One-sixth of Mediterranean mammal species are threatened with extinction at regional level, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said yesterday.
The IUCN study released in Malaga assessed the status of 320 mammals,excluding whales and dolphins.
Threats to mammals include agriculture, hunting, trapping and competition from invasive species.
Rodents, bats, shrews, hedgehogs and moles are increasingly threatened by the loss or degradation of their habitat from agriculture, pollution, climate change and urbanisation, it said.
Large herbivores, such as deer,carnivores and rabbits, are particularly vulnerable. The Mediterranean monk seal and the Iberian lynx are critically endangered. Several species have already become extinct in the region, including the Mesopotamian fallow deer and the common hippopotamus.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
"Contact lenses" from Germany for lions, tigers and bears
Lions, giraffes, tigers, rabbits, bears,rhinoceroses and even owls can go blind from cataracts, but a German firm has an answer: Custom-made "contact lenses".
The procedure is delicate, to say the least, and requires special training for veterinarians.
But it has propelled tiny S&V Technologies, founded by Bavarian chemist and entrepreneur Christine Kreiner in the former communist east, to global leadership in a highly specialised field.
The acrylic intraocular lenses are implanted into animals' eyes when their vision has clouded to the point of total impairment, and are fitted for various species, from cat-eye-sized to fist-width for rhinos.
"Cataracts generally means blindness for animals, unlike for humans," said the head of the company's veterinary division, Ingeborg Fromberg.
"And because animals have short life spans, it means losing quality of life in a greater share of that life."
Since its launch last year, the firm has fielded calls from Sea World in San Diego (a sea lion who had trouble performing his tricks due to severely blurry vision), an Australian nature park (a blind kangaroo) and a Romanian zoo (a visually impaired lioness).
The German lenses have helped turn the lights back on for dozens of house pets, racehorses, circus animals, guide dogs - literally preventing the blind leading the blind - and even wild creatures roaming nature reserves.
Special lenses that absorb UV rays can also be used to help horses afflicted with "head shaker syndrome", an excruciating and ultimately lifethreatening ailment.
Although the expense of such an operation and subsequent check-ups can run into the thousands of euros the procedure is often worth it for animals that have gone blind - and for their owners.
"When something is unsettling for an animal, when they don't have a good sense of their surroundings, they can begin to get aggressive or unpredictable or withdrawn," Fromberg said.
That can mean the pricey investment in training an animal is wasted.
Impaired vision can also blunt the sex drive, stopping animals from reproducing.
The World Wildlife Fund, for example,has paid for lens transplants for brown bears in a preserve in China.
"Of course that is only one side of it - some are pets and seen as members of the family and worth any expense,"Fromberg said.
She said the trickiest part of treating big animals such as elephants and rhinos is the anaesthesia.
"If larger animals lie for too long on one side during an operation then it puts too much pressure on the heart.That makes things a bit harder," she said.
"With a giraffe, for example, its head may never be lower than its heart. Every animal has its peculiarities that you have to contend with."
CEO Kreiner, a 64-year-old from Munich, chose to set up her unusual firm in Hennigsdorf, a sleepy riverside town that has become a high-tech haven in the 20 years since the Berlin Wall fell.
On the capital's northern outskirts,Henningsdorf also made smart business sense because the European Union and the German government both pitched in to provide one-third of the start-up costs. Kreimer has founded five different firms in her years in business and said she was drawn to Germany's excommunist east in the heady trailblazing mood of national unification in 1990.
"I thought at the time that it would be better to go to a poorer part of Germany rather than stay in Bavaria,"the prosperous southern state, she said.
"The thinking was that it would be less bureaucratic in an eastern state,and that the subsidies would be better than in the west. It was the right decision."
Her various enterprises blossomed and evolved over the years, culminating in the founding of S&V Technologies in January last year.
The company now even has a US subsidiary in Salt Lake City.
S&V posted turnover of nearly 2.5 million (124 million baht) last year and Kreiner expects it to grow by one-third this year based on lens sales but also a thriving anti-wrinkle products division - for humans.
She employs 32 people with another five to join this year.
"There are no global players active in this area that are able to crush mediumsized firms with a major marketing operation," Kreiner said, adding that her few competitors - in Canada, France and the US - were all smaller than S&V.
The main limit to her business's growth is a lack of vets able to perform the implantation procedure, which is why she now organises training weekends for animal doctors from around the globe.
Participants have come from as far as Australia, Brazil, Japan, Taiwan and the US to learn the procedure in the company laboratory on eyes harvested from animal cadavers.
