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Guest Blog: Farming with the Titimangsa: Losing Weather (and Water) in Time

By Nikolai Sindorf, WWF-US, based in Laos

In 1997 I went to the western part of Java in Indonesia to research on agricultural water management. Java is one of the most densely populated regions and high-yielding rice paddy lands in the world.
The focus of my research was how rice farmers dealt technologically and organizationally with ongoing reforms in large, engineered irrigation systems. During this research I met a farmer who had meticulously typed out his traditional cropping calendar. This cropping calendar — a titimangsa — read like a beautiful poem, describing the smell of the dew, the color of the sunset, the touch of the soil, and the observation of insect life cycles.
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Video: UK Rivers on the Edge

When we think about great freshwater ecosystems globally, most people don't think about the United Kingdom. The Yangtze of China is probably closer to most visions of a great river, or perhaps from a wild perspective Lake Baikal of Russia or the Colorado river as it passes through the Grand Canyon. But there is also great beauty and wonder in small places — streams and ponds — that may lack grandeur but are no less moving or important. The chalk streams of southern England and northern France are precisely such places.
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