29 September 2015

Hurricanes and tropical storms

     I don't wish bad weather on any locality, and tropical storm Joaquin's hitting the east coast right now with predictions that the storm will become a hurricane.  Richmond, VA's in line to get a lot of the rain and wind and other places to get much worse.
    But when these things happen I'm still surprised that most people assume that Nicaragua is constantly hit by these same hurricanes and tropical storms when in fact those things hit Nicaragua far less than they hit the eastern coast of the United States. 
     Yeah, I know. That was a surprise to me too. See an early post on this same thing:  http://falsebluff.blogspot.com/2011/07/hurricanes-and-monkeys.html
     This sort of bad weather stuff always hits the Caribbean, right? Wrong, and since tracking storm activity in the Caribbean I've wondered, without doing any research, why bad storms so seldom hit Nicaragua.
     Granted, when they hit there they hit hard, like Joan in the '80s. But I think that when a new storm forms it runs into something caused by the land masses of the eastern-most Caribbean islands...and gets swept up toward the eastern U.S.
     After looking at decades of Caribbean storm patterns (most avalable on NHC/NOAA), the pattern's pretty consistent. Whether it's a tropical storm or a hurricane, most of this weather seems to start in the Atlantic and then bounce up and off the Virgin Islands, the Dominican Republic, Cuba...to smash into Florida, Louisiana, and the east coast going ever north depending on how strong it is.
      I have no idea why that's the pattern of most storms over the past decades, but for Nicaragua's sake I'm glad there's one less bad thing the country has to deal with...the place gets overlooked in a lot of ways like this little map below that doesn't even show where Nicaragua is!




Green and Brown


     I don't even remember who brought this event to everyone's attention.  Even after it was pointed out it was difficult to see until you got very close.  Looks like green wins.  




Little closer from a better angle.

22 September 2015

Brown Basilisk Lizard


     Around the head of the canal there are bunches of Brown Basilisk Lizards.  There are usually two on the wooden canal gate for the boat parking.  They seem to love the lumber stacks and wherever you pile up all the cut coconut fronds.  They are also able to run on water with their big back feet.


15 September 2015

Green Vine Snake


     Bright green and still hard to see.  Even when you are right up on this one they blend very well with vegetation.  This is called the Green Vine Snake.  Per Wiki they do not have venom but do have toxic saliva that is "fast acting on small animals but has little or no effect on humans".  Instead of trying to see if Wiki is right or not I'll just stick to my rule of, look but don't touch the wildlife.








09 September 2015

Missing Sunrise?

   
     Put up a few nice pics of east coats sunrises a couple posts ago.  Just wanted to show a beautiful day without a sunrise.  In the early mornings near the beach it actually gets shivering cold outside.  During our first camping trip to False Bluff we stayed in hammocks next to the beach.  Figure we're going to be in tropical jungle so I didn't bring anything warm.  Ended up sleeping with long sleeves and a double pair of socks on, but still would wake up around 4am shivering and start a fire.
     The temperature usually rises about as quickly as the sun, but every now and then you will get a nice cool foggy morning like below.






01 September 2015

Swamp Lilies in Bloom


     Landscaping can be tricky so close to the salt water.  Even further back from the Caribbean the salt air kills a lot of plants.  Luckily we found the swamp lily.  It blooms pretty much all year long.  It is easy to dig up and divide.  It puts off huge bulbs that look similar to onions and they root very easily.  Probably one of the top native landscaping plants out on the Bluff.