The procedure is delicate, to say the least, and requires special training for veterinarians.
But it has propelled tiny S&V Technologies, founded by Bavarian chemist and entrepreneur Christine Kreiner in the former communist east, to global leadership in a highly specialised field.
The acrylic intraocular lenses are implanted into animals' eyes when their vision has clouded to the point of total impairment, and are fitted for various species, from cat-eye-sized to fist-width for rhinos.
"Cataracts generally means blindness for animals, unlike for humans," said the head of the company's veterinary division, Ingeborg Fromberg.
"And because animals have short life spans, it means losing quality of life in a greater share of that life."
Since its launch last year, the firm has fielded calls from Sea World in San Diego (a sea lion who had trouble performing his tricks due to severely blurry vision), an Australian nature park (a blind kangaroo) and a Romanian zoo (a visually impaired lioness).
The German lenses have helped turn the lights back on for dozens of house pets, racehorses, circus animals, guide dogs - literally preventing the blind leading the blind - and even wild creatures roaming nature reserves.
Special lenses that absorb UV rays can also be used to help horses afflicted with "head shaker syndrome", an excruciating and ultimately lifethreatening ailment.
Although the expense of such an operation and subsequent check-ups can run into the thousands of euros the procedure is often worth it for animals that have gone blind - and for their owners.
"When something is unsettling for an animal, when they don't have a good sense of their surroundings, they can begin to get aggressive or unpredictable or withdrawn," Fromberg said.
That can mean the pricey investment in training an animal is wasted.
Impaired vision can also blunt the sex drive, stopping animals from reproducing.
The World Wildlife Fund, for example,has paid for lens transplants for brown bears in a preserve in China.
"Of course that is only one side of it - some are pets and seen as members of the family and worth any expense,"Fromberg said.
She said the trickiest part of treating big animals such as elephants and rhinos is the anaesthesia.
"If larger animals lie for too long on one side during an operation then it puts too much pressure on the heart.That makes things a bit harder," she said.
"With a giraffe, for example, its head may never be lower than its heart. Every animal has its peculiarities that you have to contend with."
CEO Kreiner, a 64-year-old from Munich, chose to set up her unusual firm in Hennigsdorf, a sleepy riverside town that has become a high-tech haven in the 20 years since the Berlin Wall fell.
On the capital's northern outskirts,Henningsdorf also made smart business sense because the European Union and the German government both pitched in to provide one-third of the start-up costs. Kreimer has founded five different firms in her years in business and said she was drawn to Germany's excommunist east in the heady trailblazing mood of national unification in 1990.
"I thought at the time that it would be better to go to a poorer part of Germany rather than stay in Bavaria,"the prosperous southern state, she said.
"The thinking was that it would be less bureaucratic in an eastern state,and that the subsidies would be better than in the west. It was the right decision."
Her various enterprises blossomed and evolved over the years, culminating in the founding of S&V Technologies in January last year.
The company now even has a US subsidiary in Salt Lake City.
S&V posted turnover of nearly 2.5 million (124 million baht) last year and Kreiner expects it to grow by one-third this year based on lens sales but also a thriving anti-wrinkle products division - for humans.
She employs 32 people with another five to join this year.
"There are no global players active in this area that are able to crush mediumsized firms with a major marketing operation," Kreiner said, adding that her few competitors - in Canada, France and the US - were all smaller than S&V.
The main limit to her business's growth is a lack of vets able to perform the implantation procedure, which is why she now organises training weekends for animal doctors from around the globe.
Participants have come from as far as Australia, Brazil, Japan, Taiwan and the US to learn the procedure in the company laboratory on eyes harvested from animal cadavers.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
GROWING OLD WITH THE GARDEN
Kathleen Williams invites me to sit with her on a bench beneath the katsura tree she planted years ago. The view of her back yard is across a ravine, where garden sculptures and specimen trees talk to one another.
"This I call the box seat," she says, where she rests to take in the drama of her own making. At age 97, Williams spends most days in her garden, still drawing inspiration and delight from it. Her eyesight isn't what it was, and she uses a cane when she's in the multilevel garden.
But here is a women born before the Titanic sank who is still actively gardening and loving it.
A sculptor and later a jewellery designer, Williams has used her skills to create a woodland sculpture garden behind her home in Chevy Chase, in the Atlantic US state of Maryland.
Good genes and healthy living may be at play, but one can't help but think that the creative life has kept her going. The garden, needless to say, has many stories.
