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Tadhg MacCarthaigh 54%

Randal g 46%

KIERAN McCARTHY REPORTS

ON Sunday morning, only hours after the final whistle had sounded, Sean Collins was back out working on Tadhg MacCarthaighs field of dreams.

He wasnt resting on his laurels. The grass needed to be cut and Collins was up early to get the job done and dedication like this is one of the reasons why the clubs top-class sod at Aughaville was crowned Pitch Perfect champion last weekend.

Sean Collins has been a constant for the last 30 years, he has helped keep the pitch looking as good as it is, club chairman Kieran Daly said.

We have a lot of work done on the pitch over the years, the likes of Sean and all these fellas have kept it in good shape, so winning this is a great reward for them and all their hard work.

Out of 32 GAA clubs from both the Carbery and Beara divisions, only two were left standing in last Saturdays Pitch Perfect final Tadhg MacCarthaighs Aughaville and Randal gs impressive Ballinacarriga pitch.

This was always going to an epic decider to a competition (run on Twitter polls) that entertained for the past few weeks and we werent disappointed.

Both clubs impressed en route to the last four, and what was noticeable was Tadhg MacCarthaighs late surge in their quarter-final win against St Oliver Plunketts and also the semi-final against Bere Island. They were the comeback kings of Pitch Perfect so Randals would have known they needed to hold a healthy lead heading into the early hours.

Just after the halfway mark in the final, Randals were in command, leading 57% to 43%, but within hours it was level pegging, and all to play for as we headed in the business end and the final few hours of this battle.

After Randal g got Kerry TD Michael Healy-Rae onside, Tadhg MacCarthaigh responded with an endorsement from Pope Francis (not the real Pope, granted), as both clubs pulled out all the stops to get the upper-hand.

By the end, and at the 2am cut-off point on Sunday morning, it was Tadhg MacCarthaigh that came out on top, winning 54% to 46% after an incredible 4,109 votes were cast.

The winning pitch at Aughaville had hit all the right notes to win this Pitch Perfect final that had a bit of everything.

It was the players that drove this on, in fairness to them, club chairman Kieran Daly explained.

The likes of Mark ODriscoll, even though he is in Australia, was on the case, Colm ODriscoll was on to some fella in South Africa there wasnt a country that wasnt touched over the last few weeks!

It was great to see some of our ex-players get on board too, fellas in New York and London, and the community response was brilliant as well.

Daly himself joined Twitter last week so he could vote in the competition, and he heard similar stories all over the parish, as they came together to get Tadhg MacCarthaigh over the line.

Even Sean Collins was set up with a Twitter account, Daly laughed, and the further we progressed in the competition, the more people got behind us.

Its great recognition for everyone who has helped keep the pitch in good shape. Two years ago when we had the drought, we watered the pitch every couple of nights there was Liam ODriscoll, Michel ODonovan, Eoin Murphy, different fellas with a tractor and water tank.

We only have the one pitch so we have to mind it. In fairness, any time we ask any locals to help out, they do.

And while Tadhg MacCarthaighs Aughaville sod got the thumbs up in Pitch Perfect, Kieran Daly was keen to point out that there are plenty of excellent pitches in West Cork.

Like every other club, we have some very good people and we are lucky to have them, Daly said.

A lot of clubs invest money in their pitches, clubs could be spending anywhere between 3,000 and 10,000 a year to keep their pitches in good shape. You have to spend that money to keep the surface good, especially in recent seasons with more traffic and matches on the pitch.

Of all the pitches in West Cork, theres one that stands out for Daly.

We played in Bantrys new pitch and I think that when players get the chance to play on it, and more people see how good it is, everyone will realise its a savage pitch.

But, for now, Tadhg MacCarthaighs Aughaville has been chosen as West Corks best GAA pitch after an exciting few weeks that saw over 27,500 votes cast and all the great pitches in Carbery and Beara rightly lauded.

Lets hope its not the only West Cork final we have this year.

Subscribe to the Southern Star'sYouTube channel, like us onFacebook and follow us on Twitter and Instagram for all the latest news and sport from West Cork.

Originally posted here:
Tadhg MacCarthaigh's field of dreams hits all the right notes to win Pitch Perfect - Southern Star Newspaper

RAPID CITY, S.D. (KOTA TV) - Despite more people staying home, plumbing issues can still happen.

