Tuesday was a great day. I, Kemmel, traveled to Chichicastenango to meet with a group of agriculture professors from the University of Tennessee Knoxville whom we have been working with over the last 2-3 years to identify needs in communities to in turn assist the communities with either education or appropriate technology to meet their needs. This is a picture of the group from UT, Danny (an HTI employee), me and the ladies from Xepocol.
These professors consist of dirt (more appropriately soil) scientists, an animal scientist, a meteorologist and a tree (for not knowing the correct terminology) scientist. In the past they have come to review a few needs including the need for water in a small community called La Fortuna in the area around Montellano where the Clinica Ezell is and the issue of loosing chickens to disease in Xepocol.
For La Fortuna, the solution was to build some above ground cisterns to house rain water collected from the families roofing. The community was not sold on the idea so we started with some test homes and last year some students and the professors came from UT Knoxville to build 3 of these cisterns to see how they would work. Earlier this week, they visited the community to see how the cisterns have worked and if the families have taken care of this precious water source. The results were outstanding. Of the 3 cisterns, 2 provided water to the families during the entire rainy season and a 2-3 months into the rainy season. Then, the 3rd provided water for the entire rainy season and now near the end of the dry season they still 1/3 of the water left (apparently they have been more careful with the use of the water). What you also need to understand is that in this community there is no running water, so the ladies of the community must make multiple trips to either the town well, which is not very clean and not always full or to the river which lets just say is dirty! So now 2 of these families have only had to make the trip for 2-3 months of the year and the other has not had to make any. To put the icing on the cake, they also tested the water and after 24 hours of incubation, the water from the cisterns reported no bacteria. So not only have they had water, but clean, potable water. They also tested the well and of course it was full of bacteria and the river, lets just say the 4 students who went swimming ended up paying for it later. :) The cost for making these cisterns is right around Q600 or less than $100. So now our task is to continue to encourage the community that this is a viable option for a clean water source and that they can do these on their own with their own resources and materials for much less expense than piping in water from a spring that can be up to 3 miles away.
For Xepocol and the chicken mortality rate, the solution was to provide some classes on the proper care of chickens and on the importance in the use of vaccinations against diseases such as new castle disease, bronchitis and influenza (the most death threatening being new castles disease). Some students came last year in August and provided some of these classes to the ladies in Xepocol including providing the first round of vaccinations for the chickens. The trick is you must keep vaccinating every 3 months which no one was doing even if they had vaccinated once. So at the first vaccination they marked each of the chickens so we could monitor their status in the following months. During the education we also reviewed the cost of the vaccinations against how much each chicken could be sold for and that if they worked as a group to vaccinate many chickens they would save on the vaccination as one vial would cover 150 chickens (the common practice was for 1 family to purchase a vial and only use for 20-30 chickens). After the group left, the ladies created a committee to monitor and continue the process of vaccinating the chickens. Today they reported they have had 3 rounds of vaccinations, including upwards of 800 chickens and between 40-50 families involved. The results, again outstanding. The months of March and April are the months that most chickens die in this area due to the drastic climate changes. For the chickens that have been vaccinated, not one has died due to illness. Now they have died to be eaten, but not to the disease. How is that for positive results. Now instead of a family loosing 10-20 chickens per year, they now are able to sell these 10-20 chickens for about Q50 ($6) each hen or Q120 ($16) each rooster while paying less than Q.50 ($.06) per vaccination. Today we also made the first step in encouraging these women to now go to another community, Paxot 2, and teach the women their how to manage their chicken population. This community recently had a mass epidemic of new castle disease and lost many chickens as well so they are very interested. The ladies response was "sure as long as they cook us a good chicken while we are there". This brought a good laugh.
These professors consist of dirt (more appropriately soil) scientists, an animal scientist, a meteorologist and a tree (for not knowing the correct terminology) scientist. In the past they have come to review a few needs including the need for water in a small community called La Fortuna in the area around Montellano where the Clinica Ezell is and the issue of loosing chickens to disease in Xepocol.
