End of Trip to Tanzania

I cannot be more pleased with the work we were able to accomplish while here at the Andrew Connally School of Preaching in Arusha, Tanzania.  We spent a week and a half in class and four full days in hands-on teaching in the garden and with the rabbits and Tilapia.  It is hard to believe that my time here is coming to a close.  But I feel confident in saying that I believe this will greatly help the students when they leave to go preach full time and it will help the full time preachers who also attended.

Before and After of Tilapia Pond

 The picture to the right is a before and after of the tilapia pond that we dug.  It was quite labor intensive but not so bad with twenty strong backs at work.  It only took one good rain (which came the moment we finished!!) to fill it half way full.  Now we are waiting for more rain to finish filling it for us.  Unfortunately we are entering into the dry season here and it may be a long wait.  It is good to know however that the ground is very full of clay and is holding the water level quite well.  We fertilized the water with cow manure to help the algae bloom (which then the fish eat) and the water is beginning to turn a nice green (that means the algae is growing).  The future plan is to dig several more ponds just like this one in order to grow lots of fish to eat here at the school.

Planting Moringa Trees

We also planted 25 Moringa Trees around the pond.  These trees will provide a valuable fodder feed for the rabbits and the future animals.  It also is a powerful tool in overcoming malnutriotion and is very easy to grow.  We also planted a field of five hundred seeds of the Moringa tree!!

Filling Drip Irrigation Bucket

Me helping build bucket stands for Drip Irrigation

 
While here we worked to install all the drip irrigation systems that the school had previously recieved from Healing Hands.  We set up around twenty of them.  Drip irrigation is very useful for here and we have already seen improvement in the crops we are irrigating with them.

Doe rabbit that gave birth Feb 8

 We went out yesterday morning to feed the rabbits and found that one was giving birth!  We quickly manufactured a nesting box out of a cardboard box and put the four babies she delivered in it.  This brought great delight to the students as we did not know she was pregnant when we purchased her last week. 

Rabbit cages at the school

The rabbit cages we are building are coming along quite nicely.  Currently we have six holes and this morning construction has been underway to create three more.  We have seven adult rabbits and four babies so we are working to get them done as soon as possible. 

One of our does munching on some fresh cabbage

 The rabbits seem quite content in their new home.  The students have been doing a fantastic job feeding the rabbits and watering them.  They already seem to have grown and look much healthier.  I really cannot be much happier with our progress.