Wild Sun Wildlife Rescue Center
The mission of the Wild Sun Rescue Center is to have a positive impact on conservation. They do this through rescue, rehabilitation and release of local fauna as well as via reintroduction of locally extinct species. You can volunteer with Wild Sun in several ways so long as you can commit to staying 2 weeks […]
Insect Pests and Solutions
There are thousands of insects in the jungle here, and several of them like to feast on our plants. We’re going to try to catalog as many of them as possible to help our friends and neighbors in the area recognize them and know what to do. Aphids Every gardener and farmer hates aphids. They […]
Bambi, our deer friend
Meet Bambi our baby deer friend, this cute little animal became part of our community at Rancho Delicioso for a while. Animal care is a daily duty at the farm, and we all loved to take care of Bambi when she comes by and is hungry for her daily milk.
Animal Challenges
A tropical organic farm is a giant salad bar to wild animals I love jungle animals. Birds, bugs, bats, and beasts of all types. When I first moved to Costa Rica in 2004 I took the time to learn the life habits of every mammal in our jungles, and the names of every bird too. […]
Lacewing Insect – A Friend to the Tropical Gardener
An Insect Predator of Aphids and Caterpillars If you’ve lived in Costa Rica for a while, and you’re paying attention to the little things around you, then you may have noticed some tiny eggs on little hairs around your house or garden. I had seen them a few times and wondered what they were, but […]
Caterpillar That Eats Passion Fruit Leaves
This beautiful orange and black butterfly looks sweet, but it lays hundreds of eggs on our passion fruit vine leaves. At first, the eggs are bright yellow, but after a time, they turn a browner shade before hatching. The tiny caterpillar babies favor these passion fruit vines leaves (maracuya) and will quickly grow much larger. […]
Goat Milk
Before I came to Rancho Delicioso, my boyfriend Roland and I had begun to experiment with making our own dairy products…yogurt, feta, and cream cheese. While they were great tasting, without a cow or a goat, they were actually far more expensive than to just buy the item at the store. But now I have […]
Artificial Wasp Nest for Caterpillar Control
There are hundreds of species of wasps in the jungles of Costa Rica. Many or most are predators of other insects, and we’ve learned that they’re already being used in other parts of Costa Rica to control flies. A Plague of Caterpillars that Eat Spinach and Arugula We have several types of small caterpillars that […]
Natural Predators as Allies on the Farm
Here I’m creating an ongoing article exploring the symbiotic relationship between our farm, and the natural creatures that live in the jungle around us. How can we help each other? What can we do to encourage the right type of critters to come to dine on the bugs and beasts that bother us? The following […]
Rhinoceros Beetle Larvae
Friendly Transparent Underground Monsters We discovered these large, transparent grubs living in the earth near the roots of our bananas. They look thoroughly vile, and with their large sharp mandibles, they seem to be able to deliver a painful bite. They are about the length and thickness of a man’s thumb. No one knew what […]
