Post a peek of yourself here...

Hi Liz,

No need to apololgise, we are here amongst friends who do not look for perfection.

Your fires can get exceedingly dangerous with your heat, lets hope this summer is didfferent and you get rain now and again but I shall watch the weather here on TV. We get far too much rain my small garden is more like a swamp right now and I need to walk on it today to get at two garden lights I never switched on from new the other day.

Does'nt sound like the Austrailia painted here..lmaoooooo

 

No there is a beautiful wild side of Oz The north and east coast even Tasmania have had plenty of rain it's just the south east is a bit dryer than it has been in the past and it's causing problems. Don't forget Aust. it is nearly as big as the US. I think England just about fits into my state. Hopefully all will work together at Copenhagen and somewhere down the ditch the weather will right it's self. Fires are a way of life here it's just we need to live with it better. Those of us that live in the forest areas need to learn how to keep the fuel load down with out damaging the environment. I am currently making sure my paddocks are eaten to a safe height and excess grass growth in the tree areas is removed. The house area is clean of excess stuff such as stacked wood, dirty spouts etc. Gums drop leaves a lot so spouting has to be kept clean and excess leaf drop composted. I have made use of a lot of decidious trees around my place for coolness and they are less combustiable (sp) if there is an ember storm from a local fire. Each family makes a fire plan in these areas and at certain times may be asked to put it into action. I personaly am out of the direct forest area and there is enough open farmland to act as a buffer. But it can burn too if the grass is dry. Our spring rain hopefully will keep the base green if it is not too eaten out
It's just the continuous warmth so early that is so wearing. The pic is looking down our valley towards a dam that already had dropped quiet a bit when this photo was taken. It is much lower now. Notice the dry grass. Just behind the photographer is where a state forest starts. Some forest below us and the hill my home looks out onto. These are from real estate pics i collected off the net.

Liz
s

 

Thanks for that Liz,

A beautiful backdrop as far as the eye can see. Looks more like our huge Witton Park. We don't have a national park like Malaysia or even where you are butwe have several parks like my Witton one.

If I lived further down the road (my terrace) I could see Blackpool Tower on a nice day.

Just take care Liz.

 

No worries, Liz - you spelled it the way it sounds to an English-speaker. At least Oz is clearing its undergrowth - the traditional form of brush control in (normally) humid Ecuador is to burn it off. This has been less than helpful this year, which is now being considered as the worst drought in at least 40 if not 120 years - it will pass the 120 year mark if we go just one more week without substantial rainfall. It finally did rain here in the jungle, which is good because the secondary forest I can see from my window was drooping and browning, something nobody every wants to see in the rainforest. We're starting to have water shortages in the areas dependant on rainfall catchment, and also the edges of the jungles, which are fed by springs born in the high cordilleras. No rain there means no drinking water. It's actually partially the reason behind my next move - Ambato's water is glacier-fed and less likely to run out on in the short and medium term. However, the glacier on Volcan Chimborazo is receding at an alarming rate with the drought - there's no snow falling to replenish it.

Kat - I'm in full agreement with Liz on this one. Enjoy your moisture! Dry and dusty, especially with the winds generated by our volcanoes and the interandean valleys, is very unpleasant. We occasionally get wind storms and dust devils that tear peoples' roofs off - they're not strong enough to be classified as tornadoes, and besides our terrain is so bumpy that they don't travel very far. Fire season (which is in itself an unusual term) this year is going to be deadly - as I said before, we've already lost 250 ha (that's 2.5 square kilometers) of forests inside the city of Quito, as well as about 400 ha in the northern dry forests of Ibarra, and who knows how far it will go before the rains come?

 

Hi Lorax,

Hmm..hard to do that when it rains everyday (almost) its been raining again today but its fine now. There are 80mph gales down south so we're luckier than them.

Thanks for talk about Ecuador (its my spell that was wrong, funny I always thought it was Equador not Ecuador ) and Liz for talk on Austrailia, I do love reading about different countries and culture.

Your right, both of you -- I would hate dry and dusty. I guess thats the drawback living in beautiful countries.

 

Don't let me mislead you, though - something like 80% of Ecuador is actually forested and very very green. It's just that people tend to live in the highlands, which are much drier but also far less buggy. The town I currently live in, Puyo, is right on the upper edge of the Amazon basin, and normally it is extremely green. The photo I have attached was taken about 6 blocks from my house, which is secondary riparian forest.

 

Good Morning All,
What Liz describes above in the way of fire prevention measures is what people are doing in the interior of our province, British Columbia. Since it got warm enough to allow the pine beetle to winter over and remain alive to kill of most of the pines, there has been much concern as well as much fire there in recent past summers. Enough smoke that is is sometimes a visible haze hanging in the clouds over the coastal mainland even though the fires are further inland.


D

 

What sort of fish are in this part of Ecaudor lorax, sorry to get off subject but it's one of my hobbies as well as gardening.

 

''OH MY OH MY''!