The general manager of Loyal Plumbing, Jason White, says business has been about the same during the pandemic, and they're staying pretty busy.

According to White, they've seen more sewer lines getting clogged or broken, and the reason could be people are using their bathrooms and plumbing more often.

Now when workers do go into homes, they're taking extra precautions.

And due to social distancing, the staff started a program called "plumber in a pocket."

If someone doesn't feel comfortable having a tech in their home, they can set up a meeting through zoom, and a tech can walk them through the steps to diagnose problems and try to fix it.

"So that's had some good traction and good results. And it's kind of cost savings for people with the economy and stuff and some people wondering how they will get stuffed fixed. So it's been nice for them to have that," says White.

White says they do about two zoom calls a week and says most people don't want to mess with the plumbing themselves.

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Staff at Loyal Plumbing continue to get the job done during the pandemic - Kotatv

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The following manufacturers are covered:3MSaint-GobainHenkelBerryNittoTechnetics GroupA. W. Chesterton CompanyDixon ValveOateyDeWAL Industries (Rogers)RectorSealSSP CorporationGasoila ChemicalsJC Whitlam ManufacturingElectro Tape

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Low Density Plumber Tape Market to Slip Due to Delays in Production Amidst Coronavirus Outbreak - Cole of Duty

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Original post:
Plumbing Fitting Market to be Moderately Disrupted by Covid-19 Outbreak, Owing to Abc Issues - Jewish Life News

An urgent motion for a moratorium on land clearing on the NSW South Coast is before Shoalhaven City Council as a property developer prepares to raze a local forest.

Manyana residents have been protesting project developer Ozy Homes clearing the forest to make way for nearly 180 housing lots, given so much local bushland has recently burned.

The urgency motion mayor Amanda Findley put to council - which requires a report - was passed 12 votes to one.

If the report is supported at next Tuesday's council meeting urgent representations will be put before Planning Minister Rob Stokes.

Ms Findley says clearing of the forest must be halted because the trees offer a refuge for animals who lost other crucial habitats during the summer's unprecedented bushfires.

"There are animals living in there now that have nowhere else to go because the local forest is so badly burned," Ms Findley told AAP.

Bill Eger, 60, has lived in the area for 35 years and recently helped fight fires that blazed through Conjola National Park.

He said it was hard to think he risked his life alongside emergency services and other members from the local community to save land that would potentially be destroyed by a developer.

"After putting our lives on the line, to save these pockets of ground, to have it then taken out by Ozy Homes ... what's the point," Mr Eger told AAP.

"What are we doing here, why are risking our lives to save these endangered species and little critters, if they're going to be bulldozed a few months later."

Mr Eger is particularly worried about the greater glider possums which had their habitat decimated by the Currowan fire.

"It took 22 years for the gliders to come back to the Conjola National Park, they were making a comeback until the Currowan fire wiped out nearly everything in that park," he said.

Ozy Homes was forced to delay bulldozing about 20 hectares of the Manyana forest following the bushfires for three months and set up fauna boxes to re-home native animals.

"The attempts to try and transfer animals from homes in thriving bushland to burned-out bushland is a ludicrous proposition at this point in time," Ms Findley said.

The council is asking Mr Stokes to halt logging until there is a better understanding of the ecological impacts of the fires in the area.

Protesting residents continued to observe COVID-19 social distancing rules on Wednesday morning by running, cycling and doing yoga in case they needed to physically block workers from entering the site.

Manyana Matters spokeswoman Jorj Lowrey said she understood Ozy Homes was to start clearing land on Wednesday and was pleased those plans had been delayed.

Following yesterday's gathering of more than 100 people, Manyana Matters spokesman Peter Winkler said residents would remain on-site throughout the week.

"The local community will remain vigilant and will launch into action if required," Mr Winkler told AAP.

Comment was sought from Ozy Homes and Mr Stokes.

Go here to read the rest:
Urgent call to halt land clearing in NSW - Yahoo News Australia

Demonstrators were forced to use exercise as a means of protest amid the COVID-19 pandemic on May 4, when New South Wales South Coast residents campaigned against the clearing of forest that had been spared from the catastrophic 2019-2020 bushfires.

