Foo - Lightning and bugs

We sat on the patio in the light rain watching the lightning flash throught the sky, the lightning bugs filling in the brief moments of dark.*



*VERY severe waether in the surrounding counties, non-stop lightning for nearly an hour.

As long as I'm not in actual danger, I love to see Nature in her most wild, beautiful forms.

We sat on the patio in the light rain watching the lightning flash throught the sky, the lightning bugs filling in the brief moments of dark.*



*VERY severe waether in the surrounding counties, non-stop lightning for nearly an hour.


I love watching lightning storms, from a safe place, of course! Sadly, outside of Los Angeles here, we get very little thunder or lightning.

As for lightning bugs, those little floaty lights in the air that I remember so fondly from my childhood and my trip through the south about 20 years ago, we have none. Too dry here, I guess.

There's nothing like a summer evening in the Carolinas. One of our favorite evening passtimes is catching a Warthogs (minor league ball club) games on a hot muggy night.

There's nothing like a summer evening in the Carolinas. One of our favorite evening passtimes is catching a Warthogs (minor league ball club) games on a hot muggy night.
I used to love to go to Tampa International Airport and watch storms roll in down the flightline. Being in the Lightning Capital of North America (http://wildthings.fgcu.edu/transcripts/script001.html) I always got agood show. Sadly these days I can't do that they call it "suspicious activity".

As long as I'm not in actual danger, I love to see Nature in her most wild, beautiful forms.

This is nature at one of its most destructive stages. Yet it is one ooff the most beautiful pics I have ever seen

This is nature at one of its most destructive stages. Yet it is one ooff the most beautiful pics I have ever seen
The forest renewing herself, cleaning out the underbrush etc. I thought it was kinda cool to learn that certain trees (can't remember which ones) have seed pods that open only in the heat of a fire.

The forest renewing herself, cleaning out the underbrush etc. I thought it was kinda cool to learn that certain trees (can't remember which ones) have seed pods that open only in the heat of a fire.

Seeds from many Californina trees and plants have to be scarified by fire to really sprout; they are adapted to burn and grow cycles.

Isn't it funny that for all these years humans "protected" the forests from fires and now we are paying the price for these "intelligent" practices with horrendous fires that don't just clear out undergrowth and renew, but get so hot that they destroy every thing below the ground as well, creating a charred, naked mess that will take many, many years to grow back, if it does grow back! If humans are automatically the lords of creation and can run things better than they naturally do without human intervention, why do things like this happen? Maybe we aren't as smart as we thought and there might be reasons for the "bad " things that happen in wilderness areas "unsupervised" by us?

Seeds from many Californina trees and plants have to be scarified by fire to really sprout; they are adapted to burn and grow cycles.

Isn't it funny that for all these years humans "protected" the forests from fires and now we are paying the price for these "intelligent" practices with horrendous fires that don't just clear out undergrowth and renew, but get so hot that they destroy every thing below the ground as well, creating a charred, naked mess that will take many, many years to grow back, if it does grow back! If humans are automatically the lords of creation and can run things better than they naturally do without human intervention, why do things like this happen? Maybe we aren't as smart as we thought and there might be reasons for the "bad " things that happen in wilderness areas "unsupervised" by us?

why are our fires worse?

Seeds from many Californina trees and plants have to be scarified by fire to really sprout; they are adapted to burn and grow cycles.

Isn't it funny that for all these years humans "protected" the forests from fires and now we are paying the price for these "intelligent" practices with horrendous fires that don't just clear out undergrowth and renew, but get so hot that they destroy every thing below the ground as well, creating a charred, naked mess that will take many, many years to grow back, if it does grow back! If humans are automatically the lords of creation and can run things better than they naturally do without human intervention, why do things like this happen? Maybe we aren't as smart as we thought and there might be reasons for the "bad " things that happen in wilderness areas "unsupervised" by us?
Preaching to the choir foehn. http://img19.imageshack.us/img19/841/10fireman.gif
Here's a great website for more info. http://www.smokeybear.com/only_you.asp