For La Fortuna, the solution was to build some above ground cisterns to house rain water collected from the families roofing. The community was not sold on the idea so we started with some test homes and last year some students and the professors came from UT Knoxville to build 3 of these cisterns to see how they would work. Earlier this week, they visited the community to see how the cisterns have worked and if the families have taken care of this precious water source. The results were outstanding. Of the 3 cisterns, 2 provided water to the families during the entire rainy season and a 2-3 months into the rainy season. Then, the 3rd provided water for the entire rainy season and now near the end of the dry season they still 1/3 of the water left (apparently they have been more careful with the use of the water). What you also need to understand is that in this community there is no running water, so the ladies of the community must make multiple trips to either the town well, which is not very clean and not always full or to the river which lets just say is dirty! So now 2 of these families have only had to make the trip for 2-3 months of the year and the other has not had to make any. To put the icing on the cake, they also tested the water and after 24 hours of incubation, the water from the cisterns reported no bacteria. So not only have they had water, but clean, potable water. They also tested the well and of course it was full of bacteria and the river, lets just say the 4 students who went swimming ended up paying for it later. :) The cost for making these cisterns is right around Q600 or less than $100. So now our task is to continue to encourage the community that this is a viable option for a clean water source and that they can do these on their own with their own resources and materials for much less expense than piping in water from a spring that can be up to 3 miles away.
For Xepocol and the chicken mortality rate, the solution was to provide some classes on the proper care of chickens and on the importance in the use of vaccinations against diseases such as new castle disease, bronchitis and influenza (the most death threatening being new castles disease). Some students came last year in August and provided some of these classes to the ladies in Xepocol including providing the first round of vaccinations for the chickens. The trick is you must keep vaccinating every 3 months which no one was doing even if they had vaccinated once. So at the first vaccination they marked each of the chickens so we could monitor their status in the following months. During the education we also reviewed the cost of the vaccinations against how much each chicken could be sold for and that if they worked as a group to vaccinate many chickens they would save on the vaccination as one vial would cover 150 chickens (the common practice was for 1 family to purchase a vial and only use for 20-30 chickens). After the group left, the ladies created a committee to monitor and continue the process of vaccinating the chickens. Today they reported they have had 3 rounds of vaccinations, including upwards of 800 chickens and between 40-50 families involved. The results, again outstanding. The months of March and April are the months that most chickens die in this area due to the drastic climate changes. For the chickens that have been vaccinated, not one has died due to illness. Now they have died to be eaten, but not to the disease. How is that for positive results. Now instead of a family loosing 10-20 chickens per year, they now are able to sell these 10-20 chickens for about Q50 ($6) each hen or Q120 ($16) each rooster while paying less than Q.50 ($.06) per vaccination. Today we also made the first step in encouraging these women to now go to another community, Paxot 2, and teach the women their how to manage their chicken population. This community recently had a mass epidemic of new castle disease and lost many chickens as well so they are very interested. The ladies response was "sure as long as they cook us a good chicken while we are there". This brought a good laugh.
This is a pictire of the ladies in Xepocol who manage the Chicken vaccinations - Juana, Candelaria, Maria and Rosalia. Candelaria and Rosalia are the 2 who have started the project in the neighboring town of Saquilla which is where they live.
Here is a picture of the ladies with Kelly, who is the Animal Science Professor from UT. The original program was developed by him and his class and then he came with some students last August and the students presented the program to these ladies and about 15 others.
Today we also met with some members of the community of Paxot 2 regarding some possible classes on orchards and did some investigative work to prepare something for the future. Tomorrow we head to Chuchipaca to do some of the same. I will report more on that tomorrow.
And I cannot end a good day without giving you a follow-up on Tomas Sut Gonzales I. This is the man that in December was on deaths door with pneumonia and his family would not take him to the hospital. The first day we went to visit him people from different communities were visiting to express their last greetings and to pray over him. Some of what we heard was he is old (only 63 or so) and his time has come. Well, thanks to our gracious Lord, the family did take him to the hospital and he got better. Tomas is one of the miracles God continues to bless us with. This is a picture of Tomas (on the left) during a wedding on Monday where he was to be the witness for the bride, Juan Quino's sister Tomasa. He also joined us today walking all around Paxot 2 looking at trees and enjoying some great laughs. God continues to have a plan from Tomas!
And I cannot end a good day without giving you a follow-up on Tomas Sut Gonzales I. This is the man that in December was on deaths door with pneumonia and his family would not take him to the hospital. The first day we went to visit him people from different communities were visiting to express their last greetings and to pray over him. Some of what we heard was he is old (only 63 or so) and his time has come. Well, thanks to our gracious Lord, the family did take him to the hospital and he got better. Tomas is one of the miracles God continues to bless us with. This is a picture of Tomas (on the left) during a wedding on Monday where he was to be the witness for the bride, Juan Quino's sister Tomasa. He also joined us today walking all around Paxot 2 looking at trees and enjoying some great laughs. God continues to have a plan from Tomas!
God is good, all the time!
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