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My First Video! Check out where I work!

This was another beautiful sunny day on the farm. We were repotting Latan's and Manilla Palms. The nursery's irrigation is divided into sections, drip lines and six foot high impact sprinklers, shade house and dry zone. The shade house is for all the new starts, as well as an elevated portion of the nursery with no irrigation, for the Cycads, which require a drier climate.

On top of all that there is a second nursery for the smaller plants. Once they get big enough, we'll repot them and then move them to the big show up front. When you do make a sale, you create open space in the big show (main nursery). Now you have a large area to fill with new plants from the lower nursery. On top of that when you're always propagating from seed to move into the shade house, and then into the lower nursery.

Running a nursery is somewhat like the playing the commodities market, we want a diversified portfolio but also lots of stock in the popular sellers. We try to have lots of healthy bigger plants in the most popular species. For example Areca palms, because they are used for hedges and so will be ordered in large numbers (this is worth the space sacrifice). As well we will try to have some rarer palms that maybe others won't have, so we create a unique niche for ourselves in the market. Things like Gardenias are also extremely popular so we dedicate a lot of space to growing this fragrant flowering plant. With only X amount of square footage to use, we must be diligent about what we grow and how much space it takes up.

I call it the dance, trying to fill the empty spaces with newly repotted palms. Always starting from seed in the shade house, then moving the starts into the lower nursery, and then moving the bigger plants to the big show up front. Balancing all this takes an amazing knowledge of all the varieties of plants you have in the nursery, as well as an understanding of what landscaping companies are looking for. Luckily I work for the master of this dance, my Yoda, David Breen.

One love,

WW

New Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVjue0R5tHQ

I just wanted to share this video with everyone. Midway Atoll is part of the Hawaiian Island chain. It is a huge Albatross breeding ground, and many of these birds are dying because of the plastic in our oceans.

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Plastic Island

I think that one of the greatest advantages of living on an eco-friendly island is the people you meet and stories you hear. With such a focus on Organic farming and sustainable living this place attracts some amazing people.

One of those people is Tom, and abstract artist. He is going to the United Nations to showcase a new painting of his, and to raise awareness about the Plastic Island floating in the pacific ocean. And I quote:

In the middle of the Pacific Ocean, 500 nuatical miles of the coast of California, a patch of garbage that has been said to be twice the size of Texas floats in the sea. The incredible mash of garbage is actually more like a soup, half floating, half sunken, consisting of 80 percent plastics and has been said to weigh up to 3.5 million tons.

Sad but true, it has amounted to this. The amount of plastics in this world is devastating our ocean and our marine life. Fish and birds have been feeding of this island thinking it is food. Tiny pieces of plastics, bottle caps, plastic bags are then consumed by these poor animals and in turn they are killed by them.

This is something I think we are all responsible for. So pass this on and let the world know. We can all make a difference, we have to use biodegradeable compostible bags or reuseable cloth bags, not plastic shopping bags. Because they end up in the stomachs of birds and fish.

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Bikram Yoga

Firstly, I have just begun to attend Bikram yoga classes. We go once a week to the TGIF (Thank Ganesh it's Friday), in Kapa'a. Typically a Bikram class can run from 12$ to 18$ for one session, however on TGIF it's only 5$. Perfect for the humble wwoofer. It's brand new and has been opened by two sisters from the mainland, it has a great vibe and I have really been enjoying the heat and sweat. I would say I lose about 6 pounds in sweat during a 90 min. class. Some may be alarmed by this, but you gain all the weight back in water over the next 24 hours. Having all your pores open up and all your sweat glands working can really invigorate your skin and detoxify your system. I always feel incredibly energetic/light headed/giddy/fantastic from these classes. After only three classes I can feel and see the difference in my flexibility in my hip flexors and especially my hamstrings and groin. Being a tall guy, all these areas are susceptible to being very tight and unflexible, so it feels great to work on those areas.

So for those of you who don't know Bikram, it's known for it's rigorously scheduled and strict methods. There is no talking in class, you are only allowed to drink water at certain points, and it is a fast paced and intense workout. The final key to the puzzle being that Bikram Yoga is practiced in a room heated to 45C. Add on top of that 15-20 people sweating for 90 minutes and the humidity can be unbelievable at times. It is this that makes the gains so incredible. When working your muscles in such a hot environment you can't help but feel supple and loose. It would be compared to the 20 min. dynamic warmup I would perform before a game in Volleyball. You need to warm up the body, and a 45C degree room will definately do that...