Developer Ozy Homes planned to develop a 20-hectare area at Manyana after receiving approval for the project in 2008, according to reports.

However, locals were concerned that the development land had become a last refuge for local wildlife that had lost its habitat during the bushfires.

Social distancing regulations in place across New South Wales to stem the spread of coronavirus had effectively banned mass protests, forcing the demonstrators to use exercise such as yoga and walking as a reason to attend the site.

An estimated 312 homes were destroyed and 500,000 hectares were burnt in the surrounding area by the 74-day Currowan fire in late 2019 and early 2020. The blaze threatened homes and forced resident to evacuate to beaches in the area on New Years Eve.

Record bushfires gripped much of New South Wales in late 2019 and early 2020, with over 11,400 bush and grass fires burning 5.5 million hectares, the equivalent of 6.2 percent of the state of New South Wales. Fires burned across the state for 240 consecutive days between July 2019 and March 2020. Credit: Manyana Matters via Storyful

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Demonstrators Exercise in Protest Against Land Clearing on South Coast During COVID-19 Restrictions - Yahoo News UK

One of the most beneficial trees for wildlife is the oak tree. Oaks offer food, shelter, cover and nesting sites for a number of animals. The branches, nooks, crannies and hollow areas in oak trees afford protection from the elements, a place to rest, escape predators and nesting areas to raise the young.

Many animals feed on the small twigs, buds, shoots and leaves of oaks as well. Oak trees attract hundreds of insects and invertebrates that feed on their foliage. These insects attract insectivorous birds, reptiles, frogs and mammals, developing a very dynamic food web within the forest. Because oak trees attract such a wide variety of insects they are considered to be one of the most important trees for woodland inhabiting birds. Oak trees also produce acorns, which are a very important winter food for deer, fox, bear, squirrels, turkey, wood duck and many birds. Animal populations tend to increase or decrease based on yearly acorn production, a testament to the importance of oak trees. As oaks mature, they typically produce more acorns and develop a large hollow area, which further enhances their value for wildlife.

Oak trees tend to be longer lived, slower growing trees that develop best in full sunlight to moderate shade. Acorns may be able to germinate and develop a small tree in dense shade, but the oak tree will cease growing in shady conditions, waiting until it can exploit a gap in the canopy and continue its development. In this holding pattern, the small oak trees are vulnerable to deer browse or they may eventually succumb to lack of sunlight. Trees such as red maple, black gum, hickory, beech, sugar, maple, black birch and hemlock can develop much better in the shade, and they will overtake the young oaks underneath a dense canopy.

Many of the oak forests we now have are a result of former land clearing and logging practices that created conditions beneficial to oak germination and growth. In the past, large forest fires were also much more common throughout our region, giving rise to more oak regeneration. The thick bark oak tree is more resistant to forest fires and more likely to continue growing when the thinner barked maple, beech, birch or white pine tree may succumb following a forest fire. Oak and oak-pine forests are considered to be fire-dependent communities by ecologists.

Many of our present oak forests contain trees in their golden years, and the understory is full of shade-tolerant maple, birch, gum and beech trees. In ecological terms, an oak forest is considered to be intermediate, while a beech birch maple forest is considered to be a climax forest community. This means that in the absence of disturbances as the older oaks succumb to old age, the forest composition will change and the forest will contain more maple, birch, beech and gum, and less oaks. And, the prevailing trend seen throughout the east is that oak numbers are indeed declining. Along with changes brought about by forest succession, factors such as gypsy moth mortality, oak decline and other diseases, feeding activity of white tail deer, logging operations that remove oak and little else, forest fragmentation and invasive plants that overrun the forest thereby suppressing most native plants are all contributing to the decline of oak trees.

To understand how intricately nature interacts, it has been shown that a reduction in the amount of oak trees is impacting numerous forest interior bird species, including the wood thrush and wood pewee. Many of these species are displaying sustained population declines of 3 to 4 percent per year. Other factors contributing to this decline include loss of habitat from forest fragmentation, increased mortality, nest parasitism, overabundance of deer, cell towers, wind turbines and acid rain.