In the early 1950s Williams was living in London with her three children. Her husband had moved to the Washington area to work for a political organisation. He found the house for sale and phoned his wife to ask whether he should buy it.
"I said, "I don't know, darling. You're there; you decide.' And the house was dreadful," she says, erupting into laughter.
She arrived on Christmas Eve 1951 and found the roof was leaking and the wallpaper was far too florid.
But when she looked out to the back garden, she saw the potential drama of the site, a hill that descended to a stream and then rose up behind it to what was then a railway line, now the Capital Crescent Trail.
In the front of the house, a garden has been crafted around a ceramic birdbath she designed, and an old yew has been carefully shaped to produce a cloud effect, a technique seen on many old shrubs throughout the garden.
"This is what I call my green sculpture," Williams says. A dwarf conifer has been painstakingly pruned into a dome.
The back of the house, which was enlarged, now features a deck with transparent railings as part of Williams' careful framing of views. Likewise, trees around the deck have had lower branches removed.
As other trees have fallen, the emptiness has become a platform for her sculptures. "I'd been brought up to appreciate views," she says.
The area below the deck is a stage for an abstract sculpture, and in the open bed in front of it a large sitting figure of Pan gazes over the four descending terraces to the stream.
Seated on the bench, Williams explains that she views the garden in front of the stream as theatrical seating and the far slope as a stage.
The main act is a drama she calls the Poet's Garden. The sculpted head of the poet directs its gaze toward an artfully pruned blue Atlas cedar tree she calls "the Blue Princess".
"This is really the key to the garden," she says.
At the far end, a large black walnut tree is underplanted with bamboo and Leyland cypress, both vigorous plants but here stunted agreeably by the soil chemicals exuded by the walnut.
Nearby, a large clay torso, "Daphne", is framed by a decorative trellis. This was Williams" last big sculpture, done about 20 years ago. "I made her in two parts so I could get her into the kiln."
Williams' gardening partner for the past five years has been Eleanor Hillegeist, a professional gardener who specialises in working with elderly clients.
While Hillegeist works the central compost bins and does the heavy pruning and shovel work, Williams is doing the lighter stuff. "She weeds like you wouldn't believe," says Hillegeist, whose clients range in age from 87 to 104.
The two also work together in placing each sculptural element in a way that it supports the conversation Williams wants it to have with surrounding plants, other artwork and the garden as a whole.
For Hillegeist, that requires patience and an understanding that if Williams "is going to take an hour to get a certain figure in just the right design, that this isn't a waste of time, it's for her a work of art. To me it's a joy."
Williams grew up in the artistically gifted family of an English industrialist. Her 91-year-old brother, Michael Kidner, is a major op-art painter who lives in London.
When Williams switched to designing jewellery, she focused on intricate necklaces. "I think she has been in the business of creating her life," says Hillegeist, "and she continues to do that. When she became too old to do sculpture, she didn't just lay down her tools and die."
They garden together one or two times a week for as long as three hours. Williams also employs an arbourist to look after the trees and additional help to keep the stream clean and welcoming for the rich bird life.
Williams stops to point out a new project, a miniature rock garden in the front yard, filled with the tiniest of conifers and perennials. "It's very young still," she says, "but I think it's coming along."
"This I call the box seat," she says, where she rests to take in the drama of her own making. At age 97, Williams spends most days in her garden, still drawing inspiration and delight from it. Her eyesight isn't what it was, and she uses a cane when she's in the multilevel garden.
But here is a women born before the Titanic sank who is still actively gardening and loving it.
A sculptor and later a jewellery designer, Williams has used her skills to create a woodland sculpture garden behind her home in Chevy Chase, in the Atlantic US state of Maryland.
Good genes and healthy living may be at play, but one can't help but think that the creative life has kept her going. The garden, needless to say, has many stories.
In the early 1950s Williams was living in London with her three children. Her husband had moved to the Washington area to work for a political organisation. He found the house for sale and phoned his wife to ask whether he should buy it.
"I said, "I don't know, darling. You're there; you decide.' And the house was dreadful," she says, erupting into laughter.
She arrived on Christmas Eve 1951 and found the roof was leaking and the wallpaper was far too florid.
But when she looked out to the back garden, she saw the potential drama of the site, a hill that descended to a stream and then rose up behind it to what was then a railway line, now the Capital Crescent Trail.
In the front of the house, a garden has been crafted around a ceramic birdbath she designed, and an old yew has been carefully shaped to produce a cloud effect, a technique seen on many old shrubs throughout the garden.
