Category: Nature

General observations, generally during dog walks

No Silent Spring – just missing spring

Neighbors in the country tell me there is no spring here anymore – winter ends and summer starts.

After a few hours in the country, gathering poles from slash piles across the road, cutting up storm-damaged trees and hauling them, disassembling a collapsing pig house (the word chancho – pig – also refers to the traffic police, preferably not to their faces), I return to the coast.

In my downstairs office (a 90×90 cm table with two shelves next to a window), a cool breeze blows through. I take dogs to the beach for the first time in several days, wearing a light hoodie, in case the breeze is cooler there.

Not a chance. The beach is hot, and equally littered with sun worshippers, surfcasting fishermen, and plastic trash. It’s not summer, so the beach cleanup patrol doesn’t come through first thing in the morning. The amount of trash amazes me: looks like a garbage barge was scuttled offshore.

Anticipating collapse

Piles of sand block the street to car traffic. Apparently the exceptionally heavy rain last week carved out whatever caused the rambla (waterfront road) to collapse three years ago. You can see the new crack forming halfway to the missing chunk.  When all is done, they’ll dump in a bunch of sand, pave it (maybe), and that will be that.  Until next time.

Where’d the beach go?

After a day of intense rain and flooding, a day of intense wind, driving the waves all the way into the dunes.

The waves look benign, but with howling wind and stinging sand seemed less so. Then I stepped into quicksand and sunk one foot to the ankle. I should know by know – on the upwind side of the drainage channels formed by water from the street, windblown sand becomes quicksand. A little disconcerting, especially with no other human being in sight.

Testy llama

Llama, Atlántida, Uruguay zoo

Walking the dogs back past our local zoo, I saw only one llama standing, making a roink-roink-roink noise near the shed in which the other lay.

When I approached he bared his teeth and I vaguely remembered something about those critters spitting and kept my distance.

Expectant papa guarding mama inside?

Ya veremos – we’ll see.

Storm

Shortly before we returned to Uruguay, a powerful storm swept through. Here’s just one of many similar scenes:

Storm damage, Atlántida, Uruguay

On the ground in front you see a concrete power pole that supported the intersection of wires now hanging in the air, all knocked about by the large eucalyptus in the background.

By all accounts, it was a most exciting time 😉

Bats!

We finally determined that the scratching noises in the roof many mornings just before daybreak are the sounds of bats returning home. Bats are good. Bats in the roof less so.

So how do you get rid of bats yet keep them at the same time? The answer: a bat hotel!

Bat hotel I built for the side of our house, Uruguay

Welcome to the Hotel Murciélago!

I hope.