Environmental Graffiti

Photo: Gerald Zinnecker all rights reserved

If you are indoors when it happens, the first thing you notice is the crackling noise, a chorus of clicking. The march has begun. Looking outside, the sight beggars belief: the entire forest floor, and even the roads that run through it, swathed in a sea of red. So thickly do the crabs blanket the routes to the shoreline that they can easily be seen from air. What we are witnessing is the annual migration of the red crabs – one of the most spectacular animal migrations on the planet.

Human help: Red crabs confront a ‘crab barrier’ to cross a road

Photo: J Jaycock, Australian Government Attorney-General’s Department, copyright Commonwealth of Australia reproduced by permission

Christmas Island in Southeast Asia sets the stage for this most epic of nature’s journeys: the synchronised mass movement of 65 million crabs walking up to 8 km in just 5 days. When the wet season kicks in, and the tide is right, the crabs make their move, emerging from their solitary burrows in the tall rainforest, and walking as one to the sea. Nothing gets in the way of these single-minded crustaceans, neither shops, nor golf course nor busy roads. Even cliff faces are climbed down with apparent ease.

As one: Red crabs at Christmas Island’s blow holes

Photo: © CITA

The millions of bright red crabs that set off each year – normally in October or November – are driven by a clear purpose: to breed and spawn. When the broad columns arrive at the beaches, following their well-trodden routes, the males leading the way first rehydrate in the sea, then retreat to the lower terraces to dig and fight over burrows. The greater numbers of females soon follow and mating takes place, usually in the privacy of the burrows for which the males have fought so hard for possession.

Beautiful day: Red crabs at sunrise on Ethel Beach

Photo: © Justin Gilligan

The males return inland first, reaching the rainforest in 1–2 days. The female crabs remain in the moist burrows for the next 12–13 days to produce and brood their eggs – up to 100,000 per crab. When the last quarter of the moon arrives, the females move to the seashore to release their eggs into the sea. The eggs hatch into larvae on contact with the water and grow over the ensuing month. After growing through several larval stages, at last the young crabs, only 5 mm wide, leave the water before they too march inland in roughly 9 days.

Baby migration: Diminutive red crabs return from the sea

Photo: J Jaycock, Australian Government Attorney-General’s Department, copyright Commonwealth of Australia reproduced by permission

Inland, the baby crabs disappear from sight, living under fallen trees, inside rocky crevices and even in human gardens. Eating a diet of mainly fruit, leaves and rotting vegetation, each crab grows slowly but can reach up to 16 cm across. So how are such big creatures able to walk a kilometre a day during the migration, when usually they can’t crawl for more than 5 minutes at a time? Scientists recently found that they are fuelled by the release of a hormone that produces a sugar-rush, giving the crabs the energy they need for their marathon journey.

Road Crabs: Migrating red crabs navigate a highway

Photo: © Diane Masters

Current estimates place the population of red crabs on Christmas Island at a staggering 120 million – dwarfing the human population of just 1600 – but their numbers are under threat. Human activity has had a major impact. Crabs are at risk of drying out when forced to traverse areas cleared of forest cover. Also, thousands are crushed by vehicles while crossing roads – a situation that has led to road closures, traffic detours and crab crossing tunnels being built under highways for crabs to pass through.

Sign of hope: Red crab road closure

Photo: © CITA

An even deadlier menace for the crabs has appeared in the form of an insidious biological invasion: the yellow crazy ant. Accidentally introduced to Christmas Island from Africa, the crazy ants prey upon the red crabs after first squirting them with poison. The super-colonies are believed to have killed 15–20 million of the crabs in recent years, and the population of these ants is exploding amid climatic changes already threatening the red crabs through the late arrival of the monsoon.

Mass movement: Crabs on Christmas Island

Photo: © Max Orchard

Dehydration plus death at the mandibles of the crazy ants may soon jeopardise this incredible species of crustacean. For further information on the red crab migration, go to the Christmas Island Tourism Association website.

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

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In Africa many victims of violence are killed by necklacing, which is burning people alive with a tyre wrapped around them
Photo: venetia joubert sarah oosterveld

With the weakening grip of imperial powers like Britain and France after World War II, was the world going to care enough about what became of Africa’s emerging nations? As dozens of newly formed republics struggled to find their feet without a helping hand, the borders drawn up during the bygone colonial era were never likely to be grounds for a long lasting peace. The facts are there in the fallout.

Since colonialism, instability, corruption, violence and despotism have marred the histories of many African states, obstructing the path to a better future. Far from setting the tone for freedom, democratic governments have proven difficult to sustain in most cases, leaving many republics to instead cycle through a series of coups giving rise to military dictatorships. Civil war and grave human rights violations have never been far from the picture, as names like Sierra Leone and Rwanda bear witness.

