Good morning fellow NERDS. It’s been raining here so I’ve been reading through this wonderful page full of fabulous factoids. I decided that I couldn’t possibly keep them to my self any longer, as they’re too interesting not to share. So here they are – enjoy your Sunday reading!
Category Archives: Nature
A Big Thank You for Donating to the Elephant Nature Park Projects
A Big Thank You to these business in our lil’ town in New Zealand:
Whangamata Veterinary Hospital for their kind donations of supplies for us to take to Elephant Nature Park for their animals.
Sunny’s, Whangamata, for their donations of pencils and T-shirts for us to take to the free school for Cambodian kids that ENP is developing at the Cambodia Wildlife Sanctuary.
And Whangamata Library for donating books for the kids also.
Big smiles and thanks to all of you – I know this stuff is going to be really appreciated at the other end. 🙂
Mong Dee keeps bananas at the ready while Sao Yai bathes in ecstacy…
Returning to the Banana-Hoovers. Traveling, Logistics, and Nightmares of Things Forgotten
Luckily, elephants are vegetarians. One of the Park residents, Pom, giving an ele a treat.
My partner and I are off to North Thailand in three weeks to work with elephants. Specifically the ones at Elephant Nature Park, Chiang Mai, North Thailand. Large, grey proboscis-laden pachyderms banana-hoovers abound there, as well as many rescued dogs, cats, buffalo, cows, chickens and assorted other beasties. They’ve had 2 baby elephants since I was there last year – Navann and Dok Mai. Will I be able to resist hanging around them like a tween at a Bieber concert? Probably not. Will I be able to stop myself from trying to sneak one home in my luggage? Well, that would be a yes, because we only have a 30kg luggage allowance, and I’m pretty sure even a baby banana-hoover weights more than 30kg. Will I be able to avoid snakes, spiders and leech attacks? That remains to be seen. Last time I was in Thailand, it wasn’t out in the jungle I came close to having a snake-related cardiac arrest, it was in a town where I was innocently waiting to cross the road and one fell out of the power lines beside me! Very funny God! Read that story here. Read about the Giant Killer-Leech Attack here.
And so, the preparation begins: Continue reading
Death by Balloon
Balloons – not so cute once they’ve landed.
I feel very strongly about this matter, so I decided to put a post up about it. When you buy balloons and let go of them, they float off into the sky and look ever so pretty. But eventually they will pop or deflate and land somewhere out of your sight. Then it’s very possible that an animal or bird will come along and try to eat it, or get tangled up in it. And your lovely little momentary thrill will torture this animal or bird to death.
Please use your awareness a little more and refuse to buy balloons. And pass this around, because it’s something people just don’t think about. And it’s time more people did. Thank you, on behalf of the animals of the world.
Read more about balloons and sky lanterns (formerly known as Chinese lanterns) here
An Awesome Woman!!
Lek Chailert, founder of Elephant Nature Park – she gets to many places and helps many other beings. An awesome woman!
Lek in Burma
The Elephant Whisperer – Documentary, 2012.
Produced in 2012, this is a documentary that features Lek Chailert, founder of Elephant Nature Park, and covers a wide range of the situations and issues of the Asian elephant today.
The reality is that the Asian elephant is becoming extinct. If we don’t all come to the realization that in little or big ways we can help the ones that are left, our grandchildren or their children will have to visit museums to gasp at an animal that until recently walked this earth.
What will they think of us, their recent ancestors, the ones that allowed the unethical treatment of elephants to continue, and allowed the extinction of them to occur? I, for one, don’t want to find out the answer to that question…
View the documentary here
Chang Yim – young male elephant and all around ratbag. Elephant Nature Park, Chiang Mai, Thailand.
The Otis Files. Otis – The Final Tail. Or Not…
Otis finally left us at the age of 16. Apparently in her last two weeks she would go and visit some people around the corner who had two huge dogs and several cats. They told us that she would walk up to the animals’ bowls and help herself to their food, then lie down in the garden, and their dogs and cats would all lie down around her. On the last day they found her in her final sleep, in the same situation.
In some of the later photos here, her physical deterioration is evident, but she was still really big on the inside… Continue reading
The Otis Files. Otis, I Notice 7
‘You are feeling coooold. You need a warm furrrrry thiiiiing in your bedddd….’
Otis, I notice
Likes sleeping on beds
And sometimes enjoys
Curling up by my head
She’ll come in the dark hours
And prod me to show
It’s time to move over
And share my pillow
She’ll tap me quite gently
With padded wee paws
But if I don’t wake up
She’ll put out her claws Continue reading
The Otis Files. Otis, I Notice 6
Sometimes when she’s washing she’ll leave her wee tongue peeping out of her mouth, which really looks dumb!
Otis, I notice
Likes to be clean
But you’ll never see her
In a washing machine
She uses her tongue
To comb out her fur
It’s got brushy bits on
For getting out burrs
Sometimes when she’s washing
She’ll leave her wee tongue
Peeping out of her mouth
Which really looks dumb! Continue reading
The Otis Files. Otis, I Notice 5
The axis of evil…
Otis, I notice
Likes a good laugh
And acts like a kitten
When I’m in the bath
She crouches in secret
Awaiting her prey
And takes swipes at me
When I’m turned away Continue reading
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