Agricultural

Transvala hay, concentrate and minerals for the summer:

the dry season is when feed changes hands here, because the grass that carried a herd through the rains stops growing and every finca has to find fibre somewhere. Square bales of Transvala are the standard hay. Rice-straw bales are cheaper but fill a belly rather than hold weight on an animal. Bagged concentrate is chosen by species and the protein figure on the sack, not the brand. Hay, sacks and supplements all sit under animal feed. A 46 kg sack of beef fattening concentrate is around ₡12,500 and dairy concentrate nearer ₡15,000, with several thousand colones between one agroservicio and the next. Surplus from a farm that has cut its herd should go well below that, and is only worth having in sealed, recently made sacks, since concentrate does not keep.

A bale of Transvala worth the drive:

pick one up and cut the strings. A standard square bale weighs around 18 to 20 kg, is an even gold-green and smells of dry grass. A light bale was cut too young or packed loose; a heavy, warm one was baled damp and will mould from the middle. Look for weeds and other plants mixed through it, which lower its value and can upset a horse’s gut. Ask which grass it is and how long it regrew before cutting; a producer who cannot say has probably not watched either. With sacks, squeeze for hard lumps and check the bottom of the stack for rat holes and water marks.

Stock trailers and horse trailers:

both get called carretas, but they carry different loads. A livestock trailer is an open-sided box, often with a centre gate, pulled on a ball hitch behind a pickup or, in bigger sizes, on a gooseneck. A horse trailer carries fewer animals and needs padded partitions, an easy ramp or step and air that moves when it is parked, because a horse stands the whole trip and a nervous one kicks. Many horse trailers here only do a few short runs a year to topes and cabalgatas, so a looked-after one can be in better shape than its age suggests.

A used trailer and its floor:

that is where it fails first. Urine and manure pool towards the back, rotting the boards and eating into the steel cross-members, and new rubber mats or fresh bedding hide all of it, so have the mats lifted and push a screwdriver into the boards by the rear gate. Check the welds on gates and hinges, which crack where animals push, stand behind it to see whether a wheel leans from a bent axle, and test lights and brakes hitched to your own vehicle.

Livestock looking for a new finca:

each species, from cows and horses down to hens, has its own page under livestock, and they are handed over, not shipped like a sack of feed. See the animal where it lives, watch it walk and ask for the documentation that goes with it. A good handover is settled before anyone loads: which trailer, who drives, and an early start so the animal is not standing in a hot box at midday.

Hay by the bale, trailers by the axle, feed by the date:

put the numbers buyers ring to ask about straight into the listing. For hay: the grass, cutting age, bale weight, how many and whether they were kept under a roof, with a photo of one opened. For a trailer: inside length, axles, floor, hitch and brakes, with the floor photographed mats out. For feed: species, protein figure, manufacture date and sealed sacks left. Say which canton it is in and who will help load: someone driving from Nicoya to Bagaces for sixty bales wants to know they are not stacking them alone.