The Tilapia Are Coming, The Tilapia Are Coming!

Over the last few months, I have been working with 12 farmers in San Luis to introduce the cultivation of fish. The first step of the project was to build the tanks. The majority of tanks were simple holes in the ground, no deeper than a meter, that were then covered with a sheet of black construction plastic. In some places, the ground was too rocky, so tanks were built with bricks or adobe blocks. A few very excited farmers made a larger investment and cemented the sides of their tank, making the structure a bit more permanent. With plastic, the project is extremely cheap and easily repeated, making it a solidly sustainable project in very rural, poor areas.


After all the tanks were constructed, we had to fill the tanks with water. Since only about half the homes in San Luis have water, and even where there is water, it only falls for 30 or 45 minutes every 4th or 5th day, filling the tanks posed a large problem. I solicited the help of the nearby sugar cane cooperative, which loaned us a tractor and a large mobile water tank which we filled up from a spring then brought house to house. The spring was far away and down a very large hill, so even in 5 or 6 hours of work every morning, we were only able to fill 2 tanks a day (on a good day). It ended up taking 8 straight days of making the long treks in the tractor to fill up the mobile water tank then bringing the water back to San Luis. The locations of the tanks proved incredibly hard to reach by tractor and required quite a bit of ingenuity.


In two cases, the fish tanks were just impossible to reach, so water had to be brought in buckets by foot to the tank. Each of these tanks took an entire day to fill. Although very tiring, it was inspiring to see entire families (and I mean entire families--from toddlers with tiny buckets to grandmothers basically transporting what seemed to me to be teacups of water) working to fill up their tanks.


Wednesday afternoon, a counterpart of mine who works for the Ministry of Agriculture's Freshwater Fish Division arrived with a truck full of over 1,000+ baby fish (2 to 3 weeks old), in individual bags packed for every farmer. The 1,000+ fish were donated free of charge by the Ministry of Agriculture and brought from their fish cultivation center near Sonsonate, a city about 3 hours away.

The bags had too be placed in the fish tanks for 5 to 10 minutes before releasing the baby fish into their new homes. Allowing the water temperature to equalize is critical, as releasing the small fish into water of a much different temperature can quickly shock and kill them.


The 12 farmers in San Luis are now raising grey tilapia. There are two types of tilapia--red and grey--but grey grow slightly quicker and birds are less likely to swoop down and make a snack out of them. If farmers take good care of the fish, they should be full-grown in 4 months, although in my experience with similar projects in other parts of El Salvador, Salvadorans don't have the patience to wait the last month, and usually eat their fish after just 3 or 3.5 months, when the fish are, as a Ministry of Agriculture friends joked, "the size of a tortilla."


Fish cultivation is a completely new concept in the area I live, so it was pretty interesting to watch the reactions of families to their new "pets" and future dinners. One small, 4-year-old girl had already begun crying before we had even moved on to the next house, after her father accidentally broke the news in front of her that, yes, in fact, they would be eating her new "pets" in a few months.


If all goes to plan, the fish should represent a large improvement to the levels of protein in people's diets, as fish (and all meat in general) is usually out of the price range of most San Luis residents. About 10 fish can be fit for every square meter of tank, so the farmer's are all raising between 60 and 100 fish, depending on the size of their tank. The farmers, especially those with the largest tanks, are also planning on supplementing their income at points during the year when there is not a corn or bean harvest to bring money in, by selling fish.


I chose to introduce fish cultivation to San Luis with tilapia because they are among the easiest types of fish to raise. The tanks do not need to be any deeper than one meter--or else the sun won't reach the bottom--and tilapia thrive in warm water and sunny environments. They are also very easy to feed, eating just about anything. In my community farmers are feeding them ground-up corn and/or sorghum, but they can also be fed tortillas, bread, 4 or 5 types of weeds that grow abundantly during the rainy season, and a few indigenous flowers.



While the fish are small, there is no need to make sure there is enough oxygen in the water (like in a home fish tank)--the sun can do that. However, as the fish grow (in about 6 weeks), the farmers will have to come up with some way of making sure there is plenty of oxygen in the water at night. While pumps are the easiest way, they are expensive, so the majority of the farmers will just be hanging ever-so-slightly opened upside-down soda bottles above the tanks and allowing water to drip out all night.

Volcano Pacaya

On our second day in Antigua, we woke up early, leaving our hostel at 6am, to climb to the crater of the still active Volcano Pacaya. Just last year, Pacaya had an extremely large explosion, completely destroying multiple nearby villages and claiming the lives of more than 100 people.

This is a view from a little over halfway up Volcano Pacaya. The closest volcano is Volcano Acatenango. The other two, to the left are Volcano Fuego (still active, as you can see) and Volcano Agua. Antigua, where we spent the entire New Year’s vacation, is on the other side of Acatenango, nestled in a valley in between all three volcanoes.



This is a panoramic view across all the entire crater. While we did make it to summit of Volcano Pacaya, it is impossible and way to dangerous to go down into the crater itself. As you can see, especially towards the left, it is still constantly steaming and releasing huge amounts of sulfuric vapor.




Although most of last year’s eruption’s force went in the other direction, in this photo the path traveled by the now-cooled lava (the black veins stretching across the otherwise green landscape) is obvious. Both the randomness of where the lava flows and the complete destruction it brings are stark and frightening to the Guatemalan communities near the volcano.



That’s us celebrating for a brief moment our ascent and descent of Volcano Pacaya. Because of the looseness of the volcanic rock, it feels like every step up you take, you slide back down two, and although the descent is much faster, you don’t feel any more secure while slipping and sliding your way back down the volcano laboring just to stay upright.

Exploring Antigua

Antigua is characterized by its pastel facades, terracotta roofs, cobblestone streets, many churches, cathedrals, and ruins, and the three dramatic volcanoes surrounding it in all directions.

On our first day in Antigua, we hiked up Cerro de la Cruz (Hill of the Cross) to enjoy the views over the old colonial town. For over 200 years, between the 1500s and 1700s, Antigua served as the capitol of all of Guatemala, and for a much shorter period of time, when all of Central America was united as one country (until an earthquake razed the city in the 1770s), Antigua also served as the capitol of all of Central America. In 1979, the whole town of Antigua was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.



The following are just a few shots from a two-day break-dancing competition being held just half a block from our hostel in the large courtyard of one of Antigua's many cathedrals:

While many of the churches and cathedrals are still in wonderful condition, others have fallen into ruin (due to the multitude of earthquakes that have hit Antigua over the years), but are nonetheless open for viewing. In many cases, the ruins are just as stunning as their still-standing peers.

New Year's Eve Celebrations

Antigua is a New Year’s Eve destination for Central American travelers, crowds from Guatemala City, and people from all over Guatemala and Central America. By the time dusk settles in on the 31st of December, the streets and central park are so packed with people, it is hard to even move. Bands and fireworks displays pop up all night on every block.

The next few photos are of a group of indigenous Mayans burning incense and beating drums while performing some of their traditional dances in the middle of the street:

Another Central American tradition (I have seen it in El Salvador, but never close this big) is building “animals” (in this case, bulls and butterflies) out of fireworks, then running through crowds as the sparks and flames fly in all directions. Although people are usually able to get out of the way and form an area for the person donning the costume to run around, in the crowded streets of Antigua I saw more than one or two people leave who looked to have gotten a bit too close!