La Tronosa

About La Tronosa:

La Tronosa covers 86.4 km² of hill and river country north-west of Tonosí town, with El Cortezo, Altos de Güera, Flores and Guánico among its neighbours. Its seat, also called La Tronosa, is a small village with a primary school and the Capilla Don Bosco. The other communities are spread out along farm roads and river banks: La Llana, which has its own school, Barrancón, Bijagual, El Guayabo and Guaniquito Arriba. The Río Tonosí runs through the corregimiento, and Quebrada La Tronosa flows into it here. For the bank, the hospital and a proper supermarket, people drive into Tonosí; for anything bigger, it is Las Tablas.

Life here runs on cattle and small farms. The roads between communities are caminos de producción, built for trucks and livestock, and the public works ministry has graded the stretches to La Caliza and Barrancón in recent years. Crossing the river has been the harder problem. When the footbridge serving Barrancón, Bijagual and El Guayabo collapsed in 2006, people on the far bank spent years swimming the Río Tonosí or crossing in an old boat to reach the rest of the district. The power grid does reach the corregimiento. The population is small and shrinking: 637 people in 2010, down from 721 in 1990.

The Reserva Forestal La Tronosa, created by Ley 52 of 1977 and redrawn under Ley 6 of 1994, covers about 20,579 hectares of the Azuero massif around Cerro La Tronosa. It protects the headwaters of the Tonosí, Jobero and Guánico rivers, the water the rice paddies downstream depend on. Humid tropical forest survives mainly on the high ground. Lower down, decades of felling, burning and pasture have opened the slopes, and that cleared belt between forest and river is where the farms are. Environment ministry staff have held sessions in La Tronosa on registering trees and on the paperwork for forestry work, so plan on the ministry’s permit before you clear or log anything.

Buyers here are mostly local: ranchers adding pasture, families from Tonosí or Las Tablas who want land of their own, and people with roots in the communities who come back to farm. Bank-repossessed fincas come up in Bijagual from time to time. What sets the value is not a view but the basics: road access in the wet months, water on the land, and clean title. In the dry season, people from all over the district come to La Angostura near La Llana, a river pool between walls of volcanic rock where howler monkeys call from the trees.

Fincas in La Tronosa:

Most of what you can buy in La Tronosa is farmland: pasture on the slopes, flatter ground near the rivers, and patches of secondary forest along the creeks. Farms are sold by the hectare, often fenced and divided into paddocks, and those with year-round water from the Río Tonosí or a quebrada are worth more when the dry season hits. Ask how the farm is reached in October as well as in March, because a farm road that a pickup handles in the dry season can turn to mud after the rains. Ask too whether any tree cover on the land is forest you will need a permit to clear. When you compare fincas for sale in La Tronosa, put the ones with all-weather access in a separate column.

Bank-Owned Fincas in La Tronosa:

A bank has offered several repossessed agricultural fincas in Bijagual, ranging from about 5 to more than 10 hectares, sold by offer, which the bank is free to accept or turn down. Buying this way can be cheaper than buying from a farmer, but you are buying the land as it stands. Walk the boundaries yourself, find out who has been grazing it since it was repossessed, and check the registry entry before you make an offer. Getting there from Tonosí, keep in mind that Bijagual is one of the communities on the far side of the river.

FAQ:

• Can I buy land inside the Reserva Forestal La Tronosa?

  No, not as a private finca. Land inside the reserve is part of the State’s forest heritage, and grazing, felling and burning are restricted there. The boundary has been redrawn since 1977, so have the survey plan of any farm on the upper slopes checked against the current reserve limits at the environment ministry before you sign anything.

• How do I get to the farms across the Río Tonosí?

  Barrancón, Bijagual and El Guayabo sit on the far bank, and for years after the 2006 bridge collapse the river was the only way across. Ask the seller exactly how a vehicle reaches the farm today, and try the route yourself in the rainy season before you agree a price.

• What should I check on the title of a finca here?

  Hill farms here are often held through possession rights or inherited by several siblings, not registered to one owner. Make sure the land has its own folio in the Registro Público, that every heir signs, and that the plan matches the fences on the ground. Land held only by possession has to go through ANATI before it can be titled.

• Where are the nearest shops, schools and health care?

  There are primary schools in La Tronosa and La Llana. For the hospital, the bank and the weekly shopping, residents go to Tonosí town, about half an hour away, and Las Tablas is the nearest larger city.

• Is there anything to do in La Tronosa beyond farming?

  The forest reserve has walking trails on its upper slopes, and La Angostura near La Llana is a favourite dry-season swimming spot, with rock walls and howler monkeys. Both are day trips rather than a tourism trade, so do not expect much in the way of rentals.