Recognizing that the gradual loss of oak canopy may impact future wildlife populations, plant diversity, and the forest products industry, many foresters, wildlife managers and forest ecologists, etc., are attempting to encourage the retention of oak forests or the establishment and development of oak tree regeneration where it is suitable.

In the fall of 2019, a prescribed burn was conducted at the Pine Swamp area on the Frederick City watershed. The purpose of this controlled burn was to encourage pitch pine, shortleaf pine and oak development by controlling the thin barked maple, beech and birch trees that had colonized the site while reducing fire danger by eliminating some of the downed fuels that were scattered around the site. The burn was deemed a success. Preliminary evidence suggests that numerous young pine and oak trees are developing in the area that was burned in 2017. Besides these silvicultural practices to encourage oak regeneration, landowners can plant oak seedlings and protect their oak trees from destructive insects like gypsy moth to help maintain this majestic tree on our landscape.

More:
Nature Notes: The importance of oak trees | Travel And Outdoors - Frederick News Post

Ever since COVID-19 lockdowns put a stop to tourism, wildlife has been thriving in the heart of the Maya Biosphere, Guatemala, a UNESCO recognised reserve.

The reserve covers a fifth of the country, with El Mirador National Park at its heart. With ancient Mayan cities, tropical forests and wildlife, this territory has been the centre of conservation efforts and initiatives to make sustainable tourism the countrys biggest source of income.

El Mirador has been under constant threat from land clearing projects for cattle ranches, as well as narcotrafficking and wildlife poaching. But major efforts have been made to protect the park through ecotourism, with job opportunities in hospitality for local residents who might otherwise have made a living through hunting or logging.

While the current travel restrictions mean a lack of tourism draws resources away from these projects, animals are being seen more frequently, including large mammals like cats, jaguars, and pumas.

"What the coronavirus leaves me with, is that we really do affect the animals. We do affect the forest," says Gabriel Urruela, photographer and park ranger at El Mirador National Park.

Original post:
Wildlife is roaming the Mayan forests | Living - Euronews

ATLANTA Georgias annual ban on outdoor burning began Friday in 47 counties. The Georgia Environmental Protection Division puts the restrictions in place during the summer months, when increases in ground level ozone may create health risks.

For seven counties that are normally included in the summer burn ban, restrictions will be activated on June 1, giving them extra time to clear vegetative debris from April storms. Those counties are Banks, Catoosa, Chattooga, Floyd, Gordon, Upson and Walker.

From May until Sept. 1, open burning of yard and land-clearing debris is prohibited in some counties where particulate matter pollutants and chemicals from smoke are more likely to combine with emissions from vehicles and industrial activities, Frank Sorrells, chief of protection for the Georgia Forestry Commission, said in a news release. Thats more likely to occur in cities, where theres more asphalt and concrete than open green space and trees to help cool and filter air. The risk of wildfire also may be high in summer, so our agencies are closely monitoring air quality and weather conditions for the safety of all Georgians.

The 47 counties affected by the ban beginning May 1 are Barrow, Bartow, Bibb, Butts, Carroll, Cherokee, Clarke, Clayton, Cobb, Columbia, Coweta, Crawford, Dawson, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Hall, Haralson, Heard, Henry, Houston, Jackson, Jasper, Jones, Lamar, Lumpkin, Madison, Meriwether, Monroe, Morgan, Newton, Oconee, Paulding, Peach, Pickens, Pike, Polk, Putnam, Richmond, Rockdale, Spalding, Troup, Twiggs and Walton.

May through September is the time of year when people, particularly children, are more likely to be outdoors. Higher levels of ground-level ozone and particle pollution levels are known to contribute to lung problems and heart disease.

Residents in Georgia counties not included in the annual burn ban will continue to be required to secure a burn permit from the Georgia Forestry Commission before burning outdoors. Permits can be secured online at GaTrees.org, by calling 1-877-OK2-BURN or contacting their county GFC office.

During this time of increased focus on safety and respiratory issues in response to COVID-19, the GFC will be particularly mindful about the potential impact of smoke in every area of the state, Georgia Forestry Commission Director Chuck Williams said. The GFC and EPD carefully monitor air quality indices and will continue to do so wherever prescribed fire is permitted.