"This is what I call my green sculpture," Williams says. A dwarf conifer has been painstakingly pruned into a dome.
The back of the house, which was enlarged, now features a deck with transparent railings as part of Williams' careful framing of views. Likewise, trees around the deck have had lower branches removed.
As other trees have fallen, the emptiness has become a platform for her sculptures. "I'd been brought up to appreciate views," she says.
The area below the deck is a stage for an abstract sculpture, and in the open bed in front of it a large sitting figure of Pan gazes over the four descending terraces to the stream.
Seated on the bench, Williams explains that she views the garden in front of the stream as theatrical seating and the far slope as a stage.
The main act is a drama she calls the Poet's Garden. The sculpted head of the poet directs its gaze toward an artfully pruned blue Atlas cedar tree she calls "the Blue Princess".
"This is really the key to the garden," she says.
At the far end, a large black walnut tree is underplanted with bamboo and Leyland cypress, both vigorous plants but here stunted agreeably by the soil chemicals exuded by the walnut.
Nearby, a large clay torso, "Daphne", is framed by a decorative trellis. This was Williams" last big sculpture, done about 20 years ago. "I made her in two parts so I could get her into the kiln."
Williams' gardening partner for the past five years has been Eleanor Hillegeist, a professional gardener who specialises in working with elderly clients.
While Hillegeist works the central compost bins and does the heavy pruning and shovel work, Williams is doing the lighter stuff. "She weeds like you wouldn't believe," says Hillegeist, whose clients range in age from 87 to 104.
The two also work together in placing each sculptural element in a way that it supports the conversation Williams wants it to have with surrounding plants, other artwork and the garden as a whole.
For Hillegeist, that requires patience and an understanding that if Williams "is going to take an hour to get a certain figure in just the right design, that this isn't a waste of time, it's for her a work of art. To me it's a joy."
Williams grew up in the artistically gifted family of an English industrialist. Her 91-year-old brother, Michael Kidner, is a major op-art painter who lives in London.
When Williams switched to designing jewellery, she focused on intricate necklaces. "I think she has been in the business of creating her life," says Hillegeist, "and she continues to do that. When she became too old to do sculpture, she didn't just lay down her tools and die."
They garden together one or two times a week for as long as three hours. Williams also employs an arbourist to look after the trees and additional help to keep the stream clean and welcoming for the rich bird life.
Williams stops to point out a new project, a miniature rock garden in the front yard, filled with the tiniest of conifers and perennials. "It's very young still," she says, "but I think it's coming along."
Friday, September 11, 2009
City elephants get park in Surin
Surin is to be home to a new elephant park to shelter jumbos rescued from city streets.
A number of elephants have died or been seriously injured in accidents in Bangkok and other cities after being hit by cars, falling into potholes or suffering an electrical shock.
In the latest bid to solve the seemingly insurmountable problem, the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry will set up an elephant shelter on 6,000 rai owned by the Royal Forest Department and the Forestry Industry Organisation, permanent secretary Saksit Tridech said yesterday.
Initially, about 100 stray elephants were expected to be relocated to the shelter, which could become another tourist attraction in Surin, dubbed "elephant city" because of the number of captive elephants in the province.
"We are going to invite all related parties such as the Interior Ministry and the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration and elephant owners to discuss how to operate the shelter in a way that will help solve the elephant problem,"Mr Saksit said.
The Department of National Parks,Wildlife and Plant Conservation believes there are about 2,000 elephants living in the wild and about 3,000 in captivity.
Officials estimate about half of the captive elephants have been forced to roam city streets and tourists sites at some stage.
Mattana Srikrachang, the wildlife department's elephant expert, said more needed to be done to stop elephant owners from bringing the animals into the major cities and putting their lives at risk. That included overhauling the captive elephant registration system so the authorities could get an accurate count of the number of captive elephants as well as information about their ownership and working places.
The data would help authorities come up with effective plans to manage and protect the elephants from danger.
A number of elephants have died or been seriously injured in accidents in Bangkok and other cities after being hit by cars, falling into potholes or suffering an electrical shock.
In the latest bid to solve the seemingly insurmountable problem, the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry will set up an elephant shelter on 6,000 rai owned by the Royal Forest Department and the Forestry Industry Organisation, permanent secretary Saksit Tridech said yesterday.
Initially, about 100 stray elephants were expected to be relocated to the shelter, which could become another tourist attraction in Surin, dubbed "elephant city" because of the number of captive elephants in the province.
