Hundreds of migrants leave southern Mexico on foot in a new caravan headed for the US border

 Hundreds of migrants from around a dozen countries left from Mexico’s southern border on foot Sunday, as they attempt to make it to the U.S. border.

Some of the members of the group said they hoped to make it to the U.S. border before elections are held in November, because they fear that if Donald Trump wins, he will follow through on a promise to close the border to asylum-seekers.

“We are running the risk that permits (to cross the border) might be blocked,” said Miguel Salazar, a migrant from El Salvador. He feared that a new Trump administration might stop granting appointments to migrants through CBP One, an app used by asylum-seekers to enter the U.S. legally — by getting appointments at U.S. border posts, where they make their cases to officials.

...Migrants trying to pass through Mexico in recent years have organized large groups to try to reduce the risk of being attacked by gangs or stopped by Mexican immigration officials as they travel. But the caravans tend to break up in southern Mexico, as people get tired of walking for hundreds of miles (kilometers).

...Recently, Mexico has also made it more difficult for migrants to reach the U.S. border on buses and trains...MORE

A post-fire ‘nightmare’ in New Mexico: Eight floods in four weeks

 

...Ruidoso, a scenic town of nearly 8,000 in southern New Mexico, is now at the mercy of an enduring, double-barreled disaster. Two massive fires broke out last month along the mountains encircling the town, torching more than 25,000 acres, burning nearly a thousand homes and killing two people. Then, eight times and counting since June 21, including Saturday, floodwaters have cascaded down those same mountainsides into the village.

...It’s a worst-case scenario that may become more frequent as weather extremes intensify in the American West. Studies suggest climate change is increasing the risk that severe rainfall comes in the wake of wildfires. Increasingly hot and dry conditions breed fiercer blazes. Warming air can also hold more moisture, leading to more intense storms. The burn scars from fires can elevate the flooding risk for more than five years, as vegetation regrows.

The fires in June sheared hillsides of their evergreen trees and shrubs and even altered the composition of the soil, dramatically reducing its ability to absorb rainfall. Andrew Mangham, a National Weather Service hydrologist, said it was as if giant plastic sheets had been draped on the mountains, then covered with ash and tree trunks that would tumble down at the slightest invitation. The blazes came just in time for the state’s monsoon season — and suddenly even normal rainstorms could produce supercharged flash floods...more

Paralyzed mountain lion found in Colorado is first case of “staggering disease” in North America

In May 2023, a homeowner in Douglas County was astonished to find a partially paralyzed mountain lion taking cover between her basement window well and a spruce tree, dragging itself forward with its front paws. The year-old female couldn’t stand up, a phenomenon clear in the video the owner took while safely inside the house.

Wildlife officers tranquilized the debilitated lion, then euthanized her with a gunshot to the chest to protect brain cells for a necropsy. 

After a year of studying the animal, researchers are declaring her the first North American case of “staggering disease” in a mountain lion, according to Colorado State University veterinarian and former Colorado Parks and Wildlife pathologist Karen Fox.

The disease, caused by variants of the rustrela virus, makes a virulent attack on muscles and the nervous system and is more frequent in Europe. It was known best in European cats, especially in Sweden, but has now been found to attack mammals including cats, horses and possums...more