John, as far as I remember the Dai in Sipsongpanna (Xishuangbanna) hold their New Year (or what the atheist Chinese call “Water splashing festival”) in April as well. I then wonder how a Mon/Khmer tradition could have gone up that far and leave the Tai Long totally unaffected (The Khuen seem to have a Songkran, however). It would be interesting to know when the animist Tai Dam celebrate their new year….
Regardless from this splashing with water in that hot month makes totally sense. The Shan must be scorchering without watersplashing 🙂
As long as the focus of public debate is on
water supply, the regulatory focus will be on those resident in the forested upland areas that are seen as being crucial in securing downstream flows.
This reminds me of the present situation with the Murray.. (Infact it reads like the diversion debate between Malcolm Turnbull and the States at the moment.. haha)
Probably it’s an ill-informed idea, but there ought to be plenty of data available regarding the removal of mangroves in SA along the Murray and water quality..? Possibly its not upstream enough for a good comparison, but then that also could be do to with irresponsible NSW & QLD farmers! 😛
Thank you for your wishes and I wish the New Mandala team a safe and happy Songkran and Thingyan as well. I haven’t been on a Songkran in Thailand since I was six years old, so I don’t have a imagination how wild this celebration has become. I try to get to the local Songkran here in London which I reckon to be tamer than over there.
Swasdee Pee Mai Thai
Here’s a question though. It’s billed as Thai New Years. Two or three years ago I was in Chiang Tung on November 16 and was told it was Tai Yai New Years. Apparently a moveable feast that’d been standardized by the Burmese. Coincides more or less with Loi Krathong.
So is Songkron, the feast in the middle of the dry season, the Mon/Khmer New Year adopted by the Central Thai and the feast at the end of the rainy season, post harvest, the Tai New Year? Or not?
[…] readers will recall that back in March, Andrew and I made a post titled “A Thai Studies Boycott?” which asked some questions of the 2008 Thai Studies conference to be held at Thammasat […]
This is indeed a surprise – the speed at which the pardon has come about. I wonder if all the YouTube hoopla had anything to do with it?
Come to think of it, this saga has provided an insight into the leanings of the Palace. Why did the Palace pardon him at this time after the verdict and sentence had been handed down? If the Palace had always thought this saga was an overreaction for overzealous local officials, why didn’t they intervene quietly earlier, before the case even went before the courts and attracted international attention? Does it prove that the Palace believes the lese majeste law is still a useful tool, and the Jufer case serves as an example/reminder that, at the end of the day, you are at the mercy of their whim?
If I was a King, I’d want Lese Majeste Laws too, no?
[…] I think it would be a good way to make a positive contribution and enjoy a holiday of a very … Comment on Wishful thinking about forests and water by Deathpower … […] read Andrew Walker’s post “Wishful Thinking About Forests and Water” over at the excellent […]
The second half of the text, if taken literally, can be interpreted to mean “return clear water to the Mae Sa”. The message then would be that forest cover reduce soil erosion. I don’t think that is a controversial point.
Anyway, I don’t think you have enough data in your paper to draw any scientifically robust conclusion really. With the very sparse data you have, I don’t think a real card-carrying hydrologist would be so bold as to question that there is something amiss in the reasoning faculty of those who disagree with him.
I understand that to do this kind of study you need a very thorough, extensive, and expensive experiment. I don’t expect that to happen very soon in Thailand. For example, to me the ET argument is really a hand-waving argument. Looking into your references, looks like these numbers all come from simulation. Well, you will be well advised to take it with a grain of salt. There are tons of assumptions hidden under the rug, I’m sure. I’ll buy it if somebody can do, say, a real measurement with isotopic tracer like Oxygen 18, for exampe.
Anyway, sometimes people arrive at the right conclusion even with a ‘wrong’ way of thinking. And just as many times people arrive at the wrong conclusion even with the ‘right’ way of thinking.
The royal family may go about preserving the forest for all the wrong reasons, but I must say I’m quite happy with that.
Are you anti-forest? I think you’d say you are trying to direct our attention to the demand side of hydrology and the politics of what to spend the water on rather than on how to “create” more. But you seem unable to resist slamming the forests. Damn useless things are they? Ought to be wiped out? Certainly not rejuvenated!?
The picture does not remind me of any village anywhere in Thailand. The architecture does remind me of the first wave of improved bungalows on Koh Samui circa 1983. It also reminds me of a low security prison farm.
It’s very refreshing to have found a discussion about this topic that goes beyond the normal ranting.
I would like to point out that the Bangkok Post released on 11. April 2007 an interesting commentary on the lese majeste laws by David Streckfuss, who had earned a PhD on the issue of lese majeste and defamation in Thailand. Streckfuss – rightly, I think – argues that as this law is open to interpretation and can be used rather freely, it’s mostly used to attack political opponents. Streckfuss also suggests to add a clause that his law should only by applied “by order of the king of with his consent”.
I think LEE Kuan Yew is one of the greatest political leader to be respected in the whole world. Just look at the leaders of other countries. They all involved in some kind of corruption, sex scandals, cruelty etc, Lee Kuan Yew is the only one who can stand tall among them. I love LEE Kuan Yew! He is great! He deserves more than a Doctorate Degree from the world!