"We are going to invite all related parties such as the Interior Ministry and the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration and elephant owners to discuss how to operate the shelter in a way that will help solve the elephant problem,"Mr Saksit said.
The Department of National Parks,Wildlife and Plant Conservation believes there are about 2,000 elephants living in the wild and about 3,000 in captivity.
Officials estimate about half of the captive elephants have been forced to roam city streets and tourists sites at some stage.
Mattana Srikrachang, the wildlife department's elephant expert, said more needed to be done to stop elephant owners from bringing the animals into the major cities and putting their lives at risk. That included overhauling the captive elephant registration system so the authorities could get an accurate count of the number of captive elephants as well as information about their ownership and working places.
The data would help authorities come up with effective plans to manage and protect the elephants from danger.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Nepal villagers on climate change frontline
Three years ago Naina Shahi's husband left their small village in rural Nepal to seek work in neighbouring India, leaving her to bring up their three children alone.
The dry winters and unpredictable monsoons Nepal has experienced in recent years had hit crop production on the couple's land plot in the foothills of the Himalayas, forcing them to look for other ways to feed their family.
For the past two years, their crop has failed entirely and Shahi now buys rice on credit from a local shopkeeper while she waits for her husband to return to their village with his earnings.
"My husband stopped farming because this place is not good for growing crops. We needed to earn money to feed the children," Shahi,35, said in the remote village of Bhattegaun in midwestern Nepal.
"There is not enough rainfall for the crops to grow well and we have to walk for two or three hours every day to get water."
International aid agency Oxfam says Nepal's changing weather patterns are threatening the livelihoods of hundreds of desperately poor communities already struggling to produce enough food to survive.
In a new report released recently,100 days before a conference in Copenhagen aimed at sealing an international accord on fighting climate change, Oxfam warns of the potentially devastating effects on people in the Himalayan nation.
"The majority of Nepal's population are poor farmers reliant on rainfall and occupying small parcels of land that can barely produce enough food for the family," it said.
"They often live in areas most at risk to floods and landslides and are more reliant on local natural resources such as forests and water.
"Even small changes to rainfall patterns can have devastating consequences on their crops," said the report,based on interviews conducted in rural communities across Nepal in February and March this year.
Almost a third of Nepal's 28 million people live below the poverty line and the UN's World Food Programme said recently there had been a "sharp and sustained decline in food security" in recent years.
It blamed a rise in food prices and a series of unusually dry winters.
This year Nepal's winter rains failed altogether, leading to severe water shortages and power cuts of up to 18 hours a day in the capital as hydroelectric projects struggled to meet de-mand.
There is no firm scientific evidence linking the winter droughts to climate change, and rapid population growth and a lack of development during the 10-year civil war have contributed to Nepal's rising food shortages.
But low winter rainfall and the late onset of the monsoons are in line with what climate change scientists have predicted for the region, and Oxfam says Nepal must act now to help its citizens adapt.
"There is no time to waste and nothing to lose," said country director Wayne Gum.
"The government needs to do more to support local communities. Even if we're wrong about climate change and I don't think we are - people will always benefit from better water management systems."
The residents of Bhattegaun, a settlement of around 150 mud huts deep in the forest, know little about the science behind climate change.
But they say changing weather patterns are already forcing them to change their way of life.
"These days, the weather is getting much hotter and the rains don't fall when they are supposed to," said 59-yearold Ram Bahadur Himal.
"Landslides washed away our last plot of land so we moved here and settled in the forest. We ploughed the land, but since we moved here, there has been no regular rainfall."
Most men of working age have left to seek casual work, leaving the backbreaking tasks of fetching water and firewood to the women.
Padam Bahadur Sunar works in India for between five and eight months of the year, earning up to 25,000 rupees (11,000 baht) a month which he sends home to feed his parents and eight siblings.
The 31-year-old recently got married,but he will soon be forced to leave his new bride behind when he returns to his work as a driver on Indian construction sites.
"There has been less rainfall over the years and there is no irrigation for the farmland," he said."Without going to India I wouldn't be able to feed my family."
The dry winters and unpredictable monsoons Nepal has experienced in recent years had hit crop production on the couple's land plot in the foothills of the Himalayas, forcing them to look for other ways to feed their family.
For the past two years, their crop has failed entirely and Shahi now buys rice on credit from a local shopkeeper while she waits for her husband to return to their village with his earnings.
"My husband stopped farming because this place is not good for growing crops. We needed to earn money to feed the children," Shahi,35, said in the remote village of Bhattegaun in midwestern Nepal.