Sierra Leone

The government’s election slogan in Sierra Leone in ‘99 was ‘The future is in your hands,’ so the RUF rebels amputated people’s hands to intimidate them into not voting. This boy is 13
Photo: American Embassy in Freetown via Travlr

The West African country of Sierra Leone was host to a bitter civil war between 1991 and 2001 in which at least 50,000 people were killed and hundreds of thousands more tortured or forced to flee their homes. Triggered by the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) under Foday Sankoh – students but also trained killers opposed to military leader Joseph Momoh – control of Sierra Leone’s diamond industry was a prime objective for the war. Coup after coup occurred over the ensuing decade.

Violence, mutilation and sexual violence were rife
Photo: American Embassy in Freetown, Sierra Leone via Travlr

When the RUF launched their first attacks in Sierra Leone in March 1991, the rebels were quick to demonstrate their brutality, decapitating community leaders and putting their heads on stakes. The signature terror tactic employed by the bands was physical mutilation: they severed the hands, arms, legs, lips, ears or genitalia of an estimated 20,000 civilians using machetes and axes. Whole villages were destroyed, with the majority of civilians killed as well as anyone trying to escape.

School destroyed by the civil war in Sierra Leone
Photo: Laura Lartigue

The use of child soldiers was part of the strategy of both the rebel and government militia during the war. The RUF used horrific methods to numb new recruits to barbarity and thousands of abducted boys and girls – often between the ages of 7 and 12 – were forced to serve as soldiers or prostitutes. Those chosen to be fighters were sometimes forced to murder their parents, and horrendous bets took place over the sex of unborn babies before their mothers proceeded to be sliced open.

Rwanda

During the 1994 genocide, Ugandan fishermen found themselves pulling dozens of bodies out of Lake Victoria. The badly decomposed bodies had travelled hundreds of miles by river from Rwanda
Photo: daveblume

It is ironic that the beautiful green equatorial country of Rwanda is now synonymous with slaughter on a massive scale. The 1994 Rwandan Genocide was the mass killing of hundreds of thousands of Rwanda’s Tutsis and Hutu political moderates by Hutus under the extremist, Tutsi-opposed Hutu Power ideology. Over the course of just three months, at least 500,000 people were killed, though most estimates propose a death toll of between 800,000 and one million.

Rwandan genocide victims taken out of Lake Victoria by Ugandan fishermen, 1994
Photo: daveblume

The killing was well organised, and by the time it began there were agents of the Rwandan militia in every neighbourhood. From Prime Minister Jean Kambanda down, the genocide’s organisers included many top ranking government officials and members of the army, and at a local level officials like mayors and police. Local newspapers and government-sponsored radio also deliberately incited the violence, fanning the flames of ethnic hatred.

Skulls at the Nyamata Memorial Site, Nyamata, Rwanda
Photo: Fanny Schertzer

Most victims were killed in their own villages and towns, often by fellow residents. Militia members typically hacked victims to death with machetes, though some army units fired rifles. Victims were often found hiding in churches and schools, where they were massacred by Hutu gangs. Ordinary citizens were called on to kill neighbours, and those who refused were often murdered themselves. Horrific sexual violence and war rape was also integral to destroying the Tutsi ethnic group.

Rwandan Tutsis travelling toward the Tanzanian border, fleeing the genocide, 1994
Photo: daveblume

The igniting spark for the genocide was the assassination of Rwandan Hutu president Juvénal Habyarimana on April 6 1994, but its underlying causes were much deeper. The 1990–93 Rwandan Civil War, fought between the Ugandan-backed Rwandan Patriotic Front, a rebel group comprising mostly Tutsi refugees, and the Hutu regime, supported by Francophone nations, greatly increased the ethnic tensions in the country and led to the rise of Hutu Power.

Zimbabwe and beyond

Many African nations such as Zimbabwe have been divided throughout history by violent conflicts between rival factions
Photo: venetia joubert sarah oosterveld

Although not as notorious for violence due to the absence of recent civil war, Zimbabwe has experienced its share of bloodshed under Robert Mugabe, whose rule has been characterised by widespread human rights abuses. Opposition gatherings are frequently subjected to brutal attacks by the police and activists severely beaten. In the build-up to the 2008 election, the wife of one opposition head had one of her hands and both her feet chopped off before being burned alive.

Zimbabwean burn victim
Photo: venetia joubert sarah oosterveld

In southern Africa many victims of violence are killed by necklacing, the appalling method of killing that involves burning people alive by forcing a petrol-filled tyre over the victim’s midriff and setting it ablaze. A common method of lynching during disturbances in South Africa in the 1980s and 1990s, necklacing returned to South Africa in 2008 when people in some of the country’s poorest areas turned against immigrants from Zimbabwe fleeing violence and poverty in their own country.