Calling him a jerk actually implies that he had control over what he did.
Well… I guess some people still fall for “the devil made me do it” as a defense. As a drunk who no longer drinks himself I do count myself lucky for having been able to quit. Lot’s of others die drunk, as perhaps Lufer will. But I cannot buy “my life is beyond my control” as sufficient to escape the consequences of one’s acts. To explain them, ok. I’m sure that Jufer is not a jerk at all… when he’s not drinking.
I am curious as to how the evapotranspiration numbers are arrived at in these studies that you cite. Did they do real in situ measurement? Or do they just guesstimate from what is known about the number and types of trees and their density and other more easily measureable quantities? Also, do they also account for recondensation? Water loss from the soil during evapotranspiration which happened much more during the day because of the photosynthesis-capillary pull is not necessarily all lost to a bottomless sink. I can imagine that the increased humidity from ET will lead to a feedback which has an inhibitory effect on further ET. Also, during the night, a lot of the lingering moisture is going to condense and drop back to the soil. Anyone who has done some camping in the forest of northern Thailand should notice that recondensation is quite considerable. You can get quite soaked by it. A well known case of this kind of effect is the coast redwoods of Northern California. These trees are very effective at capturing moisture from the air. Many studies have been done on these.
I don’t think this ET number will be an easy thing to arrive at with any kind of uncertainty unless somebody did some very extensive modeling or measurements. So, I’m not quite convinced of the given explanation that attribute the observed effect to increased ET in forest.
And what about these:
“the absolute level of dry season flow does not necessarily decline and it may increase.”
Is that another way of saying there is no correlation or the data is too noisy?
Anyway, I guess these days I am extra-cautious about any studies that claim certain yes/no things about the climate and the environment. The devil is always in the details.
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“Is Songkran fun?”
John, as far as I remember the Dai in Sipsongpanna (Xishuangbanna) hold their New Year (or what the atheist Chinese call “Water splashing festival”) in April as well. I then wonder how a Mon/Khmer tradition could have gone up that far and leave the Tai Long totally unaffected (The Khuen seem to have a Songkran, however). It would be interesting to know when the animist Tai Dam celebrate their new year….
Regardless from this splashing with water in that hot month makes totally sense. The Shan must be scorchering without watersplashing 🙂
“Is Songkran fun?”
I shoot my e-water pistol at you all!
Roadside hydrology
As long as the focus of public debate is on
water supply, the regulatory focus will be on those resident in the forested upland areas that are seen as being crucial in securing downstream flows.
This reminds me of the present situation with the Murray.. (Infact it reads like the diversion debate between Malcolm Turnbull and the States at the moment.. haha)
Probably it’s an ill-informed idea, but there ought to be plenty of data available regarding the removal of mangroves in SA along the Murray and water quality..? Possibly its not upstream enough for a good comparison, but then that also could be do to with irresponsible NSW & QLD farmers! 😛
“Is Songkran fun?”
Thank you for your wishes and I wish the New Mandala team a safe and happy Songkran and Thingyan as well. I haven’t been on a Songkran in Thailand since I was six years old, so I don’t have a imagination how wild this celebration has become. I try to get to the local Songkran here in London which I reckon to be tamer than over there.
Swasdee Pee Mai Thai
“Is Songkran fun?”
No. It’s not fun. But that’s just me.
Here’s a question though. It’s billed as Thai New Years. Two or three years ago I was in Chiang Tung on November 16 and was told it was Tai Yai New Years. Apparently a moveable feast that’d been standardized by the Burmese. Coincides more or less with Loi Krathong.
So is Songkron, the feast in the middle of the dry season, the Mon/Khmer New Year adopted by the Central Thai and the feast at the end of the rainy season, post harvest, the Tai New Year? Or not?
A Thai Studies boycott?
[…] readers will recall that back in March, Andrew and I made a post titled “A Thai Studies Boycott?” which asked some questions of the 2008 Thai Studies conference to be held at Thammasat […]
Pardon me, Jufer free
This is indeed a surprise – the speed at which the pardon has come about. I wonder if all the YouTube hoopla had anything to do with it?
Come to think of it, this saga has provided an insight into the leanings of the Palace. Why did the Palace pardon him at this time after the verdict and sentence had been handed down? If the Palace had always thought this saga was an overreaction for overzealous local officials, why didn’t they intervene quietly earlier, before the case even went before the courts and attracted international attention? Does it prove that the Palace believes the lese majeste law is still a useful tool, and the Jufer case serves as an example/reminder that, at the end of the day, you are at the mercy of their whim?
If I was a King, I’d want Lese Majeste Laws too, no?
Sign of the last days of the Thaksin government
[…] in November I posted a photograph of a sign near Thapae Gate in central Chiang Mai. It was a Thaksin-era billboard and, at the […]
Pardon me, Jufer free
If Juffer had been a Thai nobody would have cared of that story…
Crazy world.