"There is not enough rainfall for the crops to grow well and we have to walk for two or three hours every day to get water."
International aid agency Oxfam says Nepal's changing weather patterns are threatening the livelihoods of hundreds of desperately poor communities already struggling to produce enough food to survive.
In a new report released recently,100 days before a conference in Copenhagen aimed at sealing an international accord on fighting climate change, Oxfam warns of the potentially devastating effects on people in the Himalayan nation.
"The majority of Nepal's population are poor farmers reliant on rainfall and occupying small parcels of land that can barely produce enough food for the family," it said.
"They often live in areas most at risk to floods and landslides and are more reliant on local natural resources such as forests and water.
"Even small changes to rainfall patterns can have devastating consequences on their crops," said the report,based on interviews conducted in rural communities across Nepal in February and March this year.
Almost a third of Nepal's 28 million people live below the poverty line and the UN's World Food Programme said recently there had been a "sharp and sustained decline in food security" in recent years.
It blamed a rise in food prices and a series of unusually dry winters.
This year Nepal's winter rains failed altogether, leading to severe water shortages and power cuts of up to 18 hours a day in the capital as hydroelectric projects struggled to meet de-mand.
There is no firm scientific evidence linking the winter droughts to climate change, and rapid population growth and a lack of development during the 10-year civil war have contributed to Nepal's rising food shortages.
But low winter rainfall and the late onset of the monsoons are in line with what climate change scientists have predicted for the region, and Oxfam says Nepal must act now to help its citizens adapt.
"There is no time to waste and nothing to lose," said country director Wayne Gum.
"The government needs to do more to support local communities. Even if we're wrong about climate change and I don't think we are - people will always benefit from better water management systems."
The residents of Bhattegaun, a settlement of around 150 mud huts deep in the forest, know little about the science behind climate change.
But they say changing weather patterns are already forcing them to change their way of life.
"These days, the weather is getting much hotter and the rains don't fall when they are supposed to," said 59-yearold Ram Bahadur Himal.
"Landslides washed away our last plot of land so we moved here and settled in the forest. We ploughed the land, but since we moved here, there has been no regular rainfall."
Most men of working age have left to seek casual work, leaving the backbreaking tasks of fetching water and firewood to the women.
Padam Bahadur Sunar works in India for between five and eight months of the year, earning up to 25,000 rupees (11,000 baht) a month which he sends home to feed his parents and eight siblings.
The 31-year-old recently got married,but he will soon be forced to leave his new bride behind when he returns to his work as a driver on Indian construction sites.
"There has been less rainfall over the years and there is no irrigation for the farmland," he said."Without going to India I wouldn't be able to feed my family."
Friday, September 4, 2009
Weather helps California firefighters
Firefighters took advantage of a turn in the weather on Tuesday to gain ground against the enormous wildfire burning for a week above Los Angeles, saying they hoped to drive the flames away from historic Mount Wilson, a key telecommunications site.
But while higher humidity and cooler temperatures helped crews make their first significant headway against the fire - achieving 22% containment, up from 5% on Monday - officials warned that it was too early to believe that they had the upper hand.
The blaze already has charred 51,000 hectares, an area nearly the size of Chicago, destroyed at least 62 homes, and is still capable of terrible destruction,fire commander Mike Dietrich said.
Two firefighters were killed in the fire on Sunday, and at least three civilians have been injured.
"If I were in a boxing match I think we are even today," Mr Dietrich said."This fire still has a lot of potential and it's a very big animal out there."
The outbreak of wildfires across California was burning through cash at a rate that alarmed leaders in Sacramento,who are grappling with a still-growing state budget deficit.
As of Monday, just two months into the fiscal year and before the state's usual fire season had begun, California had already spent over half of its annual firefighting budget.
The Station Fire alone, roaring out of control since last Wednesday though the San Gabriel Mountains of Angeles National Forest, has cost $14 million to fight so far. A flare-up along the fire's southwestern flank still threatened some foothill neighbourhoods just inside Los Angeles city limits, and fire commanders said it would probably take another two weeks to fully contain the blaze.
But with 3,600 people on the fire lines, Mr Dietrich said the overall growth of the blaze slowed for the first time on Tuesday and that he was a lot more optimistic.
"Substantial progress has been made," he said."The weather has helped us, certainly. I do not believe that we have totally turned the corner. The fire has laid down but it could be a very angry fire again."