For more information about the EPD summer burn ban, go to epd.georgia.gov/ and click on Open Burning Rules for Georgia under Popular Topics, or call the EPD district office serving your area. To learn about services of the Georgia Forestry Commission, visit GaTrees.org.

Now, more than ever, the world needs trustworthy reportingbut good journalism isnt free.Please support us by subscribing or making a contribution today.

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Georgia burn ban is in effect for 47 counties - The Albany Herald

We found the first fire without looking, crackling and roaring on farmland beside the busy Amazon highway, the flames consuming a road sign with its name BR-163 lying in the grass. Trucks thundered past, ferrying soya and corn from the agricultural heartlands of Brazils central-west to the ports of Santarm and Miritituba. Nobody was around.

Every year fires roar across the Amazon, and in just a few months they will be here again. But last August the number of blazes reached a nine-year high, and sparked an international crisis for Brazils far-right president Jair Bolsonaro. Months later, their traces hung over the forests in the Amazon state of Par, leaving blackened logs and charred tree stumps where there was once rainforest.

But what happens to the land afterwards, especially in protected reserves? Is anyone punished for burning the forests? Are the forests allowed to grow back? Most of all, what can we expect from this years fire season? Late last year, reporters from the Guardian and investigative site Rporter Brasil spent a week at reserves along the BR-163 to find out.

We started in the hardscrabble settlers town of Novo Progresso in the state of Par, with its plethora of gold shops serving the largely-illegal wildcat mining trade. Police are still investigating Novo Progresso farmers for allegedly coordinating a fire day last August to show Bolsonaro their will to work fires soared by 300% around the town that day. The town sits beside the Jamanxim national forest, a protected reserve of more than 1.3 million hectares (3 million acres) that is one of the most devastated in Brazil. Where better to begin?

The first morning we steered the rented 4x4 along a dirt road out of Novo Progresso, bouncing over potholes as it snaked in and out of the Jamanxim forest. This forest is managed by the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio), a federal environment agency named after the rubber tapper, activist and environmentalist who won international acclaim before being murdered in 1988 by cattle ranchers.

Inside Jamanxims borders, as forest gave way to a sweep of cattle farms, we found more fire: a patch of forest still smouldering in places, trees swiped at waist height, and the felled, blackened trunk of a regal brazil nut tree in the scorched earth. An extensive search of government websites, publicly available information and internal ICMBio documents revealed that this very patch of forest has an emblematic history of environmental offences and fires.

This smouldering land fell inside the 889 hectares of land registered in 2015 by Jair Ferreira de Souza, a Novo Progresso resident, on Par state governments Rural Register (CAR), just inside the borders of the Jamanxim forest. In 2017 and 2018 Nasa satellites spotted fires on this land, and in 2015 and 2019 De Souza was fined more than 500,000 for destroying hundreds of acres within it by environment officials who photographed cattle branded with his initials: JF.

De Souza has appealed the fines, none of which have been paid. He told officials that he needed pasture and denied that one patch of destroyed forest was his. He claimed his family had owned land here for 30 years, arguing that he had cleared only a minimal area he needed to work, and requested one fine be annulled because he was unable to pay it.

Souza did not respond to messages sent to his phone.

But to understand how Jair Ferreira de Souza is able to claim ownership of land within a federally protected forest, we need to step back into the Amazons chaotic and rapacious history of colonisation.

The military dictatorship that ruled Brazil until 1985 often lauded by Bolsonaro - encouraged migration and built highways to force development into the Amazon region, but failed to impose a functioning property system. Instead, it sold off chunks of forest then largely government owned to private investors. It also handed out lots to migrants who had been encouraged to move there from the poorer north-east.

Much of this land was sold on later, often in deals involving unscrupulous notaries in a range of scams that continue until today, aided by the remoteness and lawlessness of the Amazon region. Adding to the disorder, under Brazilian law, improving land you are on can strengthen an eventual ownership claim. And Amazon farmers often argue that previous governments had encouraged them to move to the region, only to plonk a reserve on top of them years later even if they actually squatted the land afterwards.

As long as its confusing, as long its undetermined who owns what, the guys with the lawyers, the guys with the guns and the influence always win, said Jeremy Campbell, an associate professor of anthropology at Roger Williams University in Rhode Island, who specialises in Amazon land conflicts.

