In an effort to prevent tragedies to human life, CONRED (Coordinadora Nacional para la Reducción de Desastres) has set up a 24 hour emergency phone number that people can call to report cracks or ground movements. That number is 1566.
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Ecology Education and Festival Atitlán Fundraiser
Roberto Luz , Violeta Luz and Rene Dionisio have designed an educational comic book in Spanish that informs about the causes of the cianobacteria at Lake Atitlan and some solutions. They have already printed and distributed 5,000 and are fundraising to print another 5,000. It is also a fundraiser for Festival Atitlan. Click here to view the comic book:
http://www.festivalatitlan.com/cyanobacteria/comic.html
Click here to donate: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=2ZSNNS7C8YZGL
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Reforestation Tips
Now that it is the season to plant trees, "Tepee" Bob Miller has offered up some tree planting ideas for reforestation.
- Plant each tree with a good helping of wood charcol mixed into the soil of each hole.
- Plant each tree in a depression so that water can accumulate when it rains.
- Use a mulch around each tree to retain moisture. This mulch could be any organic material: tree moss, rotted sawdust, dry leaves, dry vetiver grass. Green sawdust and materials are not as good as they rob a bit of nitrogen to break down into compost.
- In the dry season do the following using l-litre plastic water bottles per tree: Bury the neck/mouth part of the bottle in the ground a couple of inches and under the mulch so that the water will leave the bottle slowly over time to water each tree. Also with this method you will give each tree exactly the same water with no waste. It also reuses the bottles.