Officials said that for the first time they were feeling confident about their ability to save structures atop Mount Wilson, a hub for broadcast towers and other telecommunications equipment,as well as home to a historic observatory.
Flames around the peak had eased,and fire crews were sent back to the site around dawn on Tuesday, days after they were withdrawn for fear of being engulfed.
Meteorologists say the change in weather was due mostly to wind patterns pulling in more damp air from northern Mexico and the Baja region, a phenomenon called monsoonal moisture. They said there may also be a slight benefit from excess moisture associated with Hurricane Jimena off Mexico's coast.
"It's a huge difference," fire captain Art Burgess, with a crew mopping up hot spots near one neighbourhood, said of the higher humidity.
Residents who stayed put despite evacuation orders looked on as dozens of firefighters, backed by bulldozers and an aerial assault from water-dropping helicopters, quickly halted flames creeping down a steep slope at the end of their street.
"They did such a wonderful job,"said Carissa Totalca,55, a nurse who has lived in the area for years."I've never seen them in action before."
The weather change is a mixed blessing, though, posing the potential for gusty winds and dry lightning strikes that could ignite new blazes in dense,drought-parched brush.
Moist air also kept smoke from the fire closer to the ground, making it more difficult to fight with aircraft in some spots.
But while higher humidity and cooler temperatures helped crews make their first significant headway against the fire - achieving 22% containment, up from 5% on Monday - officials warned that it was too early to believe that they had the upper hand.
The blaze already has charred 51,000 hectares, an area nearly the size of Chicago, destroyed at least 62 homes, and is still capable of terrible destruction,fire commander Mike Dietrich said.
Two firefighters were killed in the fire on Sunday, and at least three civilians have been injured.
"If I were in a boxing match I think we are even today," Mr Dietrich said."This fire still has a lot of potential and it's a very big animal out there."
The outbreak of wildfires across California was burning through cash at a rate that alarmed leaders in Sacramento,who are grappling with a still-growing state budget deficit.
As of Monday, just two months into the fiscal year and before the state's usual fire season had begun, California had already spent over half of its annual firefighting budget.
The Station Fire alone, roaring out of control since last Wednesday though the San Gabriel Mountains of Angeles National Forest, has cost $14 million to fight so far. A flare-up along the fire's southwestern flank still threatened some foothill neighbourhoods just inside Los Angeles city limits, and fire commanders said it would probably take another two weeks to fully contain the blaze.
But with 3,600 people on the fire lines, Mr Dietrich said the overall growth of the blaze slowed for the first time on Tuesday and that he was a lot more optimistic.
"Substantial progress has been made," he said."The weather has helped us, certainly. I do not believe that we have totally turned the corner. The fire has laid down but it could be a very angry fire again."
Officials said that for the first time they were feeling confident about their ability to save structures atop Mount Wilson, a hub for broadcast towers and other telecommunications equipment,as well as home to a historic observatory.
Flames around the peak had eased,and fire crews were sent back to the site around dawn on Tuesday, days after they were withdrawn for fear of being engulfed.
Meteorologists say the change in weather was due mostly to wind patterns pulling in more damp air from northern Mexico and the Baja region, a phenomenon called monsoonal moisture. They said there may also be a slight benefit from excess moisture associated with Hurricane Jimena off Mexico's coast.
"It's a huge difference," fire captain Art Burgess, with a crew mopping up hot spots near one neighbourhood, said of the higher humidity.
Residents who stayed put despite evacuation orders looked on as dozens of firefighters, backed by bulldozers and an aerial assault from water-dropping helicopters, quickly halted flames creeping down a steep slope at the end of their street.
"They did such a wonderful job,"said Carissa Totalca,55, a nurse who has lived in the area for years."I've never seen them in action before."
The weather change is a mixed blessing, though, posing the potential for gusty winds and dry lightning strikes that could ignite new blazes in dense,drought-parched brush.
Moist air also kept smoke from the fire closer to the ground, making it more difficult to fight with aircraft in some spots.
Export markets will require a greener approach
Strict environmental regulations in key markets could cause Thai furniture exports to slump unless local manufacturers start making more eco-friendly products,experts say.
Local firms need to become alert to the increased demand for green products and the fact that they could save costs by using more efficient manufacturing processes, said Somchai Chatratana, deputy executive director of the Technology Management Center, a state agency that provides technological assistance to the private sector.
"Five years ago, promoting the concept of eco-friendly products would have been impossible because manufacturers were scared of higher costs. But now we have to give more importance to it,"said Dr Somchai, speaking yesterday at the Woodworking Forum 2009, which focused on boosting the competitiveness of Thai furniture.
