Victory is ours!!!

A federal judge has blocked the Bush Administration from proceeding with oil
and gas development in the famed Teshekpuk Lake region and its world-class
wildlife nurseries.

The Western Arctic Reserve may be less well-known than the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge but its wildlife populations are every bit as unique,
spectacular and endangered.

It is home to the 45,000-member Teshekpuk Lake caribou herd. Tens of thousands
of migratory birds come here from as far away as Antarctica to nest without
disturbance.

Even Ronald Reagan's Interior Secretary James Watt -- no friend of the
environment -- recognized Teshekpuk's great importance and granted it federal
protection in the 1980s.

But the Bush Administration was preparing to strip this wildlife treasure of
its protections, sell it to the highest bidder, and create a sprawling
industrial zone of pipelines, rigs and waste sites.

NRDC and our partner groups went to court to stop this unconscionable giveaway
to Big Oil. And now that court has ruled that the Interior Department failed to
consider the cumulative environmental impacts of oil and gas drilling on this
sensitive ecosystem.

This is great news!

Garden pictures

Ornamental pepper "Black Pearl" that has ripened
Zinnia

And now the bubbling brook of the outing

The setting

It flows over the rocks
Swirls around in haste
Bubbles
Water laughs - "What larks!"

Flowers of Sunday outing

Last Sunday we went to the Japanese garden. Hardly had we entered when a sudden storm blew up, wringing itself out after about 20 minutes. We were sheltered by the awning of the entrance to the Garden, along with a motley group of individuals. Afterwards, I took pictures of the flowers and flowing water in a brook, swollen after the rain.
These are the flowers, of a most interesting type.
Some lightly-fragrant flowers
After the rain
Blue flower
So what color is that?
The hoi polloi of flowers

Yosef at work

My father took this cellphone picture a while back of me in full gear during a gardening day.
Kibbutznik Yosef