Democratic Republic of the Congo: War wounded rebels being provided with medical treatment and support for their reintegration into civilian life
Photo: Spyros Demetriou

The atrocities don’t end here. People are still dying as a result of war closely associated with the carnage in Rwanda in the Democratic Republic of the Congo – the world’s deadliest conflict since World War II, killing 5.4 million people. Meanwhile, in Darfur, Sudan, charges of genocide and other atrocities have been levelled at the Sudanese government in its ongoing conflict with rebels recruited from non-Arab ethnic groups, notably the Sudan Liberation Army.

War wounded rebels in North Kivu, DR Congo
Photo: Spyros Demetriou

Is there hope amidst the picture painted here? It seems at least that there are signs of increased networking among African states. In the civil war in the DR Congo, for example, instead of rich, non-African countries intervening, neighbouring African countries became involved. More promisingly, political associations such as the African Union offer hope for greater co-operation and peace between the continent’s many countries – all of which are eager to rebuild.

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

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Suddenly, in the middle of nowhere, a lake
Image: Carl Montgomery

Band-e Amir is Afghanistan’s first and only national park. It consists of six lakes whose waters are bluer than the sky. It is located almost 10,000 ft above sea level in a mountainous desert, 75 km northwest of the ancient city of Bamiyan, once famous for its two monumental Buddha statues, destroyed by the Taliban in 2001. Getting to Band-e Amir requires a sense of adventure and determination.

Not the Wild West but Afghanistan’s Grand Canyon:

Image: Cacahuate

Band-e Amir, also spelled Band-e Ameer or Band-i Amir, is a group of six lakes high up in the Hindu Kush Mountains in Central Afghanistan. The naturally formed lakes are at an elevation of 3,000 m and were created by carbon dioxide rich water from geothermally heated hot springs. The carbonite minerals inside the water formed the sedimentary rock or white travertines that separate the lakes today.

A turquoise jewel at 3,000 metres:

Image: Sqamarabbas

The names of the six lakes refer to this dam-like (“Band”) appearance: Band-e-Haibat or Dam of Awe is the largest and deepest lake, estimated to have an average depth of 150 m. Band-e Gholaman, Band-e Qambar, Band-e Pamir, Band-e Pudina and Band-e Zulfiquar make up the rest.

Serene – Band-e Pamir:

Image: Hadi1121

The Band-e Amir region was already slated to become Afghanistan’s first national park in the 1960s but these plans had to be postponed due to the country’s unstable political situation. Since submission in 2004, Band-e Amir has been on the tentative list for becoming a UNESCO World Heritage site. In 2008, it was finally declared Afghanistan’s first national park.

Band-e Amir’s (only?) concession to commercialism – pedal boating:

Image: Carl Montgomery

A few thousand tourists, mainly Afghans and a few international aid workers, visit the 228-sq-mile park every spring and summer. The trek there is not easy and visitors have to be determined to brave the harsh terrain, rocky plateaus, lack of basic facilities and, worst of all, unpaved roads that are mined. Traffic is therefore restricted to a thin track that is clear of mines, and travel from Kabul takes about 12 hours.

The seemingly endless plains of Band-e Amir:

Image: Sqamarabbas

The lakes seen from space in winter:

Image: NASA

Given the still troubled nature of Afghanistan’s affairs, maintenance of the park has not been a priority. Lack of a park authority has led to various environmental problems: increasing pollution through human waste and trash, a damaged aquatic ecosystem because of fishing with electricity and grenades (yes, grenades!) and a threatened ecological balance because of unrestricted grazing of animals and uprooting of shrubs, which can result in soil erosion and even landslides.

Creating ripples at Band-e Amir:

Image: Hadi1121

According to the Wildlife Conservation Society, much of Band-e Amir’s wildlife has already been lost. In 2008, the Afghan government at least banned the use of boats with gas engines on the lakes to decrease water pollution.

Composition in brown, green and grey:

Image: Carl Montgomery

This leaves us to end with the description of adventure traveler and photographer Carl Montgomery:

“Drive for hours over dusty mountain roads and you’re brought to Afghanistan’s only national park. Band-e Amir is a series of deep blue lakes nestled amidst limestone canyons. This is Afghanistan’s Grand Canyon, truly a sight inspiring of awe. Whether it is worth traveling through Taliban territory to get here is entirely another question. Pictures tell the story although sadly fail to do it justice.”

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

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“Vertigo is the conflict between the fear of falling and the desire to fall.” Salman Rushdie

Image via pixdaus

The $31-million horseshoe-shaped Grand Canyon Skywalk opened in March 2007 and allows visitors to gaze 4,000 ft (1,200 m) down its glass bottom to take in the breathtaking panorama. The only drawback? No cameras allowed. Yup, it’s all gotta be preserved as memories. But not everyone trusts brain memory as much as camera memory, so we managed to compile a picture collection of those who sneaked a shot of that stomach-churning view down…

Visitors wear funny shoe protection so that they won’t scratch the glass:

Image: Heather King

Standing on the sky:

Image via sedonablog

Billed as a new architectural wonder of the world, the glass walkway extends 21 m beyond the canyon’s edge. It is 3 m wide and has 1.5 m-high glass walls. Steel beams were driven 14 m into the canyon wall to guarantee safety. Though the construction could theoretically hold several hundred people at a time, only 120 visitors are allowed at a time.

