What's on your mind?

Will_Workout_for_food wrote: »

mustacheU2Lift wrote: »

Thinking im going to regret this.

no u wont, just eat it

777Gemma888 wrote: »

xFunctionalStrengthx wrote: »

The sad part is that CA either burns, or washes away in mudslides depending upon the season. April '17, I spent a weekend in an area just north of Fresno and there was almost 4" of standing water. Just a couple months later, it was burning.

Hope all these fires are contained soon ... That firefighters return safely to their families and that ample resources are made available to kill the embers, so it doesn't lie dormant and reignite this time next year, to finish the destruction.

What typically causes the fires are things such as lightning strikes, discarded lit cigarette butts tossed out windows, broken glass, careless people burning things, or even just a passing vehicle that sends a spark into the scrub brush alongside a road.

Unfortunately, there's a lot of issues with CA and other states with similarly dry brush: The never do controlled burns in/around populated areas. So, there's years, if not decades of scrub brush that lays around and is like kindling. Contrary to popular belief, fire can be a good thing. It burns off the scrub brush that chokes out other plant life, and provides rich nourishment to the ground. Some plants require high heat to drop seeds. The burning of the brush also helps to control brush fires, such as the Western states are experiencing now.

People also need to do their part to help prevent and control fires. They need to remove brush, sticks, etc from around their homes. Don't leave anything highly flammable such as patio cushions, umbrellas, etc out that an ember that's been in the air for over a mile can drop on and ignite. City planners and engineers also need to better design cities and residential areas to not be so susceptible to burning.

The last couple of years has really opened the eyes of poor design and planning. But, sadly the fires will still continue.

@Functional_Strength Thank you very much for going in depth, with reference to the proper terminologies and descriptors of California’s biome as the kindling to what causes our fires. The environmental structure-fail is designed by nature to annihilate and restore itself, albeit via a destructive path.

From my earliest memories of having viewed multiple cowboy movies, I’d always wanted to see those dry rolling tumbleweeds live. Think, a romanticised dreamscape of me plus tumbleweed and dry arid winds. Don't even ask. Lol. It worked, hey, here I am. Only now, it’s so rampant that if you’re driving, running, walking and the winds pick up, they appear out of nowhere. What the movies don’t clue-in on, is that it is nasty. Not so easy to handle. They are wirey like barbed wire, yet thick like a thicket.
You don’t want that caught up in a stroller or to jam your foot right into one, as you attempt to block it from hitting you. They can be aerial and projectile. Add fire to it, very dangerous. I concur from this small element of non-brush@dry rolling tumbleweed, but rather, a free roaming nuisance, combined with poor town planning & engineering, compounds fire damage.

If only all these gated tract communities were required to install more than just fire hydrants. In the Calabasas CA gated community we'd lived in, the cliffs were fitted with heavy duty sprinklers. Once fires erupted near Las Virgenes or the 101, the guards at the back gate could switch them on, saturating the area close to where fire had erupted. Installing fire retardant protocols as a safety measure reduces the risk, does it not?

Knowing California fauna as you do Functional, is there any truth to the damaging effects of what is purported to be non-native California plants aiding the spread of fire? Namely an Australian breed of brush to tree, which was transplanted into the forest in the ‘70s, supposedly anti-erosion?

I like Kern County. Their dairy farms produce the best tasting milk in Northern or Southern California. Great people too. A fairly large number of my friends families originated from Kern County.😊

rickswifey83 wrote: »

AliNouveau wrote: »

Another shooting. What's happening this summer?!?!

What?!? Where?

DeadliftsAndSprinkles wrote: »

I love not being able to go to my profile page and not being able to see my newsfeed or diary

cee134 wrote: »

Vikka_V wrote: »

I still can't access my profile - I'm sick of looking at my smile

You can change it on your phone.

DeadliftsAndSprinkles wrote: »

Vikka_V wrote: »

DeadliftsAndSprinkles wrote: »

I love not being able to go to my profile page and not being able to see my newsfeed or diary

Me too. I emailed them and they said it's a known problem 🙁

I know that I am not even remotely close to being able to build and maintain a website with thousands of users but up until a few months ago I never had a problem so I'm not sure what's gone on.

caco_ethes wrote: »

Vikka_V wrote: »

DeadliftsAndSprinkles wrote: »

I love not being able to go to my profile page and not being able to see my newsfeed or diary

Me too. I emailed them and they said it's a known problem 🙁

I haven’t seen my profile since April 😑