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“In my mind the right amount of trees, wildfire, juniper, bark beetles, is whatever exists. All of these are controlled by climate, just like the amount of ice that covered the continents and mountains was dictated by climate. Climate will decide what density of trees can grow on any particular site.

LOGGING IS NOT BENIGN

“One of the assumptions of many collaboratives, agencies like the Forest Service, and of course the timber industry is that logging emulates natural processes. There is a very small amount of truth in that logging as well as wildfire, beetles and other natural agents do kill trees. However, that is like suggesting that someone shot to death by a gun is analogous to dying from old age because in both cases, the person is dead. The sad truth is that most so-called “restoration” is degrading our forest ecosystems.” www.thewildlifenews.com

GR:  Wuerthner debunks many of the…

These are not jallikattu bulls, but bulls rescued by Blue Cross of India.

By Sharon St Joan

A December 31, 2015 editorial in the newspaper The Hindu, “A Stand Against Reason,” describes the possibility that the cruel sport of “jallikattu,” bull-racing, will be re-introduced in Tamil Nadu, although it was banned last year by the Supreme Court. Here is the gist of the main points in The Hindu editorial:

In human sports, the contenders have a choice as to whether or not to participate in a sport where they may incur a risk of injury. Of course, animals have no such choice.

This is especially true of jallikattu, in which frightened bulls in pain are forced to run a gauntlet of young men trying to leap onto them, hanging onto their horns. The essential cruelty of this “sport” lies in the fact that bulls, unlike horses, do…

By Rudra Krishna

On the morning of the December 2, 2015, the Blue Cross of India received a call from the Adyar police, with the information that that many cows and buffalos had been picked up by the torrential currents of the overflowing and much-swollen Adyar River, and that they were being washed away into the Indian Ocean.

As we later found out, the Chembarambakkam Reservoir had received an unprecedented amount of rainfall the previous night, and authorities had been forced to release water as quickly as they could, which caused the river to flow about 8-10 feet higher than it is even meant to, and in a most rapid and destructive manner.

All that aside, when we received the call at our Guindy facility, we immediately sent out a rescue vehicle with a couple of our rescue staff and a volunteer, Satish. Please remember that we had no clear…

By Rudra Krishna

During the recent floods in Chennai, on November 14 at about 6 am, the Blue Cross of India received a call from Mr. Velu, on the Red Hills by-pass road, with the information that a buffalo was being washed away with the heavy current of the breached Ambathur lake, that he was following her, and that we needed to rush out right away.

Our volunteers Kiran, Selvam, Kavin, Santosh, Arjun, and Shunmugam had all returned from late-night flood rescues just an hour and a half before the call came in, and were resting at the Blue Cross facility in Guindy. They were woken up and immediately left to attend to the rescue. The scene that met their eyes seemed to be out of a nightmare, for they all saw a massive buffalo (they didn’t know at the time that she was full-term pregnant) who was fighting against the…

By Nanditha Krishna

Dec 8 2015

The rainfall from Nov I to 30 was 1255.7 mm, as against a normal of 407.4 . From December 1 to 7, we received 531.8 mm of rain.  It had stopped raining yesterday but has begun again today, a lighter rain.

I don’t know if this is Climate Change, but I have never seen such extreme weather. This is Nature’s fury at its beautiful best!

The floods were caused by the unannounced and sudden opening of the sluice gates of Chembarabakkam lake . The waters were let into the Adyar and Cooum, and then burst their banks. Since the original channels connecting the lakes and rivers had been built over, the waters used the roads as channels, and came down TTK Road (where we live) from the river, entering our house and the Foundation campus. From December 1 to 6 there was no electricity, so…

Morocco is very inspiring for being photographed. The colors and lighting are unique, so it was easy to find the interesting and exciting angles to shot.

By Robert A. Vella

Here’s an update on the critically important climate talks in Paris (a.k.a. COP 21):

From The Guardian – The six key road blocks at the UN climate talks in Paris:

Negotiators at the UN climate talks in Paris are now nearing the end of a fortnight of searching for a global deal on climate change. The mood is upbeat but there are still significant disagreements over some key issues. They came out in the publication on Wednesday of the draft negotiating text.

These are the six key road blocks that negotiators will have to move or get around if a deal is to be done:

From Yahoo – Ambition of Paris climate talks rises by half a degree:

PARIS (Reuters) – It would have been unthinkable just a few months ago, but a new global deal to combat climate change may set the…