by Lovely A. Carillo
The 30-hectare Malagos Farm and Garden Resort in Barangay Malagos, Calinan, Davao City is a perfect example of agri-tourism at its best. For one, resorting to sustainable management practices for the farm did not only cut back on the farm’s operational costs, but it seems it has also resulted to a more profitable business, and more reasons for tourists to come back.
People are familiar with the Malagos Garden Resort thanks to the Bird Show held in the resort on Sundays. While there will still be a show on August 7 and 8, people will not be trekking to Malagos for the birds, but for the Malagos Farm Fair.
Its amazing birds may be the most popular members of the Puentespina menagerie of animals. But this time, Dabawenyos and visitors from other places will also discover that inside the Malagos Farm (which has never been opened to the public) there are more animals that help in making the farm operations more sustainable. Think of dairy goats, dairy cows, sheep, horses, peacocks, pheasants, ostriches, fancy chickens, dogs and the very popular ornamental birds.
Expect the Malagos Garden Resort to be transformed into an Animal Fair, the same kind of fair you may have seen only in the movies like “Babe” where farmers showcased their prized animals and buyers from all over the country flock to choose the best of each kind!
“This is actually the first of its kind in Mindanao and we are encouraging those who are planning to start a business or who want to improve their herds to join the Farm Fair,” Malagos Garden Resort’s Dr. Roberto “Bo” Puentespina said during a farm tour last Friday.
The Tractor Ride
While on board a tractor, children and adults alike will be taken on a magical tour of the Malagos Farm. First stop, at least during last Friday’s tour preview, was the cacao fermentation area. According to Peuntespina, “cacao tastes better when fermented.”
The Malagos Farm has been exporting cacao to the United States for the past two years. Their cacao produce is consolidated with other cacao producers and are sold to Mars Cocoa Development Center, which needs about 100 thousand metric tons of quality cacao beans by 2015 to 2020.
“Mars has a very big demand and not a single plantation can meet that demand yet, so we are encouraging farmers to go into cacao production,” Charita Puentespina, founder of the Puentespina Orchids & Tropical Plants, Inc. said,
The hundreds, if not thousands of cacao trees that line up almost 17 hectares of the farm, play a very significant role in the farm’s sustainable management. While riding the tractor, one will see cacao trees planted in such a way that the sun still shines through. The weeds under most trees are, however, noticeable.
Unknown to visitors, the weeds under the cacao trees are gathered and given to the almost 300 dairy goats being reared on another section of the farm. At the kidding area where 77 goats are presently being milked, visitors will be able to witness the actual milking process.
“Our dairy goats are high-yielding and they give us an average of 1.2 Liters of milk per goat daily,” he said. While the Farm keeps almost 300 dairy goats, “we just can’t keep all of them, so we are selling them during the fair and will give buyers some tips on how to take care of their dairy goats so they stay productive,” he added.
The fresh milk sourced from the goats are pasteurized and then either sold or processed into cheese. Olive Puentespina is the fairy godmother who sprinkles her laboratory magic on the milk and turns them into 16 kinds of cheese, including the Fresh Goat Cheese more popularly known as kesong puti; Chevre or French-style cheese; Blue Goat Cheese which is a young goat cheese, mildly aged with blue mold; Blue Pepato, mildly aged cow’s milk cheese with whole green pepper corn; Feta which is made from pure goats milk, aged in brine and the Blush which is a young semi soft cow’s milk cheese, aged with both white and blue mold.
But in the course of its lifetime, every goat must poop or produce waste. Instead of treating this as another waste to get rid of, they gather the goat’s poop inside a biogas digester which was installed only last June and which turns the poop into methane gas. The gas is then used to heat the water used in the farm for cleaning.
Some of the goat poop is used as fertilizer by mixing them with the other farm waste like dried leaves and rice hulls, and earthworms particularly the European nightcrawlers species. All these undergo a process called vermicomposting which produces organic fertilizer. Puentespina said they planted Passion Fruit to provide a shaded area for the nightcrawlers that love dark places.
Along the way, you will see the Currant Tree Berries locally known as Bignay, which the Puentespina’s process into fruit wine. Some of the cacao produce are also processed and turned into tablea.
Just in front of the Malagos Garden Resort is the 9-hectare Orchid Farm planted to cutflowers which are sold not only in Davao but elsewere in the country. The Orchid Farm is normally closed to the public, but if you are too curious about the famous Puentespina orchids, simply buy P50 worth of orchids or other plants from the selling area and you get to tour the Orchid Farm for free!
“A tour of the Malagos Farm will be highly educational for those who want to start a farm using sustainable farm management,” Puentespina said. The two-day Farm Fair is in fact a great opportunity to see how the whole farm operates considering that it will cost you only P250 for one day, inclusive of buffet lunch, adventure games, seminars and lots of food testing!
Puentespina said the Malagos Farm Fair will show Dabawenyos that Davao can be a favorite destination not only for sun and sea tourism but also for agri-tourism. The Farm is undoubtedly an almost perfect proof that sustainable development is not only a way to curb global warming but is also a way to make a business profitable.
If there is one thing that the Malagos Farm Tour can teach kids, it is the fact that milk does not only come from bottles!.