The ring in the sky:

Image via thecanyon

Preview for the press:

Image via biker.ie

For those wondering why there would be a no camera policy – it’s the economy, stupid! Why let people take their own pictures when they can buy them for $25 a pop? Just to make sure there’s a little extra after the park fee of $25, $10 for the bus if you’re not driving and the tour package ranging from $54 to $213. Ka-ching, ka-ching, we hear the cash registers ring. Bet you never knew logging on to Environmental Graffiti could save you that much cash…

Trapdoor to the sky – obviously Photoshopped but best view down:

Image via freakingnews

Up to half of the proceeds from ticket sales will go to Shanghai businessman David Jin who proposed the project in 1996 and the other half to the Arizona’s poverty-stricken Hualapai tribe.

The skywalk from above:

Image via indianz

Like a giant magnet:

Image via theage

We’re not saying don’t go on the Grand Canyon Skywalk – just be prepared to lose your cash along with your breath. This video shows the exact location of the Skywalk – a giant magnet lost in the vastness of the Grand Canyon really – and may help make up your mind.

Source: 1, 2, 3

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Photo: Emodern

Shaded by trees and lightly cloaked in a patina of moss, the massive stone figures stare down at the awestruck visitors. What kind of garden features the screaming face of a terrible ogre that’s like a doorway to hell, a mythical giant hero literally tearing his foe from limb to limb, one of Hannibal’s elephants goring a legionnaire, and a Siren’s legs splayed along the ground? You may well ask. The answer is the Park of the Monsters, an amazing monumental complex tucked away 65km north of Rome.

Fantasy meets myth: The early sea god Proteus or Glaucus

Photo: Emodern

The Garden of Bomarzo, as it’s also known, was created under the directive of mercenary leader and patron of the arts Pier Francesco Orsini during the mid-16th century. Broken-hearted at the death of his wife, Orsini decided to channel his energies into this intense personal project, which spanned some thirty years. Orsini commissioned Pirro Ligorio – the great architect better known for his formal waterworks at Villa d’Este – to make his weird and wonderful dream a reality.

Violent crime: Sculpture perhaps of Hercules tearing his enemy in two

Photo: Emodern

Disdaining the idea that gardens should be places purely of tranquility, Orsini instead let fantasy run riot. Some of the scattered sculptures might appear horrific, like the ferocious dragon beset by beasts; many are mythically inspired, such as the huge head of the Greek sea god Proteus-Glaucus; and others are plain strange, like the giant tortoise with a woman on its back. Violence is rife among the two dozen or so statues, while some of figures frozen in stone appear shamelessly sexual.

Beastly designs: The dragon locked in combat with lions or dogs

Photo: Alessio Damato

Too larger-than-life to be frightening, the Garden might better be described as gobsmacking. In keeping with the Mannerist style in which it was built, it was designed to astonish rather than please its audience. It eschewed the harmonious proportions of the declining Renaissance, in favour of exaggerated forms – and arcane symbolism. The taste was for the mythical and the monstrous. This was a place in which wild fauna met the wilder side of the human imagination.

Shock and awe: The war elephant popularly seen as one of Hannibal’s

Photo: Alessio Damato

Originally carved out of the natural volcanic rock formations littering the wooded landscape on which it lies, the Garden would later return to the earth and forest when it was abandoned and fell into disrepair after Pier Francesco Orsini’s death. By the 19th century it was largely forgotten and overgrown by the encroaching forest and remained so until it was restored in the 1950s. The surreal scene would provide the inspiration for many other artistic minds, among them Salvador Dali.

Strange imaginings: The lady standing on a tortoise

Photo: Emodern

Some have tried to comprehend what drove Pier Francesco Orsini to conceive of such a place – what inner demons were haunting him – but, like the exact meaning of many of the pieces in the Garden, perhaps some things are best left in obscurity. In the words of one irreverent blogger: “Beats me how one’s bereavement is quelled by statues of giant turtles, but perhaps the answer lies between the gargantuan fins of a stone mermaid with a gaping hairy wishing well.” Pur-lease.

Sexual allusion: The Siren with two lions

Photo: Emodern

What we do know is that since its inception the Garden of Monsters has provocatively played with the boundaries between what is art and what is entertainment. Upon entering what Orsini called his Sacred Grove, visitors are greeted by a challenge, inscribed in stone, which translates as: “You who enter this place, observe it piece by piece and tell me afterwards whether so many marvels were created for deception or purely for art.”

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

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US Army

Since the dawn of time, men’s creativity when it comes to hurting other men has known no bounds, and his fellow beasts have, on occasion, been called into this service. This has taken many different forms over the years.