Landgrabbers nicknamed grileiros, or crickets, after the tested ruse of leaving fake land titles in drawers full of the insects whose secretions turn them yellow and convincingly old-looking proliferate in the Amazon.

Having some sort of document is key to eventually legitimising stolen land. These days farmers register their own land online as was done for de Souza but often there is more than one claimant for the same area. In Par, there are around three times as many land titles as there is land, state prosecutor Jane Souza said in an interview. In December, Bolsonaro signed a measure allowing grileiros to claim up to 2,500 hectares (6,177 acres) of land squatted before 2018 under certain conditions, such as no environmental fines or embargoes. This needs to be approved by Congress.

The Jamanxim national forest reserve we were in was created in 2006 to slow rampant deforestation. Farms in the reserve were supposed to be repossessed by the government, but that never happened. Commercial agriculture is not permitted there but many local people have never accepted its reserve status.

Paulo Moreira, a federal prosecutor in Par, explained in an interview that protected areas like Jamanxim are attractive to speculators who buy illegally cleared land cheaply to sell on, or deforest it themselves, betting it will be regularised in the future and increase in value. Crime compensates and that makes it attractive, Moreira said.

We spoke to residents of Novo Progresso who clearly saw themselves as hard-working pioneers in a hostile wilderness. Wood, gold prospecting and now cattle made this town, Jadir Rosa told us. The 36-year-old mechanic had moved from Paran state in the south of Brazil and was lunching in the towns market. Rosa supported Bolsonaro and shared his governments scepticism over climate science. Global warming does not exist, he said.

Other residents similarly harboured little sympathy for environment officials. Laudi da Silva, a 72-year-old market stall holder and Bolsonaro supporter, complained that her brothers wildcat mining barge had been destroyed during an operation by environment officials. Theyre always burning things round here, she said. I dont like it.

Agamenon Menezes, the influential president of the towns rural producers union, has been interviewed by police in connection with the fire day investigation, and his computer seized, but he denied involvement during an interview at his unions headquarters. He argued that fire day had been invented by the media to attack Bolsonaro and that there were no more fires last August than in any other year. He denied man-made climate change existed because, he said, 35,000 serious Brazilian scientists had disproved it.

Menezes said Bolsonaro was popular in the region because he was against environmental officials and regulations preventing people working. They have to eat, they have to produce food. So they work illegally, he said. Nobody wants to be illegal as well. They want to work legally. Fires were lit to clear land for pasture that is then turned into agricultural land, he explained. You get an area of dense forest and deforest it, he said. You need to burn this wood.

Environmentalists describe a similar deforestation process. First, landgrabbers and loggers remove the most valuable trees, leaving some cover to make it harder for satellites to spot the damage. The remaining trees are then felled, left to dry and burned hence the fires. Later grass is sown, and cattle put on the deforested land to consolidate possession.

This is the classic cycle we have seen in recent years, said Greenpeace Brazils senior forest campaigner, Adriana Charoux. If the farmer feels confident enough about his ownership of the land, the next stage is soya, she added.

Soya production is growing in the Novo Progresso area, Menezes said, taking pride in the regions improving productivity.

It was striking to see how farming had eaten into the forest on both sides of the BR-163. Cows were everywhere. Wildlife survived as best it could. One morning a white monkey scuttled across a dirt road, followed by a gaggle of forest pigs. Black, blue and orange macaws squawked atop a charred tree trunk, their only perch in a field of cattle. An opportunistic anteater darted across the highway in a gap between the trucks.

All along the highway were signs of logging, including an enormous sawmill at Moraes Almeida and three clapped-out flatbed trucks parked up one morning without licence plates by a smaller sawmill at Vila Izol. Nearby were three swastikas daubed on a bar door. Logging was also evident in the Serra do Cachimbo Springs reserve a 342,000 hectare biological reserve created in 2005, which is also run by ICMBio.

Driving down a dirt road in the reserve one morning we passed a man standing next to a motorbike as a lookout while chainsaws howled in the trees. It was a tense moment: environment officials warned that running into loggers in reserves, who are often armed, can be risky.

When a convoy of government firefighters in 4x4s hurtled past, we followed them into a 6,000-hectare farm registered on the CAR system in 2016 to Andr Ferri. Cattle grazed on pasture littered with old charred logs outside an empty farmhouse, surrounded by a curtain of forest.