Many countries are moving to ban products with a large carbon footprint.International standards, such as the Green Label, are being increasingly used to verify products' environmental impact.
Such initiatives would effectively become non-tariff barriers for Thai furniture exports to developed countries if the sector does not shift to greener production techniques, said Dr Somchai.
Thailand's main furniture export markets are Japan, the US and Britain,according to the Thai Furniture Industries Association.
The sector's export figures for the first seven months to July plummeted to $500 million from $1.2 billion in the same period last year.
Nudjarin Ramungul, a researcher with the National Metal and Materials Technology Center, said eco-friendly products had become more popular since the beginning of the economic crisis as consumers are more conservative.
"We are seeing pollution controls on products to ensure they contain the least amount of resources and that they create the least damage to the environment.This is what we call sustainability," she said.
Many countries are discussing levying green taxes. Products would be taxed according to the amount of carbon dioxide created by the manufacturing process. If producers cannot show improve-ments, they will be taxed heavily.
"Japan, for instance, has a policy to eliminate waste at the very start of the production cycle, whereas European countries include waste fees in products that cannot be destroyed," said Dr Nudjarin.
Government agencies such as the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) have played a key role in encouraging manufacturers to become more green focused.
The NSTDA acts as a matchmaker between researchers and business operators. Its industrial technology assistance programme supports the private sector in developing technologies.
"By adjusting the production cycle to become more efficient on waste management and energy costs, the product's overall cost will be lower," said Dr Somchai.
Thailand still has a long way to go due to a lack of eco-design experts and the fact that many firms are simply not interested in being more green, said Prin Boonkanit, and engineering manager at Eco Design Consultant Co.
"The Thai government has no business paradigm, even though the country shows high potential to develop towards the trend given the strong skills of its [furniture] designers," Dr Prin said.
Only about 20% of Thailand's furniture products are considered to be ecofriendly, said the TFIA.
"In the future we should place importance on the life cycle of a product,starting from production to waste management," said Dr Prin.
Local firms need to become alert to the increased demand for green products and the fact that they could save costs by using more efficient manufacturing processes, said Somchai Chatratana, deputy executive director of the Technology Management Center, a state agency that provides technological assistance to the private sector.
"Five years ago, promoting the concept of eco-friendly products would have been impossible because manufacturers were scared of higher costs. But now we have to give more importance to it,"said Dr Somchai, speaking yesterday at the Woodworking Forum 2009, which focused on boosting the competitiveness of Thai furniture.
Many countries are moving to ban products with a large carbon footprint.International standards, such as the Green Label, are being increasingly used to verify products' environmental impact.
Such initiatives would effectively become non-tariff barriers for Thai furniture exports to developed countries if the sector does not shift to greener production techniques, said Dr Somchai.
Thailand's main furniture export markets are Japan, the US and Britain,according to the Thai Furniture Industries Association.
The sector's export figures for the first seven months to July plummeted to $500 million from $1.2 billion in the same period last year.
Nudjarin Ramungul, a researcher with the National Metal and Materials Technology Center, said eco-friendly products had become more popular since the beginning of the economic crisis as consumers are more conservative.
"We are seeing pollution controls on products to ensure they contain the least amount of resources and that they create the least damage to the environment.This is what we call sustainability," she said.
Many countries are discussing levying green taxes. Products would be taxed according to the amount of carbon dioxide created by the manufacturing process. If producers cannot show improve-ments, they will be taxed heavily.
"Japan, for instance, has a policy to eliminate waste at the very start of the production cycle, whereas European countries include waste fees in products that cannot be destroyed," said Dr Nudjarin.
Government agencies such as the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) have played a key role in encouraging manufacturers to become more green focused.
The NSTDA acts as a matchmaker between researchers and business operators. Its industrial technology assistance programme supports the private sector in developing technologies.
"By adjusting the production cycle to become more efficient on waste management and energy costs, the product's overall cost will be lower," said Dr Somchai.
Thailand still has a long way to go due to a lack of eco-design experts and the fact that many firms are simply not interested in being more green, said Prin Boonkanit, and engineering manager at Eco Design Consultant Co.
"The Thai government has no business paradigm, even though the country shows high potential to develop towards the trend given the strong skills of its [furniture] designers," Dr Prin said.
Only about 20% of Thailand's furniture products are considered to be ecofriendly, said the TFIA.
"In the future we should place importance on the life cycle of a product,starting from production to waste management," said Dr Prin.
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