Gallon Jug Guitars and More

The Gallon Jug estate is home to a diverse variety of projects and products.  The largest and most well know project is Gallon Jug's sustainable logging industry.  The 130,000 acre estate is divided into 80 zones.  Each year, depending on demand and environmental conditions, 1 or 2 of the zones get selectively logged for mahogany, cedar, poison wood and santa maria trees.  This makes for a 40 year sustainability plan for logging and replanting the trees around the estate.  The school takes an active role in the process, working with forestry officials to gather mahogany seeds.  The seeds are planted in a tree nursery and when the trees are ready the students again work with the forestry officials to replant the logged portions of the property.

Interestingly, the largest buyer of Gallon Jug lumber is the guitar industry.  Gibson, Les Paul, and Fender all use mahogany from Gallon Jug for their guitars.

Coffee has gone from hobby status at Gallon Jug to a big time big time business with around 150 acres of shade grown coffee currently in production.  Gallon Jug coffee is in high demand all over Belize and is currently being assessed for 'organic' status and export.
Since my arrival in August there have been huge amount of work done in preparation for the what is expected to be a record coffee harvest. 

I don't have much time for coffee personally, but I do like the ripe red coffee fruit, which has a sweet red pepper taste.

Last, but not least is the growing cattle industry in Gallon Jug.  If you have not been to Belize it will be hard to appreciate just how scarce beef is here.  I am no expert, but my assumption is that the temperatures and variety of large jungle cats each play a significant role in cattle not thriving. 
There is a running joke that the cows in Belize are all so skinny from being chased by jaguars. 

The Gallon Jug's ranch boasts around 800 of the healthiest looking cows that I have seen in Belize, including this hybrid variety of 'tiger' striped cows.  The stripes certainly couldn't hurt when it comes to avoiding the variety of predators that abound here.

 Though some of the cows have been observed being even more resourceful in the camouflage department.

AND FINALLY, the random animal sighting of the week goes to this golf ball sized relative of the triceratops, which nearly broke my window last night.