THE Falkland Islands Thread (merged)

[dolanbaker]

"two bald men fighting over a comb"

I still don't get why it's so depopulated. They have fishing, sheep, now oil. I saw a documentary on the Falklands (I like obscure subjects), seemed like they actually have a good amount of land down there, certainly for more than 3,000 people.
.

For one very simple reason ISOLATION!
It's a remote group of islands far away from where you live and ever further away away from where I live.

[rockdoc123]

Well.. you're forgetting the previous right wing government utterly wrecked the country to point of economic collapse in 2001 (in cahoots with American and Euro banksters).

no, that is why I said the educated working class are tired of the cycles of booming economy followed by collapse....they seem to go through it every ten years the '01 collapse being the last one. The gov't now is not making any better desicions than were made back in the early 2000's

I don't know what's been going on there since then. Default was a good idea, if they've gone too socialist then that was a mistake all they needed was that default reset and then root out corruption (which can never be done in Latin America, good luck).

Most economists in Argentina would argue that default was the worst possible thing for Argentina...they have never really come back. There economy is booming but it is pretty much a false economy with lots of gov't intervention...no free market here. It is really too bad because it is a beautiful country with lots of natural resources. They can export beef and soya products and the tourism industry could boom if they would let it. They likely have more shale gas than the US but it is doubtful they will access any of it in the next number of years unless they put policies in place to encourage foreign investment

[KingM]

"two bald men fighting over a comb"

I still don't get why it's so depopulated. They have fishing, sheep, now oil. I saw a documentary on the Falklands (I like obscure subjects), seemed like they actually have a good amount of land down there, certainly for more than 3,000 people.
.

For one very simple reason ISOLATION!
It's a remote group of islands far away from where you live and ever further away away from where I live.

So is New Zealand. The Falklands are also cold. Not numbingly cold in the winter like places in North America, but it never ever gets warm, either. The record high is only 75/24 F/C.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falkland_islands#Climate

[SeaGypsy]

NZ is huge, you could spend a lifetime exploring NZ and not see every forest, hot springs, glacier, reef and island, mountain top. The northernmost part is sub-tropical, with highs near 90/36 in summer, the arch spreads from this through temperate, marine to the edge of sub antarctic, parallel w/ Falklands, which is comparatively a few bare rocks in the middle of an icy windy ocean.

[rockdoc123]

NZ is huge, you could spend a lifetime exploring NZ and not see every forest, hot springs, glacier,

One of my fond memories of NZ was visiting Franz Joseph glacier in the middle of what seemed to be typical weather there, clouds down to the ground and continuous light rain (reminded me of Scotland). The humorous part of the story was I saw 5 Keas (those huge green parrots that are indigenous) walking down the road to the glacier like so many sailors rolling along. I guess it was even too wet for them to fly. Didn't keep the wee bastards from nibbling on my bicycle tires that night though!

[SeaGypsy]

They are flightless, so path of least resistance, then they are there more often than anyone else, territorialism.

[yeahbut]

Hi sg, I think that might be kakapo you're thinking of, kea are great fliers altho they do a lot of walking about as well. I loved rockdoc's description of them as rolling along like sailors, that describes perfectly their hilarious rocking gait. They are incredibly cheeky and curious and will peel the rubber off your wind screen wipers and window seals in no time at all if they feel like it.

Farmers used to kill them in the bad old days, in fact the govt actually paid a bounty for their skins at one point because they have been known, very occasionally, to peck at the backs of sheep to get at the fat, which results in a most unpleasant death for the sheep. Wisdom has prevailed for a long time now and they are fully protected- recognition that they have been here for 20 million years, and humans and their livestock for 200...

Kakapo are another matter, they must be among the most bizarre and lovable birds on the planet. They are unique both in being a flightless parrot, and nocturnal. They are very friendly(not a good idea when humans, cats, rats and ferrets turn up!), and have the most ridiculously elaborate and impractial courtship rituals imaginable. In short, they could only possibly have evolved in a crazy, isolated ecosystem with no mammalian predators at all.

For a giggle, check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T1vfsHYiKY to see a kakapo that was accidently imprinted on humans when it was raised as a chick many years ago. Techniques have since improved, so that this doesn't happen anymore, but as a result of his upbringing Sirrocco the kakapo is not interested in other kakapo at all, only humans, and takes a particularly amorous interest in the unfortunate biologist in this clip

Well I guess I have derailed threads worse than this before, but surely not by much. Apologies, and back to the pressing matter of some frozen rocks in the south atlantic