Mega Minga Day, Surprise Birth, and Cows

Today was too cool to lump in with a week's worth of activity, so I'm writing about it now.

Two of the 10-day old rabbits out for a stroll!

Size comparison

Our board of moveable rabbit info!

I had a Minga Day while the other two girls went up to the condors. Sarah and I cleaned and fed the rabbits, and then we constructed an entire board to show which rabbits are in which cages, who their parents are, and when they were born. Unfortunately we don't have some of that info for all the rabbits because they just started recording information about them recently, but in a few months it should be totally accurate. Anyways, the information is written on recycled plastic container lids and such, so if we move rabbits when cleaning cages or what not, we can just move the lids! It's awesome, and Sarah and I are proud of it.

I also helped Sarah create a spreadsheet to track the different rabbit pairings, the size of each litter, the average number of offspring per breeder, and other information so that they can figure out if any of the rabbits just isn't producing enough offspring. Afterall, the condors get hungry!

We made a pasta lunch at the house and had stewed rubarb and leftover flan for dessert. Turns out stewed rubarb is delicious. I've also tried beets and radishes since arriving here, plus tamarillo, which is a native South American fruit (and is so delicious), and a whole bunch of other awesome foods, most of them cooked by our wonderful chef, Daniel!

After lunch I did some data entry, and then we went to feed the rabbits again. On our way over I noticed that there were a lot of guys that work at the hotel (for maintenance, reception, the garden, the stables, the milkshed, etc) running around and talking quickly. I asked Sarah what was going on, and she said they got word of a fire a ways away, so they were all going over to help control it. She said it was a true Minga Day because it wasn't even as if the fire was on Zuleta property, but the "rich" hotel pooled all available men to go help control it by cutting vegetation and creating a fire break. It's not as if they got out of work either, because they still had to finish it when they got back (afterall, cows still need milking). But they all went anyways. It was really cool.

Anyways, we went to the garden to collect broccoli and cabbage leaves for the rabbits, and then we went up to feed them. Sarah had just traded two of our rabbits for two from a friend of hers to get more genetic diversity, and they had just been put in cages the day before, but the female needed to be moved since her actual cage had been cleaned. We had already put food in the cages, so Sarah moved the new female (Osita, since a couple of the guys who work in the garden thought she looked like a bear (oso = bear)), and I went out back to empty the wheelbarrow full of shit. In the two minutes that I was gone, Osita had a baby rabbit right on one of the cabbage leaves! We wouldn't have even known until the next day if Sarah hadn't gone back to double check that the cages were locked! That poor girl had been transported via 4 buses from Quito to Zuleta the day before, put in a strange cage, picked up and moved (probably during labor), so that she ended up popping a baby out on her dinner. Fortunately Sarah was able to grab some straw to make a nest in the little rabbit house in the cage, nudge the little one inside, borrow some of the fur that the other mother pulled out to put on her babies, and cover this baby with it. That poor mother! We went back a couple hours later and she was rearranging the nest, so we thought it was good that she was at least acknowledging it. We're hoping there are more babies in the morning (apparently they typical give birth at night). If so, then we traded two rabbits for two adult rabbits and possibly a small litter!

Stephanie, the calf named after me!!

By then it was after 4, and we were supposed to meet Marco, who works in the garden and also tends to the rabbits, so that he could teach me to milk his cow! He had been out at the fire, so he was running a bit late. We met up with him eventually, and he took us out behind the vegetable garden to his older, brown cow. Let me just say that milking cows is AWESOME! I must be a natural or something, because I squeezed milk out immediately. I thought I was doing so well... and then Marco started outdoing me like three times over, and he was only using one hand. Show off. We took some of the milk over to his calf, which drank that bucket faster than college kids shotgunning beers. Seriously, I was like "where did the milk go??" And she was hopping around hoping that Marco brought more with him. Also, turns out she didnt have a name yet, so Sarah convinced Marco to name her Stephanie. YES! I have a calf named after me!!

After that he said we could help milk his other cows which were over in the pasture. Apparently Zuleta allows it's employees to keep two cows in the pasture at $20/cow/month. It's a really sweet deal because the fence around the pasture is maintained and the land is irrigated in case of really dry seasons. Marco's wife, Yolanda, works with Daniel in the kitchen, so they get to keep four cows in the pasture (with the fifth hanging out behind the vegetable garden). By the time we walked over there, Marco had already milked one of his cows, but I got to help with the other three. I think I may have hit my cow-milking peak with the first cow. These other ones were a lot harder to milk! Apparently younger ones are harder, but I gave it a shot anyways. Milking is also surprisingly tiring. Though, Marco said in 8 days I would be a pro, so I guess I need to keep at it! Good thing he milks his cows twice a day!

So today's highlights: Sarah and I created a board to show information about all the rabbits, all the men had a Minga Day to stop a fire, our new rabbit had a baby, and I milked not one, but four cows! I'd say it was a good day.