Yesterday, Sunday 18th of February 2018, our forest ranger came to León in order to buy supplies. On the difficult route, his motorcycle hit a stone and the engine oil pan got cracked. Just when we sat and discussed the repair options he got a call from his brother, who takes over in his absence. The northern neighbor finca at the foot of the mountain was lit in fire and the wind was driving the fire front rapidly towards Los Cascabeles.
We handed him over our digital camera instructed him to take pictures while fire fighting and then Nadia took him as close to the finca as possible with our small Suzuki Alto – about 5 kilometers north, He had to go on foot the rest of the way for today.
He called in late night and told us, that they were able to put out almost all fire spots and that the wind had calmed down. The fire damaged about 500 meters of fence and at some places advanced up to 50 meters into Las Cascabeles, but we got away with moderate damage this time.
Thanks to the supporters of our fund raising campaign at GoFundMe we are able to afford the firefight.
This time it was not the poachers. It was the foreman of the other finca who lit fire on the land, in order to “clean the rubbish” – as they say to grass and undergrowth. He didn’t care about the wind, about weekend, about the material damage on our side and less about the animals and trees burnt down and to death, as witnessed by our forest ranger.