In ancient times, the inhabitants of the Indus valley knew that the sight of a fully-equipped war elephant would terrify an enemy, as well as providing an unstoppable (to the weapons of the time) juggernaut with which to attack. Before the 16th century and the widespread use of gunpowder, a war elephant was extremely difficult to kill, being able to endure many attacks by spear or sword before falling. Elephants continued to be used by an impressive pantheon of famous leaders and civilizations including Timur the Lame, the Ethiopians, the Greeks and Romans, and most famously, Hannibal the Carthaginian.

Andre Castaigne

Though these unwieldy beasts could change the course of battle (Antiochas defeated the Gauls using only sixteen of them), they were unpredictable, and the Romans in particular quickly learned to use them only in small numbers. Were an elephant to panic and become impossible to control, the rider (known as a ‘mahout’) was under orders to kill his animal by plunging a chisel into its head through the ear using a mallet, to prevent it from trampling troops – enemy or otherwise – indiscriminately. Typical tricks used to panic war elephants included laying out barbed ‘caltrops’ and allowing camels set on fire to run towards the massive beasts.

Francis Whitley Halsey

It was during the grim conflict that begun in 1914 that many dogs first ceased to be only a mascot for their regiment, and became an integral part of military operations. During the war, dogs were used to send messages through the vast network of trenches of the western front. Vehicles could not traverse these trenches easily, and any man sent to travel great distances was likely to be shot, so the use of dogs was the obvious solution. A special training school in Scotland produced some messenger-dogs that traveled up to 4km through the trenches. In a time when long-range communication at war was problematic, the role played by these unsung heroes was frequently vital.

W. E. Mason

The Dutch disciplined their dogs (which they used for drawing heavy machine guns) so well that they were said not to bark or turn heel even while under fire. ‘Sentinel’ dogs were trained to keep watch, often through small ‘peep-holes’ looking out into the trench, and growl upon spying any activity. Also not to be underestimated was the comfort that a loyal pet could bring to the shell-shocked men of these hellish times.

Exactly how widespread was the use of canines during the Great War? In 1916, Vanity Fair magazine drolly remarked that the Germans, with ‘characteristic efficiency and thoroughness’, were utilising no less than 8,000 dogs in their war effort.

T.Sgt. J. Sarno, uploaded by Binksternet

The gung-ho jingoistic ‘us versus them’ image of war is popularly accepted to have died a painful death in the steamy jungles of Vietnam, as Western soldiers fought an unpopular war for uncertain causes against an enemy that appeared to many to be simply defending their own country.

The guerrilla tactics used by the Vietcong were occasionally matched by the use of canines by the Western powers. The Australian army in particular used black Labradors as tracker dogs against an enemy that could seemingly melt into the jungle at will. Each Australian battalion was assigned two specially-trained tracker dogs. Each day during the campaign, they would practise following a trail deliberately left by a South Vietnamese soldier, in order that they would become accustomed to tracking the Vietnamese. When an enemy trail was detected in remote areas, several Labradors would be flown in by chopper to follow the trail. It was noted that the dogs enjoyed these flights as the cool air provided a welcome relief from the stifling jungle heat. While some individuals were known for sourcing mines as well as Viet Cong soldiers, dogs were not trained deliberately for this during the war.

Brien Aho

The intelligence and friendliness of dolphins has long been recognised, and this too has ironically been turned towards a military goal. In the mid 2000’s, dolphins were used to clear the waterways approaching the port of Umm Qasr in Iraq by using their sonar abilities to detect mines present there since the first Gulf War in the 1990’s. The dolphins were taught not to touch the mines, which in any case only detonate in the presence of a steel-hulled ship, which alters the magnetic field of the water. Cameras were attached to the dolphins to allow the handlers to see what they see. The US military claims that the dolphins work but two hours every two days and live as long as 35 years under this system – longer than their natural life in the wild. Given that each animal represents about 2 million dollars of training and investment, it certainly behooves the military to keep these animals in good condition.

Uploaded by Mattes

As long as wars continue, man will continue to explore every option available to him in the pursuit of victory.

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Image: Richard Ling

Anti-air missile, elephant bug, Pinocchio – these are just some of the nicknames the lantern bug has to endure. All because its nose is slightly long. Okay, fine, that might be an understatement – it is about half the size of the bug’s whole body. If that weren’t enough, the bug’s even supposed to poke its long proboscis into people’s sex lives. Or better, the lack of it might kill them. Find out how.

Go ahead, call me Cyrano de Bergerac, see who cares:

Image: Charles Lam

The lantern bug (Pyrops candelabria) is a tropical insect belonging to one of the more than 32,000 species of the homoptera order. What looks like a nose is actually an extended mouth so that these plant feeders can suck the sap from plants and trees.

