More chickens and Brahman cows

We rested up, then hit the road early to visit an egg production farm, Don Lapo, that is also venturing into the agrotourism business with some horses, iguanas, peacocks, turtles and deer. Yes, deer are considered exotic here.

On this visit, we had to wear protective gear to enter the production house. Y’all, I held a baby chick! This poultry farm visit was much better than the last. Smaller farm with the primary focus on egg production.

Holding a baby chick

Twinning with a student

Walking towards the chick house

Look at the babies!

Next, we headed to PZA farms, 2000 hectares in size, where they raise Brahman cows, other animals and have a palm tree farm. PZA farms are part of  the Malta family enterprise which is huge in Panama.

These cows are pampered. They are washed and massaged daily. Y’all, THE COWS GET DAILY MASSAGES! I’m clearly not living my life right.

No special equipment required here to touch the cows.

We visited the Palm farms, which is 135 hectares. We learned that it takes 2 years after planting for a palm tree to produce fruit! After that initial fruit, the tree can produce for another 30-35 years. Each fruit weighs about 15 kilos on average but can be as large as 40 kilos.

The palms primarily used for food products and the byproducts, after processing, are used for livestock feed. All the harvesting done on this farm is done by hand. We watched a worker knock a ripe fruit of the tree using a long machete, then a few students tried lifting it.

Fun fact: Panamanians, who live in rural areas have machetes like Americans have knives in their kitchens. They will have a machete for snakes, cutting grass, opening fruit, etc..They seemed shocked to find out we don’t used machetes in a daily basis😬

We ended our night checking into a hotel with an amazing view of the sunset.