All of this was burned, and this is a sensitive area, said one of the firefighters, speaking anonymously because Bolsonaros government has banned environment agency employees from talking to the media.

A few miles from here, a thousand hectares of Ferris farm was embargoed by ICMBio officials in April 2015 after being destroyed illegally and he was fined 3m. Four months later officials revisited the area and found the area had been burned and the area of devastation increased by more than 400 hectares. A satellite image from 2005, when the reserve was created, found no deforestation in the embargoed areas. In 2017, Nasa satellites found fires around the same area. The farms limits have since been modified on the CAR system to exclude the embargoed area.

Ferri has accumulated millions of pounds in fines, some of which were handed out after he broke previous embargoes and none of which has been paid. The neighbouring farm is owned by a transport company run by his brother Edner in Paran state where Andr Ferri is also believed to live. Reached by phone on a Paran number, he refused to answer questions. Brazils justice system has been unable to locate him to formally notify him of any of his fines.

The firefighters headed deeper into the reserve to check an area that had been flagged for deforestation by satellites. Near a patch of houses there were freshly felled trees but no flames yet. They raced off again, passing a charred clump of felled forest, over a rocky ridge and through more cattle farms before parking near a clearing pockmarked with blackened logs and trunks.

Officials first came here last August following a deforestation alert and found a wooden house under construction, which they destroyed. Days later, the area was set on fire. The flames spread for miles and firefighters took days to bring the blaze under control. This is an enormous loss for the environment, one firefighter said. It will take hundreds of years to recover.

As the fires raged, a woman calling herself Nair Brizola drove up to Brazilian reporters and told them that ICMBio officials had started it. Her story was widely circulated by Bolsonaro supporters and the president ordered an investigation. In 2015, nearly 2,000 hectares of land including the scorched clearing where we stood was registered on the CAR system under the name Nair Rodrigues Petry. They are the same person. As Nair Brizola, Petry stood for the council of a town 150km away and had offered a similar plot of land for sale on Facebook for around 500,000.

Brizola/Petry has since been fined 221,000 for destroying 71 hectares of forest using fire. In a telephone interview on the same mobile phone number that appeared on the Facebook land sale advert, Petry said she had documents proving the land had been hers since 2001. When they came and created this reserve, we were already there, she said. Nobody is a crook. She repeated her accusation that ICMBio officials had started the fire, denied offering the land for sale and has not paid the fine.

Petry said she was only just beginning to mess with the land. In the future, the only thing we could do is pasture, she said, meaning more cattle. If I leave there, and leave it all abandoned, someone else will go in.

Brazilian meat companies have complex systems in place to prevent them buying from Amazon farmers facing fines and embargoes, like Andr Ferri. But farmers can avoid those checks by selling cattle to other farms for fattening, who then sell on to slaughterhouses a triangulation process some environmentalists have dubbed cattle laundering. Pressure is growing on meat companies that are largely unable to monitor all their indirect suppliers. In the case of one company, Marfrig, indirect suppliers provide more than half of its cattle supplied from the Amazon.

Research by Holly Gibbs, a professor of geography at the University of Wisconsin who monitors Amazon cattle supply chains, has found that from 20172019 there were at least a hundred properties in the Jamanxim forest raising cattle 68 of them indirect suppliers. Gibbss team found another 27 properties in Serra do Cachimbo involved in cattle production from 20172019, including 25 that were indirect suppliers.

We had our answers: the farms we had managed to reach had illustrated the whole process. Fires three times more common in Amazon cattle farming areas are used to clear forest for pasture. Fragile law enforcement means fines are ignored. And when the loopholes that allow farmers to sell cattle raised on illegally burned or deforested land are taken into account, the future for Novo Progressos forests is not bright. Instead, it is black with smoke.

It was dark when the firefighters convoy left, bouncing back down dirt tracks. A huge fire lit up the night sky: Petrys neighbours burning more trees, the firefighters said. It was dark, and there was nothing they could do. We know why Amazon forests like this burn, but given Brazils current political situation, there are no solutions in view.

More here:
Forest fire season is coming. How can we stop the Amazon burning? - The Guardian