The bug’s astonishing and memorable appearance didn’t go unnoticed and local folklore even attributes magical powers to the bug. For one, it was often believed that lantern bugs are able to produce light, similar to glow worms. But their wing patterns merely reflect light, making it look as if are glowing at night.

Green lantern bug:

Image: jon yee yehsi

More intriguing is the myth that persons bitten by this bug will die if they don’t have sex within 24 hours. It’s a story that is widely circulated and already existed in the 19th century. American naturalist John C. Bannor recalled in 1885 stories of an insect called lantern fly whose bite could instantly kill people, animals and even trees. People at least were saved – according to the myth – if they had sex within 24 hours.

Related to cicadas – three lantern bugs in a row:

Image: ssmar2002

Now that’s what we call a creative way to lure, er, potential mates. Who wouldn’t want to be helpful in a life-and-death situation? You might laugh now but if bitten, would you take the risk of laughing off potential danger? Oh wait, lantern bugs actually don’t bite. Hm, Pinocchio nose after all?

The lantern bug’s cousin, Epiptera europea, with its nose high up in the air:

Image: Vas bkl

Sources: 1, 2, 3

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Image: Cecil P. Whitt
All images used with explicit permission by the photographers

Far off the beaten path in southern Nevada’s Clark County lies an ancient treasure surprisingly few know about: Little Finland, also called the Hobgoblin’s Playground. Dragons and other mythic beasts of yore seem to have turned to stone here, reminding us of times long gone by. Witness these beautiful sandstone formations turn red, orange and golden in the fading sunlight.

Enraptured by the prehistoric beast:

Image: Isabel Synnatschke

The little ancient elephant:

Image: Isabel Synnatschke

A hobgoblin portrait:

Image: Isabel Synnatschke

Having a giant discussion:

Image: Ian Parker

Shadow play of devilish beasts:

Image: Philippe Schuler

Like the Valley of Fire, only 30 km away as the crow flies, Little Finland features red sandstone formations that were formed by shifting sand dunes millions of years ago when dinosaurs still roamed the earth. So comparing these formations with prehistoric beasts is actually not that far-fetched.

The dunes were formed by a process known as Aeolian erosion, named after the Greek god of wind, Aeolus. Wind, though less powerful than water, unleashes its full force in vast, arid regions and can erode, transport and deposit materials. Over time, the sand cements into rock and is further shaped by the wind, leaving us with the incredible formations at Little Finland that we see today.

Though most visitors try to reach Little Finland an hour before sunset to play with the hobgoblins while basked in the red light of the fading sun, those who can stomach the soaring temperatures and sun will get some beautiful shots as well.

Red sandstone silhouettes:

Image: Philippe Schuler

Dragon or prehistoric dachshund?

Image: Fritz Zehrer

Double portrait with fist in the mouth?

Image: Fritz Zehrer

A peculiar extinct beast of yore:

Image: Fritz Zehrer

Pros arrive at sunset to witness the way the sun’s rays turn the sandstone formations into a sea of red, orange and yellow and then camp out in their cars or a tent to sleep under the vast sky and stars. Getting up at the crack of dawn will pay off for watching the sun rise behind the fairytale giants.

The little dinosaur – don’t miss Big Nose in the background:

Image: Philippe Schuler

A heart of gold:

Image: Ian Parker

Look into my eye…

Image: Isabel Synnatschke

Like a giant mud vase – or an elephant in quick sand?

Image: Ian Parker

Getting to this magical place is unfortunately a little more difficult than using fairy dust. Visitors really need an all-terrain vehicle and a tendency for roughing it if they want to enjoy this natural miracle. Unlike the Valley of Fire, Little Finland is not a state park and therefore the facilities usually associated with one are not available.

Here’s how you’d get to Little Finland: About five miles from Mesquite, take I-15 exit 112 towards Riverside/Bunkerville (about 1 hr from Las Vegas). Follow directions for Gold Butte Backcountry Byway and take a right onto it. This paved road turns into a dirt road after a few miles.

Follow signs for “Devil’s Throat” – a sinkhole. Where the road forks, take the right branch and follow it until it turns into Mud Wash, the river bed you will drive on. Follow it for a few miles and take the right branch again where it forks. This should lead you to Little Finland.

Since recently, white sediment covering the area has given it the look of a waterscape…

Image: Cecil P. Whitt

… and suddenly “Little Finland” makes sense:

Image: Cecil P. Whitt

A word of caution to those planning a first visit: The sandstone formations at Little Finland are very fragile, so tread carefully or they may be lost forever. Little Finland’s inaccessibility is what’s saved it so far and it’s probably just as well that it is missing from most maps and travel guides.

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

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Image via Pixdaus

Take one third European heritage, one third native Caribbean ancestry, one third African culture, shake and sprinkle with a handful of other ethnic influences and you got Curaçao, one of the world’s most diverse communities. Most inhabitants speak the island’s four official languages fluently – Papiamento, English, Spanish and Dutch. As far as religion goes, Christians, Moslems, Hindus, Jews and Africans all practice their faith side by side.

