How beavers are reviving wetlands — Exposing the Big Game

Published9 hours ago Share https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-64502365 Related Topics Climate change By Navin Singh Khadka Environment correspondent, BBC World Service We are losing wetlands three times faster than forests, according to the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. When it comes to restoring them to their natural state there is one hero with remarkable powers – the beaver. Wetlands […]

How beavers are reviving wetlands — Exposing the Big Game

Only the white owl

bird white owl feather
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

It is only the white owl

From her tall

Pine

Spire

Who

Might see the pinecone grow

And who

Still remembers

Even now, the snow

Drifting across the misted moon

After the embers

Of centuries

Of dark fire.

It was only

A while ago

Among the gold cliffs

That black ravens sounded their raucous calls

Of wisdom-woven prophecies,

They who brought the end of time, at last,

This time that has drawn to its close,

And now the single petal of the rose

Falls.

There glimmer

Within the universe of beings, the silent

Springing feet of the herd of deer

Bounding ever higher,

Ever fast,

On their journey

Across the snow.

Soon,

In the beginning,

The gold face of the setting sun

Will appear

Through silver sheets of rain that shimmer,

While, in the wandering whiffs

Of bitter smoke, will sound the cries

Of yesteryear,

That linger, still heard, echoing among the far cliffs,

The spirit of days

Gone

By.

Now hills swept with snow

Travel farther back to

The land of mists and magic, flown.

There

The wings of butterflies

Unfold in the dawn,

In the beginning

That knows still the ancient ways

And there along the shore that goes to nowhere

The brave one

Walks on alone

In the far country,

The soul of courage,

Portender of knowledge.

The howl

Of the wolf, ascendant,

Will mark

The moment

When the moon

Rises over fields of stars, when Hanuman, hero

Of the earth and the skies,

In the beginning and the ending,

Brings clouds of peace that shine

Transcendent

Through the living fire of the distant dark.

© Copyright Sharon St Joan, 2023

Unpleasant reality

Just about every day, one can see heart-wrenching ads on TV about children’s hospitals. No one would disagree that these children and their parents need and deserve help.

However, many people are unaware that the word “research” in the words “research hospital” means animal experimentation.

If you feel that this experimentation is kind and gentle, sorry, but that is not the case. Here is some information about testing on animals:

Go to Humane Society International, then click on “Our Work,” then go to “Animal Testing.”

This is very painful to read, and the photos are disturbing. However, if you are unaware of the cruelty that is never mentioned at all in the ads that present only innocent children – cruelty that is being perpetrated out-of-sight on animals, you may wish to be more informed. That way you can make a conscious decision about whether or not you feel that any good can ever come from inflicting pain and death on innocent animals who have had nothing at all to do with causing human suffering.

Only you can make this decision for yourself, and this is relevant information.

by Sharon St Joan

Giants of the Mediterranean

photo of rocky mountains under cloudy sky
Photo by Maël BALLAND on Pexels.com

“Giants of the Mediterranean” was one of the topics on Ancient Aliens this afternoon.

As well as in many other places in the world, great civilizations arose around the Mediterranean Sea.

There are stories of giants all over the world. In the 7th Century BC, Hesiod (among others) wrote about one-eyed giants, the Cyclopes. They were builders, building great structures in stone.

Thousands of stone structures in the Mediterranean were built with stones far too heavy for normal humans to lift.

In Malta, some of the biggest megalithic sites are over a thousand years older than the pyramids. The temple Ggantija – before the discovery of Gobekli Tepe – was the oldest known free-standing temple. Ggantija means “place of the giants.”

In Qrendi, Malta, there is a trefoil complex of temples which archaeologists date to around 3600 BC – a thousand years earlier than the Egyptian pyramids. Regular human people could not have lifted the stones to build them. Other estimates, based on astrological alignments, date them to 10,200 BC. Legend says that the knowledge of building was brought there by giants, who were aliens.

On Sardinia, Italy, among rugged mountains, are mysterious, ancient stone structures called nuraghe. Apparently, there are between 7,000 to 20,000 of these nuraghe towers. No one knows how they were built; building them came to a halt around 200 AD.

Some 800 tombs on Sardinia appear to have been built for giants. Giants from 9 to 12 feet tall would have been able to fit in the larger tombs.

In the museum in Cagliari, Sardinia, are featured very tall stone giants – eight feet tall. Over 40 of these stone statues have been found and are on display. They have long heads and very unusual features.

Thirty stone menhirs across the island of Sardina – large single stones — often have carvings on them that appear to depict figures flying down from the sky.

Not too far away, the ancient Sumerians (in modern Iraq) also wrote about large beings, the Anunnaki – with bird heads and with wings – always depicted as enormous beings.

There is much more, of course, all over the world — legends about giants on every continent – but this will do for the moment.

Yes, I know that giants may not seem very plausible or very relevant to the times in which we live.

But there is very much that is intriguing and so little known about the ancient past. We know so little about the past, and yet we are so quick to make pronouncements about what is true and what isn’t – as if we knew for certain – which we don’t.

Winter Waterfowl Migration — Jet Eliot

Northern California is in quite a storm stir this week and last, as many of you have probably seen on the news. Here’s a look at the winter bird migration before the storms began. Snow Geese and snow-topped mtns, CA In mid-December we visited two wildlife refuges in the Sacramento Valley and it was fantastic, […]

Winter Waterfowl Migration — Jet Eliot