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Water SA
versión On-line ISSN 1816-7950
versión impresa ISSN 0378-4738
Water SA vol.37 no.1 Pretoria ene. 2011
Influence of land-use patterns on benthic diatom communities and water quality in the tropical Monjolinho hydrological basin, São Carlos-SP, Brazil
T Bere*; JG Tundisi
Instituto Internacional de Ecologia, Rua Bento Carlos, 750 Centro, São Carlos SP Brasil
The objective of this study was to determine the effects of land-use patterns on both diatom community composition and water quality in tropical streams during the dry season. Benthic diatom collections and water quality sampling were done 4 times at 10 sites. A suite of environmental variables that varied with human land-use pattern was assessed to find the combination of variables that best explained patterns of diatom community composition. Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA) was used to determine environmental gradients along which species were distributed. A clear relationship between both benthic diatom communities and water quality and land-use pattern was observed with species richness, diversity and evenness, decreasing significantly from the agricultural and forest area to the urban area. Upstream, forested, agricultural sites, with good water quality (BOD5 = 0.9 to 2.6 mg·ℓ-1, DO = 6.8 to 8.2 mg·ℓ-1, phosphate = >2 to 4.7 µg·ℓ-1), were characterised by Thalassiosira weissflogii, Orthoseira dentroteres, Meridion anceps, Melosira varians, Diatoma spp, Diadesmis contenta, Eunotia papillo, E. bilunaris, E. intermedia, E. sudetica, Aulacoseira alpigena, A. ambigua, Cymbopleura naviculiformis and Stauroneis phoenicenteron. Urban sites, with medium to bad water quality (BOD5 = ~7 mg·ℓ-1, DO = ~7 mg·ℓ-1, phosphate = 12.6 to 83.1 µg·ℓ-1), were characterised by Diadesmis dissimilis, Frustulia rhomboids, Nitzschia scalaris, Nitzschia linearis, Cyclotella pseudostelligera Neidium ampliatum, N. affine, Encyonema silesiacum, E. neomesianum, Aulacoseira granulata, Navicula cryptotenella, Pinnularia legumen, P. gibba, P. divergens, Surirella linearis, S. robusta, and Achnanthidium minutissimum. Downstream urban sites, with very bad water quality (BOD5 = 19.5 to 26.2 mg·ℓ-1, DO = 0.4 to 1.9 mg·ℓ-1, phosphate = 142.5 to 248.7 µg·ℓ-1), were characterised by Gomphonema parvulum, G. accuminatum, Nitzschia palea, Nupela praecipua, Sellaphora pupula, Planotidium lanceolata, Fallacia monoculata and Pinnularia subcapitata. Diatom communities demonstrated potential for acting as indicators of changes in water quality due to changes in catchment land-use patterns.
Keywords: land-use, benthic diatoms, environmental gradient, agricultural, forests, urban
Land-use a function of cultural and settlement patterns, economic factors and environmental characteristics (Robbins et al., 1983; Black et al., 1998) and water resources (hence biotic communities supported by these water resources) are unequivocally linked. For example, results from predominantly agricultural watersheds, with some forests and urban development. showed that land-use had a distinct overall and seasonal effect on water quality (Osborne and Wiley, 1988). Studies in Pinelands of New Jersey also showed substantial land-use effects on natural water quality because of agricultural development, urban densities, and domestic wastewater flow (Zampella, 1994). Nutrient concentration, particularly phosphorus, increases with urban development due to stormwater runoff (Osborne and Willey, 1988; Welch et al., 1998). Increase in nutrient concentration is also a result of other catchment activities, such as runoff from agriculture or sewage treatment plants.
Changes in water quality of lotic systems because of surrounding land-use patterns affects the resulting biotic communities, as the patterns of this biota are responsive to the nature of the prevailing physical and chemical conditions.
The integrity of biota inhabiting lotic ecosystems thus provides a direct, holistic and integrated measure of the ecological conditions of a system as a whole (Karr, 1991) and the effects of land-use patterns. The relationship between diatoms and water physical and chemical variables is robust and quantifiable, making diatoms appropriate quantitative indicators of ecological conditions in lotic systems (Pan et al., 1996; Oliveira et al., 2001; Zampella et al., 2007).
Growth and development of benthic diatoms in streams is an outcome of complex interactions between hydrological, chemical and biotic factors. Local factors such as hydrology, light, temperature and water chemistry are controlled by regional factors such as geology, topography or climate, operating at spatial scales of catchments as well as ecoregions (Biggs, 1990). In addition, human land-use activities act to change both local and regional variables at an increasing rate, affecting the resultant biotic communities. Winter and Duthie (2000) showed that the diatom community composition along an urban-rural gradient was correlated with total phosphorus and total nitrogen.
Many studies have related diatom community composition to environmental variation, mainly in the temperate regions (e.g. Biggs, 1990, 1995; Descy and Coste, 1991; Rocha, 1992; Pan et al., 1996; Lobo et al., 1998; Rott et al., 1998; Chessman et al.,1999; Loez and Topalian, 1999; Stevenson and Pan, 1999; Potapova and Charles, 2003, 2005; De la Rey et al., 2008). However, few studies have specifically focused on the effect of land-use patterns in tropical systems, particularly north of Brazil. Understanding the relationship between land-use patterns, water quality and diatom community composition in streams provides a useful starting point for establishing stream water quality control regulations, conservation goals, ecological restoration efforts, and research hypotheses, all necessary for management of Brazilian and other tropical lotic systems.