For centuries, people have come from all over the world to this tiny speck in the South Caribbean Sea to try their fortune. Amerindians, Caiquetios, Spanish, Dutch, African slaves, traders from all over the world – all left their ethnic footprint on the island that is today a well-connected microcosm of the world. Cultural harmony didn’t happen overnight though and Curaçao’s history is one full of murder, betrayal and exploitation.

Passport photograph of a typical Curaçaoan:

Image: Vincent Jong Tjien Fa

Curaçao, best known for the deep blue liqueur of the same name produced here, is the largest of the three so-called ABC islands in the South Caribbean Sea including Aruba and Bonaire. The islands are part of the Netherlands Antilles and as such form an autonomous part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is believed that Curacao was named after the Portuguese “coração” for heart, referring to the island’s heart shape. Today, Curaçao has a population of over 140,000 living in an area of 444 sq km (171 sq miles).

Curaçao’s oldest inhabitants are supposed to have come from what is today Venezuela around 2500 BCE. These Amerindians were hunters and gatherers who used simple tools carved from stone and shells. Their remains were found at Curaçao’s oldest archeological site, the limestone terraces behind the airport. A group of these inhabitants migrated to Bonaire around 1500 BCE.

Connecting the world daily with Curaçao – or vice versa?

Image: Michael Condouris

Around 500 CE, another group of settlers arrived from the mainland, the Caiquetios Indians, farmers and hunters who introduced rabbits and deer to the island. It is believed that they crossed the 17 miles of open sea from the Paraguana peninsula in Venezuela in wooden canoes.

Amerindian family as drawn by John Gabriel Stedman in 1818:

Image: Geheugen van Nederland

The Caiquetios lived in small villages made up of pole huts and knew how to make ceramic vessels. Ornaments made of shell, stone and bone were also found during archeological digs. Their cave paintings and rock art are still preserved today. The Caiquetios spoke a language called Arawak, a term also used to describe the indigenous Latin-American population encountered by Christopher Columbus and later explorers.

Curaçao’s location north of Venezuela and south of the Dominican Republic:

Image: M. Minderhoud

When the first Spanish explorers arrived in Curaçao, probably during an expedition under the leadership of Alonso de Ojeda in 1499, the Caiquetios had lived peacefully on the island for one thousand years. Impressed by the tall statures of the Caiquetios, the Spanish dubbed Curaçao “la isla de los gigantos” – island of the giants. The explorers soon discovered though that they had to deal with friendly and peaceful giants so that despite being outnumbered, they soon subdued all of the approximately 2,000 Caiquetios living on Curaçao.

An Arawak woman as drawn by John Gabriel Stedman in 1818:

Image: Geheugen van Nederland

With no gold to be found, the Spaniards soon lost interest in Curaçao and around 1513, took most of the Indian population to either work in the sugar cane fields in Santo Domingo or to work in the mines in Hispañola (today’s Dominican Republic and Haiti). They brought a few of the original Indians back in 1527 but most settled in what is now Sabaneta.

That left Curaçao with a good hundred years of peace but after the Spanish came the Dutch who claimed Curaçao in 1634. They deported most of the few remaining Caiquetios, fearing them to be spies for the Spaniards. The Dutch soon discovered Curaçao’s deep, natural harbour and founded Willemstad here, the island’s capital to this today. The city soon became an ideal spot for trade and commerce, with shipping and piracy flourishing.

Not even 30 years later, life on the island hit a new humanitarian low, as the Dutch West India Company made Curaçao a centre for the Atlantic slave trade from 1662 onwards. Slaves were brought to the island from Africa and from there shipped to South America and the Caribbean. Curaçao became very affluent and boasted its new wealth with typical Spanish- and Dutch-style colonial buildings, witnesses of the time even today.

A former slave house, now a museum:

Image: Technische Fred

The colourful décor of the houses, found in many colonial cities around the world, had a practical reason: As slaves could not read, let alone decipher addresses, they simply followed the colour codes of the houses.

Willemstad with its famous row of colonial houses:

Image: Jessica Bee

The 17th century saw the arrival of Sephardic Jews from the Netherlands and then Dutch Brazil who have had a significant cultural and economic influence on the island. In fact, the Jewish congregation in Curaçao, though small, is the oldest active congregation in the Americas, dating back to 1651, and it supported early Jewish congregations in the United States in the 18th and 19th centuries. The Curaçao synagogue, completed in 1732, is the oldest synagogue of the Americas that has been in continuous use.

