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Environment
An inch of rain in a few hours!
According to Nigel Heasman’s website at www.nigelheasman.com there has been 2.3cm of rain in the last few hours and at 6am this rain is still continuing. This winter has seen a remarkable amount of flooding and the current rain storms are set to carry on until tomorrow at least. There are many stories of reservoirs... »
EU to award TRNC agricultural support grants on 24th February
An award ceremony will take place at the Lefke Gardens Hotel in Lefke on Thursday 24 February at 18:45 in order to officially award further grants to 188 Turkish Cypriot farmers and rural enterprises. The purpose of these EU awards is to help bring farming in the north in line with EU standards and... »
Cyclamen – early Spring in Cyprus
Gradually over the last few weeks the Cyclamen flowers have started to appear beneath the shade of trees, creating a beautiful pink carpet. These plants are native to the Mediterranean and the delicate flowers disappear as the season progresses and the hot sun shrivels the plant until all that is left are the tubers... »
Cyprus potato crops destroyed
About 70% of potato crops in the Famagusta district suffered extensive irrversible damage because of the recent frost. The damage had been caused by three nights of freezing temperatures. The crops had been planted 3 months ago and had been due for export to Britain and other countries. Cyprus new potatoes are a very... »
Pine Processionary Caterpillars
Whilst walking along a path in a pine forest, I noticed a group of caterpillars moving in line in front of me. A later investigation revealed that they were Pine Processionary Caterpillars, so-called because the caterpillars move in head-to-tail processions. I was glad that I didn’t look more closely at then because I discovered... »
A bourgainvillea no more
After the Ban Ki-moon non-event I thought I’d add something more interesting to NCFP. A ten year old bourgainvillea was hacked to death by the telephone company recently, without any warning to the inhabitants of the house which it stood outside. The plant had obviously been a nuisance to the telephone engineers as their box... »
Cyprus smoking ban, is it working?
Firstly, I’ll put my cards on the table. I’ve never smoked apart from two experimental efforts, one at the age of 9 and another unsuccessful attempt at 16. However, I was brought up in a house where the ceilings were yellow from smoke and have never found a problem with drinking in pubs where... »
The future of Cyprus’ water supply
The tender process has been completed for a unique project to transport water from Turkey to north Cyprus using a system of underwater pipelines. The aim is to annually carry 75m cubic meters of water from the Alaköprü Dam in Mersin to Geçitköy Dam near Girne. To do this a pipeline 78km in length... »
Cypriots eat Robins and Song Thrushes at Christmas time
When I first stumbled upon a bird trapper whilst walking my dog, at first I wasn’t sure what was going on. It wasn’t until a conversation later that I realised that he’d been out to catch songbirds, including our favourite Christmas bird the robin. His furtiveness should have told me that he was up... »
Rare wildlife found in the Cyprus Green Line areas
Whilst under the control of a United Nations peacekeeping force for the past 35 years the Green Line areas in most cases have been allowed to revert to the wild. Wildlife have multiplied without the threat of human intervention and a UN project, including both GCs and TCs, has set out to find which... »
