A view of Gahar Lake

Barg-e Sabz (Green Leave) Society, a non-governmental organization in Doroud city in a letter warned the Department of Environment about the critical status of Gahar Lake.
The letter, a copy of which was faxed to IRNA, says the lake, which is known as the most beautiful mountainous freshwater lake in Iran and the Middle East, is in critical conditions resulting from human intervention.
Sightseers have destroyed the vegetation surrounding the lake, brining about soil erosion and causing mud to enter the water. The situation has caused algae, reeds and indigenous weeds to colonize the water and the wet ground, stressing or suffocating aquatic life.
A 10-kilometer road leading to the lake from the Aligoodarz city was illegally built in 2002-03, triggering an influx of sightseers to the lake and inflicting irreversible damage on the protected area.
Industrial and domestic wastewater, soil erosion and construction activities in watersheds can over-stimulate the growth of algae, which depletes oxygen from water and harms aquatic life.
The letter has also referred to constructions in the vicinity of the lake, lack of environmental guards for patrolling the region and preventing the entry of tourists in certain seasons, garbage dumping and littering, as well as lack of an efficient environmentally friendly management as other parameters leading to the steady degradation of the lake’s ecosystem.
The society has called for rejuvenating the destroyed regions by planting trees, banning visits to the site for a few years, accelerating watershed management projects, prohibiting constructions in the locality, assigning more guards, and preventing fishing or hunting activities in the protected regions of Oshtoran-Kooh and Gahar Lake for at least a decade as alternatives for saving the lake.
Located on the slopes of Oshtoran-Kooh Mountain 35 km off Doroud, Gahar Lake has an altitude of 2,500 meters above sea level. With a length of about 1,700 meters and a width of 800 meters, the lake is as deep as 30 meters in certain spots.
The lake was discovered by Austrian geologist A. Rudler in 1888.

Seven million saplings have been planted in industrial areas nationwide since 1997, up from only one million trees, deputy minister of industries and mines said.
Addressing a national conference attended by managers of green areas of industrial parks, Valiollah Afkhami, added that creating greenbelts and spaces by employing modern irrigation systems is high on the agenda.
Afkhami, who is also managing director of Small Industries and Industrial Parks Organization, further noted that workers spend one-third of their lives in factories and have the right to fresh air and clean environment.
Afkhami noted that there are 28 trees for each laborer in industrial parks, which is more than the per capita green space in certain urban areas.

Director general of Tehran Department of Environment said more than 10 hectares of Khajir and Sorkheh Hessar national parks were gutted by fire over the past month.
Mohammad Hossein Pirasteh who suspects arson at the parks told ISNA that the fire devoured areas which used to be a habitat for rams, ewes and goats, destroying wildlife food reserves.
He warned that such incidents would cause wildlife population to shrink and make their natural habitats insecure.
Pointing out that the environmental guards extinguished the fire in collaboration with the Tehran Fire Department and Municipality, the official asked sightseers to help safeguard the environment.
Pirasteh gave assurances that environmental guards would seriously deal with the violators.

Flocks of terns descend on the island to lay eggs each year.

Four species of terns have started to lay eggs on Shidrou Island, Hormuzgan province, an expert with the provincial department of environment said.
Talking to ILNA, Nader Hamidi said the species include the white cheek, the black, the lesser and the greater crested terns.
Eggs have been found in most of the birds’ nests on the island.
He noted that flocks of egg-laying sea swallows descend on Shidrou Island every year.
Migration to the island starts in late March and the egg-laying and hatching season lasts until late August, he explained.
Hamidi said the island is the region’s sole habitat for egg-laying terns and is therefore of high ecological value.
“Some 41,000 terns were counted flying over Shidrou Island“, he noted.
He said that the island is uninhabited and its intact nature makes it a safe haven for the sea swallows.
Branded as a wildlife sanctuary, the island in being protected by the Department of Environment, and has been registered in the 1971 Ramsar Convention on International Wetlands.

Green turtles are on the verge of extinction.

Seven green turtles which had been trapped in the water softening pool of the Ports and Shipping Organization in the port city of Chabahar were released, an expert in reptiles and aquatics of the Department of Environment’s (DoE) Office for Wildlife Affairs said. Asghar Mobaraki told IRNA the turtles which had been sucked into in the pool in their early lives were rescued by DoE experts.
“Despite lack of proper nutrition, the green turtles, which had been ensnared for six years, had grown into big but slim creatures,“ he said.
Green turtles are on the verge of extinction and their existence is threatened by various environmental factors.
“Currently, the water softening pools have turned into a major threat to the aquatic creatures for they have no protective nets and can drag and kill small turtles,“ he added.
The trapped turtles were released in the Sea of Oman after undergoing biometric examinations and being tagged.
The rescue measures were carried out with the cooperation of Chabahar Department of Environment and the Ports and Shipping Organization.