The objective of this study was to assess the response of stream diatom assemblages to changes in water quality associated with land-use, i.e., from agricultural and forest areas to urban areas. A suite of environmental variables that varied with human land-use pattern was assessed, in order to find the combination of variables that best explained patterns of diatom community composition.
Materials and methods
Study area
The study area is shown in Fig. 1. Headwaters of the study streams (Monjolinho, Gregório and Água Quente) fall mainly within an agricultural area. Apart from agricultural practices in the headwaters, the streams flow through an urban area of the city of São Carlos, which covers a total area of 1 143.9 km2. The area has rugged topography and an average annual temperature of around 19.5ºC, with a mean monthly maximum of 21.9ºC recorded in January and February and a mean monthly minimum of 15.9ºC recorded in July.
In 2008, the population of São Carlos was estimated to be 218 080 inhabitants (by Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (IBGE)). The current expansion of the city does not meet the technical standards for sewage treatment, garbage collection and urban drainage. Streams in the study area, therefore, receive untreated or semi-treated effluent from various domestic and industrial sources, as well as other diffuse sources, as they flow through the city. The city also expanded without considering environmental, geological and topographical factors, leading to deforestation, erosion, and siltation. This unplanned growth, typical for many Brazilian cities and most developing country cities, results in many problems, including stream health deterioration, loss of primary vegetation, and eutrophication (Dupas et al., 2006; Rörig et al., 2007).
Ten sites were established along Monjolinho River and its tributaries: 3 sites (1, 2 and 3) in the relatively less impacted agricultural and forested headwaters; 4 sites (4, 5, 6 and 7) in the moderately polluted urban area; and 3 sites (8, 9 and 10) in the highly polluted area downstream of the urban area (Fig. 1). The rationale in choosing the sampling sites was to cover a pollution gradient of all the stream systems, from relatively unpolluted agricultural headwaters to highly polluted urban downstream sites. Most of the area above upstream sites 1, 2 and 3 was mainly agricultural and characterised by mature deciduous riparian forest strips of about 5 to 50 m wide, with a mixture of pastures, homesteads and farmland beyond the riparian strip (Table 1). The area also had a low density of buildings, and much of the road network was unpaved. The area above Sites 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 was mainly urban with more residences along the streams, a mostly paved road network and reduced riparian strips dominated by grass. In some cases, the grass along the stream edges is continuously mown. Some sections of the streams are canalised. Land-use patterns were interpreted from Google Earth Satellite Image System, June 2005 (Fig. 1) using the classification of Anderson et al. (1976) with classes combined to form 3 broad categories (forest, agriculture, and urban).
Water quality
Water quality sampling was done during the dry season when flow was stable. Four sampling trips were undertaken, two in September and October 2008 and two in May and June 2009. The dry season was selected to avoid variable effects of the rainy season, such as large variations in water level and velocity, floods and inundations, which affect diatom development, especially growth rate and relative abundance of different species (Duong et al., 2006).
At each site, dissolved oxygen (DO), electrical conductivity, temperature, pH, concentration of total dissolved solids (TDS) and turbidity were measured using a Horiba U-23 and W-23XD Water Quality Meter (Horiba Ltd, Japan). The depth and current velocity were measured at each station with an FP 201 global flow probe (Global Water Instrumentation Inc. Alaska, USA). The percentage of riparian vegetation cover was estimated at each site. The percentage embeddedness (the degree to which large particles are covered with fine particles) was also estimated along each stretch and rated on a 0 5 scale following Platts et al. (1983). Altitude was determined at each site using a GPS (Northport Systems, Inc. Toronto, Canada). Light intensity was measured using LI-193 Spherical Quantum Sensor (LI-COR Worldwide, Brazil). Water samples for total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP), biological oxygen demand (BOD5), nitrate and phosphate analysis were also collected at each site into acid-cleaned polyethylene bottles following APHA (1988).
In the laboratory, the concentrations of TN, TP, BOD5, nitrate and phosphate in the water samples were determined following standard methods (APHA, 1988). BOD5, nitrate, phosphate, DO (per cent saturation), temperature, pH, turbidity and TDS were used for calculation of a water quality index (WQI), after Brown et al. (1970). This is a method of expressing water quality that offers a simple, stable and reproducible unit of measurement that responds to changes in the principle characteristics of water quality. In this system, the values are given numerical ranking in relation to selected control values for different parameters. The information is then used to compute the standardised distance from control values for each parameter, to produce an index of water quality calculated as the weighted average of variables. The water quality index was calculated; with modification due to absence of faecal coliform data, as follows:
Wi is the weight
Qi is the quality score of available variable i
WQI is a number between 0 and 100, with 90 to 100 = excellent, 70 to 90 = good, 50 to 70 = medium, 25 to 50 = bad and 0 to 25 = very bad (Brown et al., 1970).