Wishful thinking about forests and water
[…] I think it would be a good way to make a positive contribution and enjoy a holiday of a very … Comment on Wishful thinking about forests and water by Deathpower … […] read Andrew Walker’s post “Wishful Thinking About Forests and Water” over at the excellent […]
Roadside hydrology
The second half of the text, if taken literally, can be interpreted to mean “return clear water to the Mae Sa”. The message then would be that forest cover reduce soil erosion. I don’t think that is a controversial point.
Anyway, I don’t think you have enough data in your paper to draw any scientifically robust conclusion really. With the very sparse data you have, I don’t think a real card-carrying hydrologist would be so bold as to question that there is something amiss in the reasoning faculty of those who disagree with him.
I understand that to do this kind of study you need a very thorough, extensive, and expensive experiment. I don’t expect that to happen very soon in Thailand. For example, to me the ET argument is really a hand-waving argument. Looking into your references, looks like these numbers all come from simulation. Well, you will be well advised to take it with a grain of salt. There are tons of assumptions hidden under the rug, I’m sure. I’ll buy it if somebody can do, say, a real measurement with isotopic tracer like Oxygen 18, for exampe.
Anyway, sometimes people arrive at the right conclusion even with a ‘wrong’ way of thinking. And just as many times people arrive at the wrong conclusion even with the ‘right’ way of thinking.
The royal family may go about preserving the forest for all the wrong reasons, but I must say I’m quite happy with that.
Roadside hydrology
Are you anti-forest? I think you’d say you are trying to direct our attention to the demand side of hydrology and the politics of what to spend the water on rather than on how to “create” more. But you seem unable to resist slamming the forests. Damn useless things are they? Ought to be wiped out? Certainly not rejuvenated!?
Sufficiency design principles
The picture does not remind me of any village anywhere in Thailand. The architecture does remind me of the first wave of improved bungalows on Koh Samui circa 1983. It also reminds me of a low security prison farm.
Wishful thinking about forests and water
[…] for the comments on my previous post about forests and water. Forest hydrology is a complex issue and I hope that the paper I refer to in […]
The regime’s royal ridicule
Thailand blockt YouTube – Aktualisierung…
Translation of the discussion into German….
The regime’s royal ridicule
Oh well, I just saw that Streckfuss’s article is also available here: http://rspas.anu.edu.au/rmap/newmandala/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/streckfuss.doc
The regime’s royal ridicule
It’s very refreshing to have found a discussion about this topic that goes beyond the normal ranting.
I would like to point out that the Bangkok Post released on 11. April 2007 an interesting commentary on the lese majeste laws by David Streckfuss, who had earned a PhD on the issue of lese majeste and defamation in Thailand. Streckfuss – rightly, I think – argues that as this law is open to interpretation and can be used rather freely, it’s mostly used to attack political opponents. Streckfuss also suggests to add a clause that his law should only by applied “by order of the king of with his consent”.
“Lee Kuan Yew – ANU is not for you!”
I think LEE Kuan Yew is one of the greatest political leader to be respected in the whole world. Just look at the leaders of other countries. They all involved in some kind of corruption, sex scandals, cruelty etc, Lee Kuan Yew is the only one who can stand tall among them. I love LEE Kuan Yew! He is great! He deserves more than a Doctorate Degree from the world!
Pardon me, Jufer free
Calling him a jerk actually implies that he had control over what he did.
Well… I guess some people still fall for “the devil made me do it” as a defense. As a drunk who no longer drinks himself I do count myself lucky for having been able to quit. Lot’s of others die drunk, as perhaps Lufer will. But I cannot buy “my life is beyond my control” as sufficient to escape the consequences of one’s acts. To explain them, ok. I’m sure that Jufer is not a jerk at all… when he’s not drinking.
All three sides should have backed down.
Wishful thinking about forests and water
I am curious as to how the evapotranspiration numbers are arrived at in these studies that you cite. Did they do real in situ measurement? Or do they just guesstimate from what is known about the number and types of trees and their density and other more easily measureable quantities? Also, do they also account for recondensation? Water loss from the soil during evapotranspiration which happened much more during the day because of the photosynthesis-capillary pull is not necessarily all lost to a bottomless sink. I can imagine that the increased humidity from ET will lead to a feedback which has an inhibitory effect on further ET. Also, during the night, a lot of the lingering moisture is going to condense and drop back to the soil. Anyone who has done some camping in the forest of northern Thailand should notice that recondensation is quite considerable. You can get quite soaked by it. A well known case of this kind of effect is the coast redwoods of Northern California. These trees are very effective at capturing moisture from the air. Many studies have been done on these.
I don’t think this ET number will be an easy thing to arrive at with any kind of uncertainty unless somebody did some very extensive modeling or measurements. So, I’m not quite convinced of the given explanation that attribute the observed effect to increased ET in forest.
And what about these:
“the absolute level of dry season flow does not necessarily decline and it may increase.”
Is that another way of saying there is no correlation or the data is too noisy?
Anyway, I guess these days I am extra-cautious about any studies that claim certain yes/no things about the climate and the environment. The devil is always in the details.