The Dotard

Many persons were puzzled when the president of N. Korea referred to the president of the USA as a "dotard." But he is perfectly correct as a dotard is simply a retard in his dotage.

Flamingo Gardens

Some trees are over 200 years old

Today I went on our first Meet Up trek with the Boca Raton nature group since hurricane Irma hit Florida causing much damage all around.

One place that apparently had a lot of tree and plant damage was Flamingo Gardens in Davie and today ( 23rd September) was the first day they were reopening  section of the gardens to the public.

These gardens are an important section of the Everglades Wildlife Sanctuary and are home to a myriad of birds, butterflies and flora.

The aviary is the most impressive I have ever seen with a large variety of owls, eagles, pelicans, storks, birds of prey and of course huge spectacular flamingos.

The great thing I like about Flamingo, is that these gardens are also a refuge for Florida's small, native wildlife that have been hurt. They rescue, nurse, heal them and if they are able, return them to the wild or else they remain at this sanctuary.

At this time they have panthers a black bear, otters, alligators, possums, otters, bobcats, turtles etc.

An iguana basks in the sun beside the flamingo pool

I love that aspect of the gardens but it is really mainly a botanical garden which was established in 1927 and once had over 3000 species of rare and exotic, tropical, subtropical, and native plants and trees. Some of the magnificent oak trees which thankfully are still standing are in excess of 200 years old.

Not all the trees are native to Florida however as over the years, to diversify, they have brought trees and plants from all over the world. However a number of them were damaged and are being carefully pruned and rehabilitated where possible. 

So while only about two thirds of the garden was open to the public today, it is still extremely impressive.

A bobcat sleeps in his cage in a tree

There is also a museum which had been a weekend retreat of the Wray's who used it in the 1930's and later donated the property to the state.

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TV networks failing viewers

According to recent reports, twenty four people were killed on the USA mainland during the onslaught of hurricane Irma from Friday 9^th-10th September 2017. However if there was a way of testing it accurately, I would be prepared to bet that more people died from stress-related illnesses like heart attack and strokes, as a result of how the major television networks reported  the progress of that hurricane.

Because for almost a week before hurricane Irma was even due to descend on Florida, the major networks went of a feeding frenzy implying almost ad infinitum, that the annihilation of the state was eminent.  The unnecessary scare tactics and language used by the leaders in electronic media had a toll not only on Florida residents but also on their family members in other states and abroad.

Yes, it is true that Hurricane Irma with winds registering at times as much as 195 miles per hour,  was the largest and most dangerous to develop in the Atlantic and threaten the Caribbean region, but did the media need to start spreading panic about the “certain doom” Floridians faced, long before the path of the hurricane could be determined?

Yes they could have started informing and warning residents about the possibilities but did they need to compete so fiercely to see who could use the most inflammatory language to create irrational fear among their viewers? I don’t know if they realize it, but millions of Floridians have relatives in other states and all over the world from and as far back as Monday 4^th September, the type of sensational seeking reporting that prevailed, almost totally convinced viewers that their family would be wiped off the face of the earth, if they did not leave the state.

The sad part, was the fact that while the press was creating this false impression and paying attention to remote possibilities concerning  Florida, Irma was venting its anger thousands of miles away, on small vulnerable island like Barbuda, St. Martin, St. Thomas, St. Johns, British virgin islands,Turks and Caicos island, the very beleaguered Haiti, Bahamas, and Cuba, killing 36 people as it raged. However, initially, there was nary a word from the major US television networks about what was happing  in the tiny, vulnerable islands, far from the US mainland, before or while Irma struck them, only, almost grudgingly, after the fact, while they kept playing up the hype about Florida.

While ignoring the rest of the region too in their “international news” segments, they even displayed only passing interest to what was happening to people at their southern border, where a terrible 8.3 magnitude earthquake hit their most important neighbor, Mexico killing almost 100 people.

What “international/world news” can these networks be delivering?

Further those of us who have experienced many hurricanes and “real” weather forecasters know that most hurricanes do not normally follow predicted paths  until around 24 or 48 hours before they land, and Irma operated true to form.  So reporting designed to cause fear and panic, instead of information, is counter-productive. They could easily have been more effective, had they delivered adequate, timely information to the public, only adding the necessary urgency when the outcome was more certain, instead of deluging Floridians and other viewers for hours on end, up to a week before the hurricane was due to land on their shores.

Their fear mongering type of reporting, created unnecessary panic, even causing thousands of people to move north into areas where the hurricane eventually headed, putting the “refugees” more into harm’s way than if they had not over-sold the possible dangers long before they were apparent.

 Will the media have any credibility the next time a hurricane appears to be heading towards Florida? You tell me.

I don’t know if the performance of most of the journalists at the major television networks stemmed from the fact that many are too young to have experienced a hurricane,  their feeling of failure because people in Houston were not adequately warned about the possible dangers that Harvey posed or just from for hunger for ratings.

Whatever the reason, their performance this week as the purveyors of “international/world news” has done nothing to enhance the waning credibility of the US media. Nor in reality have they demonstrated that are they any different from their president, whose nationalist worldview and rhetoric about withdrawing from world affairs, many of those same journalists at the major networks correctly criticize.  

Good radio coverage

The radio journalists at WLRN and 93.1 in Ft. Lauderdale did an excellent job on Sunday September 10^th 2017, covering hurricane Irma and keeping listeners totally informed as it passed through Florida. I normally keep my dial set on WLRN radio, but it failed after a while and that is how I ended up with listening to 93.1.

It took a lot of courage for the reporters to be out there in the midst of the storm keeping us informed while we remained comfortable and safe in our homes and I thank them.

A little criticism though, I live in Tamarac  and  being a Caribbean person, am more or less accustomed to hurricanes, so was a bit startled at times when I looked through my window and saw the trees swaying no more vigorously than in a normal storm, while hearing words like “catastrophic” and “ferocious” coming over the radio as some reporters described  what was happening in my town.  I really don’t think reporters need to exaggerate so much or use irrelevant inflammatory words to scare listeners during periods like that!

Very little tree damage

We survived well with only a very few trees losing branches or falling down totally and must congratulate FPL as we had power throughout.