I love your image Lorax. I can't imagine a few steps and your faced with such an awesome sight, I would spend everyday there.

I love water movement, its my next buy for the garden next year.

 

That's the small river. The Pastaza is about 20 blocks away, and looks like this...

 

Wow, Beth. Thanks for sharing.


: )

 

Lorax,

The greenery just after the most top hill, it looks like rolling greenery...second image.

Lovely images with the first my most favorite.

 

It's actually quite hilly here under all those trees, which is what gives it the rolling look, Katalina. I live in what would be considered the foothills if I were anywhere else. Here, we figure the foothills to be the paramo and high forest part of the central interandean valleys (with only the volcanoes really being considered to be mountains proper) and people would say I live on the toes. Even so, the idea that the Amazon is a flat place is a definite misconception. I've been in the terra firma forests near the Brazilian border with Peru, and they are very hillocky.

GM - I assume you're asking about edible sportfish? Most of the tropical aquarium fish are native to these waters, but for eating we go after the following: Carachama (plecostomus), Bagre (large catfish, by which I mean 50kg), Bocachico (a fish similar in features to a smallmouth bass), Arrowana, Electric Eel, Sartina (looks like freshwater Permit, but smaller), Carita (a type of perch, I think - they have big foreheads), Gar, Tiburon de Agua Dulce (similar to Muskie), the larger Tetras, and the three types of Piranha (red, black, and white). There are also crawdads and freshwater crabs in some streams, and further up into the Andes, Cutthroat Trout have been introduced to a couple of glacial rivers for sport purposes. The biggest "prize" fish here are the Arrowana and the larger Bagres, and in my opinion the tastiest ones are the Piranha, Carita, and Arrowana, with a close vote for the Carachama. Everything in the list with the exception of the crustaceans and the Carachama are fished on lines; Carachama is fished using small toss-nets, and crustaceans are fished with sticks and baskets. You can sometimes fly for the trout, but since the areas where they were introduced tend to be deeper, they're generally angled instead. Bagre and Arrowana are the two largest fish, with a good specimen of either beginning at 25 kg. These are fished using fairly heavy crappy yellow rope, shark hooks, and small chickens as bait, and are considered to be a team sport. Two men in a canoe go out with the line and hook, drop it in the middle of the river, and paddle like heck for the shore, where a team of 5 or so is waiting to do the haul in. You can occasionally catch an Arrowana by angling, but it is more likely to snap regular filament line and will easily cut through even a 12-ga braided steel leader.

 

It looks very nice Lorax.

Have you ever seen the tribal people near there? Its supposed to be one of the world's last uncontacted tribes that have been observed and photographed between Brazil and Peru.

 

I am very careful to ask permission of the tribes before I move across their land; the last thing I'd want is to bring a disease to people who aren't immune. If the zone is marked as intangible on my maps, I tend to avoid it except as necessary to cross through it in canoe.

 

Oh really Lorax,

I was afraid I asked a wrong question there.

You spoke to this elusive tribe...wow..I have much respect for tribal people. We only heard about this particular tribe this year, I believe the BBC unfolded the story.

Wow to about you and your mode of travel -- canoe, I could talk all night with you Lorax and what you do but alas its my bed -time.

Your a very interesting person and thanks.

Have a great night surfing but take care.

 

For anyone else before I go here is the tribe

http://www.travelexplorations.com/b...e-photographed-near-border.4487329-25678.html

This looks bad for them but as I said earlier I gotta go. I will read it tomorrow.

http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/5212

 

Thanks lorax , very interesting place you live in. I didn't realize the arrowana got so large. It would remind me of "Jurrasic park" and definitly wouldnt want one flopping in a boat with me!

 

lolol Michael I have never heard of a fish named that.

Not that fish is my first love but saw some beauties at Tenerife's Lora Parque.No idea what they were though size was small to medium.

 

The only things larger than the Arrowana in our waters are the giant river otters (Lobos del Rio), and the pink dolphins.

 

Hi Lorax,

Otters are cuties, we're just getting our Otters back

Good lord, yours are huge towards ours.

Our Otter and yours Lorax, well yours I think.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otters

Dolphin are lovely.

 

Pink Dolpins? New one to me! Thought I had at least read aboot all the South American fauna. I'll have to read up. Thanks.

 

Look up "Amazon River Dolphin" GM - that will get you an easier result. They're sort of a pale rose colour.

 

Thanks lorax , will do! Always like to learn something new.
B

 

2010!!!

Anyone take any shots over Christmas?

Feel free to post them here. The only one I took was this lame one of my snowflake xmas lights...

What kind of food did everyone indulge in? Myself, I made homemade pizza xmas eve, and I had turkey dinner and all the fixings on xmas day. Made a prime rib roast on new year's day that turned out superb.

Love to hear about how others spent Christmas...

It was just a quiet one for me - just my mom and I. Went to midnight mass and spent xmas day making the turkey, listening to carols, watching specials on t.v, etc.

Hope everyone else's holiday season was enjoyable as well...

Happy New Year, Y'all!

: )