Floriculture in Eram Botanical Garden, Shiraz, Fars province (Photo by Oshin D. Zakarian)

Orangutans and gibbons, two species threatened with extinction, are still traded and kept as pets in Indonesia despite their protected status, a wildlife conservation group said, AFP reported
Surveys of animal markets on Indonesia’s main islands of Java and Bali between 1994 and 2003 found a total of 559 orangutans and gibbons on sale, said a report by TRAFFIC, a conservation group affiliated to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).
The actual number of animals sold from the markets however are largely unknown, the report said.
“Indonesia is full of rare or unique species and therefore is a major source for legal or illegal trade,“ said Chris Shepherd, TRAFFIC’s regional program officer for Southeast Asia. “The trade is not going to stop. The penalties are not deterrent,“ he said.
Trade in orangutans and gibbons is prohibited under Indonesian law, which categorizes the two species as protected. Violators could be fined up to 100 million rupiah ($10,455) and jailed for five years.
However, people who hunt, keep and trade in orangutans and gibbons are rarely punished, with fewer than 10 percent of culprits actually prosecuted, the TRAFFIC report said.
In Indonesia “trade is displayed openly. It is not done in dark alleys during the night. Law enforcement is almost lacking,“ said Vincent Nijman, the author of the report.
The report said Indonesia may be losing 1,000 Borneo orangutans every year, or up to three a day, because of trade on Java and Bali.
There are estimated to be only 40,000 Borneo orangutans in the wild in Indonesia.
For all species, the prices of infants are considerably higher than those of adults, TRAFFIC said. A gibbon can fetch $88 while orangutans are about four times more expensive.

Baby crocodiles squirm around a holding tank at the Continental crocodile farm in Villanuevea, Hondurance.

A writhing mass of crocodiles slithers out of a muddy pond, the animals snapping their blood-spattered jaws shut on hunks of raw horsemeat and gulping them down in one, Reuters reported.
Luis Reyes, manager of the Cocodrilos Continental crocodile farm in northwestern Honduras, hopes to attract busloads of tourists for the adrenalin-packed experience, held every week.
Yet visitors might be less enthusiastic to learn that for the 1,000 crocodiles wallowing in the farm’s mud-filled ponds, there are another 9,000 who will never see the light of day.
Instead, they go from an incubator shed to pitch-black swelteringly hot “fattening tanks“--artificially heated to make the hatchlings grow faster. Once fully grown they are taken out, killed and skinned to make handbags.
What set out to be a conservation project in the 1990s amid concern that hunting was killing off the native population of American crocodiles, or Crocodylus Acutus, has become a lucrative business that so far has not returned even one of the reptiles to the wild.
The farm is approved by CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, as a project that does not endanger the species. Yet many question the ethics of breeding exotic species merely to be made into luxury goods.
“We originally captured 320 wild crocodiles and today we have 10,000,“ Reyes says proudly. “We are hoping for 6,000 births this year and our goal is 25,000 births annually.“
The farm does not appear to use brutal killing methods reported by animal rights groups at other farms around the world, such as clubbing reptiles to death or skinning them alive and leaving them to die slowly in agony.
The crocodiles look healthy and Reyes says they are killed with a quick shot in the back of the neck before skinning.
Yet animal protection groups such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, say breeding for fashion is wrong, especially without controls on conditions.
“Factory farming is inherently cruel, even if animals aren’t being killed with baseball bats,“ said Lisa Franzetta at US-based PETA.
Staff at the Honduran farm monitor the breeders--some 900 females grouped into 140 ponds with one male in eachÐ-and remove and incubate any eggs within hours of them being laid.
Once hatched, the babies are crammed, hundreds at a time, into stifling brick and aluminum tanks where sunlight only pierces the darkness when the hatchlings are fed or hosed down with soapy water. They spend three to four years there.
“We change their metabolism so they grow faster. In the wild they grow 1 foot a year, here it’s 3 feet,“ says Reyes, explaining the use of heating and daily feeds.
Once matured, a few lucky ones with skin defects go into the breeding ponds. The rest become handbags, belts and shoes.

Premature fall color in Tehran trees has been prevented thanks to timely irrigation and fertilization.

Broadleaf trees in Tehran have not exhibited premature fall color despite an abrupt rise in summer heat this year, thanks to timely irrigation and proper fertilization of trees, managing director of the Municipality’s Parks and Green Areas Organization said.
Ali Mohammad Mokhtari told ISNA that each year, broadleaf plants develop a premature fall color or drop leaves as they come under stress from heat or dry periods.
“Such behavior is avoidable through apt protection and enhancement of the trees against the heat during summer,“ he observed.
Mid-summer leaf drop or early coloration occurred in a small number of trees in Tehran since the municipality shortened the irrigation intervals and improved the soil by phosphate fertilizers, the official stated.
Pointing to the municipality’s guidelines on planting species more adaptable to the environment, Mokhtari expanded that the organization exerts efforts to plant fruit-bearing vigorous trees which can resist inversion.
“Over one million olive trees were planted across Tehran which will bear fruit in four years,“ he revealed, concluding other species such as walnut and berry trees were planted across the capital and in the city’s greenbelt project.