best results. Not everyone was able to make it my class so I did a couple of short courses during the week, for a total of thirteen breeders. |
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Billo and Marisol have two children, one who I hardly saw as he is in the 7th grade and school hours are long. Their toddler daughter really liked a young parrot the family was raising and each day. She participated by kissing the bird between spoonfuls of fresh milk and ground corn. Besides a few cows, they had a number of chickens that provided fresh eggs for the table each day. Though Billo invited me to, I declined milking the cow–-one attempt was enough for this trip. |
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There were several nice aspects about my stay here. One, there was a nice secondary forest on Billo’s property that he was that he was very protective of. It was home to a troop of congos, howler monkeys that would sound off several times daily. Though quite distant, I could see four in the treetops with binoculars. Another nice thing was a small river separating his place from the rest of the neighborbood but what really appealed to this entomologist was that they had electricity—and I had a 50 meter extension cord to run a mercury vapor light fairly close to the forest. Click here to see some of the more interesting insects that came in during the three nights of running it.
One of the breeders wanted me to see his operation about a 10-minute motorcycle ride away. Miguelito is the son of one of the biggest producers in this area and has partnered with another 18-year old, Rodrigo, to start their own butterfly business. Click here to see their year-old vivero, the largest I have seen to date.
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A couple of times Billo, Miquelito and two of his brothers and I explored the surrounding area including this pasture, strewn with logs and stumps that spoke of a forest cleared three years ago. While lacking many of its original inhabitants, it still served as home to great many arthropods and other creatures, especially under and within the decaying wood.
Next page
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