The Mikve Israel-Emanual synagogue in Willemstad with a floor of sand:

Image: Mingo Hagen

The 18th and 19th centuries were marked by the British, French and Dutch fighting over Curaçao. The island changed ownership various times until 1815 when it finally fell into Dutch hands. This turbulent history is the reason why many residents of Curaçao are fluent in four languages today: Spanish, the earliest language exported to the island; Dutch, brought by the next wave of explorers; English, brought by the British in the 18th century; and Papiemento, a Creole language derived from Portuguese or Spanish with influences from African languages, English and the Arawak native languages.

The Netherlands abolished slavery in 1863, almost exactly 200 years after it started on the island. With the island’s main source of income gone, many of the immigrants left to look for more profitable shores or other islands.

Picturesque now but then? Former slave house on Curaçao’s beach:

Image: Meindert van D.

A Jewish immigrant family of Spanish and Portuguese descent discovered Curaçao’s most famous export in the 19th century: a liqueur flavored with the dried peels of the laraha citrus fruit, offshoots of the orange seedlings brought by Spanish explorers. Actually colourless, it is the artificial bright blue colour that is the feature most associated with the Curaçao liqueur today.

The famous Blue Curaçao liqueur:

Image: AlMare

Still, the economic slump lasted more than 150 years until oil was discovered in 1914. The Royal Dutch Shell Company and the Dutch Government built an extensive oil refinery right at the site of the old slave-trade market at Asiento, symbolic of the changing times. Soon, the island provided ample employment opportunities that again attracted immigrants from surrounding islands, the mainland, Portugal and Lebanon.

The Beit Chaim Bleinheim Jewish cemetery and the former Shell oil refinery:

Image: Mingo Hagen

During the economic boom of the early 20th century, immigrants came from as far as East and South Asia. During the years before and after World War II, many Ashkenazi Jews fled from Eastern Europe, especially Romania.

Well connected with the world – container ship CFS Palamedes at the deep sea harbour:

Image: We El

But all wasn’t well as racial tensions between the Afro-Caribbean population and the European immigrants grew. Large-scale rioting and protests on May 30, 1969 fueled a social movement that resulted in more rights and greater influence over the political process for the Afro-Caribbeans.

Economically, Curaçao went through a slump again after the aging refinery was sold in the mid 1980s due to pressure over a lack of safety standards and resulting lawsuits. Trying to reinvent itself yet again, Curaçao is now banking on tourism as one important source of income.

Many inhabitants have emigrated to the Netherlands, hoping for better employment opportunities there. In return, many Dutch pensioners have switched their home country for the sunnier shores of Curaçao. Immigration from surrounding Caribbean islands and Latin America has also taken place so that the population base is changing once again.

The Youth Chess Club of Curaçao:

Image via chessbase

Though according to Dutch records, the last true Indian is said to have died in Aruba around 1862, Curaçao’s Amerindian ancestry is not lost. For one, there are all the archeological sites, not yet open to visitors, working towards preserving the island’s earliest cultural history.

Proud Curaçao Little League players:

Image: Kelly van der Kwast

And often, this ancestral aspect of Curaçao is staring visitors right in the face – in the form of the features of many native Curaçaoans who, despite having mixed ancestry, still carry prominent traits of their forefathers and -mothers many thousands of years later.

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

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Is anyone looking?
Image: Jon Law

The tropical citrus root weevil or sugarcane root stalk borer weevil (Diaprepes abbreviatus) is a pest accidentally introduced to the state of Florida in 1964. Since 2005, it’s also been spotted in California not only devouring citrus, avocado and potato roots, but also engaging in some cunning mating behaviour. Here are the facts.

The lesser of two weevils:

Image: Mohamed Shaaz

A female root weevil is by no means lazy. She can lay up to 5,000 eggs that she carefully deposits in clusters on various leaves. She then folds the leaves and glues them together, waiting for the larvae to emerge and wreak havoc. Yes, it is the kid larva that does much more damage than the adult weevil that just nibbles on the foliage.

Root stalkers in the making, neatly piled up:

Image: David Hall

Thousands of weevil larvae fall from the leaves to the ground where they burrow down to the roots of the host plant that doesn’t really stand a chance. The little weevils feed on the host plant for months, depriving it of water and nutrients and making it vulnerable to infection.

Some like it hot – diaprepes females don’t produce eggs if it’s less than 59F:

Image: rwsphoto

How does this all tie in to lesbian bug love and insect mating behaviour? Well, to produce such strong offspring that can take over a whole plant, the female weevil needs to ensure that she mates with a strong male. Therefore she applies a tactic meant to weed out weak males: She mounts another female weevil in what is clearly a copy of weevil mating behaviour, all the while looking over her shoulder to see the reaction of the males that are watching.

The root of all weevil:

Image: Keith Weller

Puny males apparently will not be able to watch this display of female bug affection and run off, leaving the sought-after strong males with the good genes that can stomach this behaviour. There you go, survival of the fittest! All to produce even better, stronger root stalk borer weevil offspring. We wonder which kinky mating behaviour they might come up with next. We’ll stay tuned…

Sources: 1, 2

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