So, we're mid class...only the teacher speaks and all the students are changing postures only when she says so. It is a focused environment and there is never a distraction. You listen to your teacher as she takes you through the class, and you focus on yourself that is it. So you can imagine my surprise when Graham starts to whisper my name in SuptaVirasana. Now, this is so uncommon, I think I'm dizzy from the heat and ignore him. But there it is again, Alex Alex!!! Now I'm a bit annoyed, not only is he breaking the energy in the room, he's pointing it at me. I know I'm not all they way down in this posture but that's the limit of my body, so I'm getting annoyed that he is bringing attention to this...I ignore him again....

ALEX ALEX ALEX!! Now the whole class has stopped the teacher is silent and staring at Graham, I finally come up out of my pose and look at Graham and he says..."There's a bug under your knee". Now I'm really upset, a little bug is not a big problem and I shrug it off and look at him incredulously....but he keeps pointing under my knee and I finally get out of the posture fully and look down....CENTIPEDE!!!!!

Now, on Kauai there is almost nothing that can hurt you. No spiders, no snakes, nothing. It's a beautiful place, but it does lack in wildlife, hence the price to pay for living in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. However, we do have the fabled centipede. Which as you can see can reach 4-6 inches, and they have an incredibly painful bite. Some are even quite afraid of them ie: our teacher from Utah who just moved here and has never seen one. She starts to scream oh my god oh my god what do we do!!!! Hahahaha the whole class is disrupted people are getting up and moving away from me and yelling to get it out!!! get it out!!!! All in all it was quite the 5 minute scene as we attempted to remove this centipede from the studio. In the end we did manage to get rid of it and I was finally able to understand why Graham was saying my name out loud in class.

Morale of the story...funny things happen on Friday the 13th..

WW

PS: after the class we all laughed about the situation but mostly about how calm Graham was to begin with, I mean I was practically laying on the centipede for a whole minute as it twisted in and out between my knees, and all he could muster was a hushed whisper..."Alex there's a bug under you". I mean geez, I could have been bitten....hahahaha

Fruit

I had a funny conversation with my mentor's daughter, 11 yrs, last night. We were talking about our summer back home in BC and she mentioned how she missed the peaches and cherries!! I agreed with her, I love peaches as well, and then she went on to say that "This place sucks, we don't have any good fruit.." silence at the table...

Just for the information of the reader I will list the fruit growing here on her farm. Mangoes, lychees, papayas, macadamia nuts, oranges, tangelos, lemons, limes, grapefruits, avocados, bananas, rambutan, mangosteen, longons...

One of the main reasons, if not the main reason, that I live here is for the abundance of organic tropical fruit. It is so energizing to eat such healthy, nutritions food right off the tree. It gives us life and vitality to have so much abundance here.

We all immediately started laughing after her statement, and I just started trying to explain what I just wrote above to her. but what about...list of fruits, you have everything we love here right on your own property!!!

At 11 yrs old kids have a great way of pointing out the obvious...she said "but we have no peaches...and no cherries, and no apples." And it occured to me, that even though she does appreciate the fruit here, and I love the fruit at home, she just shows so simply how as humans we seem to want what we don't have. She has been eating this fruit since her childhood, and I the same vice versa. It's almost the "grass is always greener on the other side" syndrome.

In the end all parties involved agreed that fruit everywhere all over the world is such an amazing blessing. And that we should all appreciate how lucky we are to have such large amounts in our home province/island. Fresh organic fruit is so rewarding, and we all agreed, it is something that should never be taken for granted...

The first three fruits I ate when I arrived here...organic of course
Starfruit
Mac nuts
Bananas

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Cock-a-doodle-doo

First day,

Gorgeous, hot, blue skies, and no trade winds. We went straight to the ocean, I ran into the clear water as fast as I could. We did some swimming for the first time in months...what an experience...wow have to get my shoulder muscles back into shape! We saw our friend the sea turtle once again...he was just casually munching on the grass bottom...so calming to watch these animals. It feels so wild to know they are endangered, and yet EVERY time we head to this beach we see him...slowly swimming along...what a treat to see.

Took the first day to stock up on supplies like food/tiki torch fuel/candles/...yknow the essentials. Checked out a few vehicles as well, today we are hoping to purchase a truck. A big part of our woofing experience here in the tropics is to take dump loads. Everything grows soooo fast here...like really fast. Palm fronds are always turning brown and starting to droop, and it is our job to stay on top of that kind of thing and keep the property looking tip top shape. Always lots of green waste to be hauled out, and so we are hoping to find a good work vehicle. Also something to haul around our boards and bikes...

That's all for now..
WW