Ham Wall is an English wetland and National Nature Reserve located 4
kilometres (2.5 mi) west of Glastonbury on the Somerset Levels. It is
managed by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, which helps
coordinate conservation issues across the Somerset Levels as part of the
Avalon Marshes Partnership. The reserve was constructed originally to
provide reed bed habitat for the bittern, which in 1997 was at a low
population level in the UK. The site is divided into sections with
independently controllable water levels, and machinery and cattle are
used to maintain the quality of the reed beds. The reserve hosts
important breeding populations of the rare little bittern and great
white egret, and has other uncommon animals and plants. Potential future
threats may include heavy summer rains and extensive flooding. Sea level
rise may make drainage more difficult, and current water pumping
facilities may become inadequate.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ham_Wall>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1909:
Ernest Shackleton, leading the Nimrod Expedition, planted the
British flag 97.5 nautical miles (180.6 km; 112.2 mi) from the South
Pole, the farthest south explorers had reached at the time.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farthest_South>
1972:
Seawise University, formerly RMS Queen Elizabeth, an ocean
liner that sailed the Atlantic for Cunard Line, caught fire in Victoria
Harbour, Hong Kong.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Queen_Elizabeth>
1991:
Representatives from the United States and Iraq met at the
Geneva Peace Conference to find a peaceful resolution to the Iraqi
invasion of Kuwait.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Peace_Conference_%281991%29>
2015:
Contaminated beer served at a funeral in Tete Province,
Mozambique, killed 75 people and made at least 230 others ill.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozambique_funeral_beer_poisoning>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
cryptodepression:
(geography, limnology) The portion of a lake which lies below sea level.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cryptodepression>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Together with the rest of the world, let us resolve to move
forward from the beginnings we have made. Let us continue to bring down
the walls of hostility which have divided the world for too long, and to
build in their place bridges of understanding — so that despite
profound differences between systems of government, the people of the
world can be friends. Let us build a structure of peace in the world in
which the weak are as safe as the strong — in which each respects the
right of the other to live by a different system — in which those who
would influence others will do so by the strength of their ideas, and
not by the force of their arms. Let us accept that high responsibility
not as a burden, but gladly — gladly because the chance to build such
a peace is the noblest endeavor in which a nation can engage; gladly,
also, because only if we act greatly in meeting our responsibilities
abroad will we remain a great Nation, and only if we remain a great
Nation will we act greatly in meeting our challenges at home.
--Richard Nixon
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon>
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