Finishing the toma de agua

Before I left for in service training we finished the toma. The basic idea of the toma is to channel the water from a natural spring into a pipe. You design them so the water never is out in open air. This prevents rainwater runoff and animals from getting into the water system. They are challenging to make because no too are alike.

This is the sort of jungle frog I see usually once or twice when I´m hiking up to the toma.
Here you can see the toma, you can tell how steep the area immediately above the toma is. I am nervous that a landslide could harm the toma but don´t want to disturb it any more because it has a good rock base. We are planning on planting an anti erosion plant called sote caballo. That is a two in pipe coming out, we used this to keep the construction area relatively dry.
Here is a real pretty picture of the toma. You can see the actual spring box. Two times a year the top (not present) will be taken off and it will be cleaned of any silt they may have accumulated. You can also see the two overflow pipes. Normally this spring puts out about 30 gallons a minute which is a very high flow for one spring. However after a large rainstorm or series of rainy days the flow can get as high as 60 gpm! and that is only when I have been measuring! For this reason I put two overflow pipes because you can cause permanent damage if the water backs up into the actual spring, because water will travel underground and find a new exit.
These are the three major players that show up to work every day. Emilio, Jose and Ramon. Emilio carried up a 100 pound cement, and then went to go get more sand, that day.

Special shout out to the Rotary Club International who provided the funds for the project.
Here is a view from the toma looking at the jungle. You can see the rancho where we would eat lunch and ladies would make coffee. This is also where we all gathered when it started pouring rain.

They are laying the form work and rebar for the spring box lid.