Diatom sampling
Where possible, epilithic (growing on stones), epiphytic (growing on macrophytes), epipelic (growing on mud) and epipsammic (growing on sand) diatoms were sampled separately at each site. Epilithic diatoms were sampled by scraping stones with a toothbrush. Prior to sampling of epilithic surfaces, all substrata were washed with water ejected from a syringe or shaken in the stream to remove any loosely attached sediments and nonepilithic diatoms. At least 5 pebble-to-cobble (5-15 cm diameter) sized stones were randomly collected at each sampling site, scraped, and the resulting diatom suspensions pooled to form a single sample, which was then put in a labelled plastic bottle. Epiphytic diatoms were sampled after Fisher and Dunbar (2007). Epipelic and epipsammic diatoms were sampled by pressing a Petri dish lid into the top layer of sand or silt/clay to a depth of 5-7 mm, followed by sliding a spatula blade under the Petri dish to isolate the contents in the dish, which were then stored in a labelled container. Six samples were taken from each station and integrated into a single sample.
In the laboratory, sub-samples of the diatom suspensions were cleaned of organic material using wet combustion with concentrated sulphuric acid and mounted in Naphrax (Northern Biological supplies Ltd. UK. RI = 1.74) following Biggs and Kilroy (2000). Three replicate slides were prepared for each sample. Up to 600 valves per sample (depending on the abundance of diatoms) were identified and counted using the phase contrast light microscope (1 000 X). The diatoms were identified to species level based on studies by Metzeltin et al. (2005), Bicudo and Menezes (2006) and Metzeltin and Lange-Bertalot (2007).
Data analysis
Species diversity (H'), richness (S) and evenness (E) were calculated following Shannon (1949) and were used as measures of community structure. A nonparametric test, Kruskal-Wallis, analogous to analysis of variance, with Mann-Whitney pair-wise comparisons and Bonferroni correlation, was used to compare means of S, H' and E among substrates sampled, and among the 4 sampling seasons and 3 sampling site categories. The distributions of turbidity, conductivity, TDS, width, and embeddedness were positively skewed, and therefore were ln( × + 1) transformed (Zar, 1984). Two-way analysis of variance (two-way ANOVA) was used to compare means of environmental variables among the 4 sampling periods and among the 3 site categories.
Multivariate data analyses were performed on the diatom data set to indicate the main gradients of floristic variation and to detect and visualise similarities in diatom samples. Preliminary de-trended correspondence analysis (DCA) was applied to the diatom data set to determine the length of the gradient. This DCA revealed that the gradient was greater than 3 standard deviation units (4.2), justifying the use of unimodial ordination techniques (Ter Braak and Verdonschot, 1995). Thus, Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA) was used to investigate relationships between predictor variables and benthic diatom communities from different sites. Preliminary CCA identified col-linear variables and selected a subset on inspection of variance inflation factors (VIF< 20; Ter Braak and Verdonschot, 1995). Monte Carlo permutation tests (999 unrestricted permutations, p < 0.05) were used to test the significance of the axis and hence determine if the selected environmental variables could explain nearly as much variation in the diatom data as all the measured environmental variables combined. Input for the programme included the relative abundance of diatom taxa that were present in a minimum of 2 samples and had a relative abundance of >1% in at least 1 sample. All statistical analyses, DCA, CCA and Kruskal-Wallis, were performed using PAlaeontological STatistics (PAST) software Version 1.90 (Hammer et al., 2009).
Water quality
The values of the physical and chemical variables measured are shown in Table 2. The pH increased slightly down the agricultural to urban gradient, being slightly acidic at upstream sites and slightly alkaline/neutral at downstream sites. However, the difference in pH among the 3 site categories was not statistically significant (ANOVA, p > 0.05). Temperature increased downstream, but, as in the case of pH, the increase was not significant (ANOVA, p > 0.05). On the other hand, conductivity, BOD5, TDS, turbidity, light intensity, TN, TP, nitrate, phosphate and embeddedness increased significantly downstream (ANOVA, p < 0.05), while DO and percentage riparian vegetation cover decreased significantly downstream (ANOVA, p < 0.05). No significant differences were observed in mean environmental variables among the 4 sampling periods (ANOVA, p > 0.05). This is expected since all sampling was confined to a stable base flow period when variations in water chemistry are low compared to the rainy season. Therefore, the mean environmental variables of the 4 sampling periods at each site were used for subsequent analysis.
The water quality generally tended to deteriorate downstream, as the streams pass through the urban area, due to discharge of treated and untreated domestic and industrial effluent as well as other diffuse sources of pollution from the city (Fig. 2). The mean water quality of Sites 1, 2 and 3, situated in a forested agricultural area, as well as Site 7, was good (with excellent water quality at Site 1 during September and October 2008). Site 4 exhibited bad water quality while Sites 5 and 6 displayed medium water quality. On the other hand, the water quality of Sites 8, 9 and 10, situated after the urban area, was very bad.
Community structure
A total of 208 diatom species belonging to 63 genera were recorded. Twenty-two genera accounted for 91.7% of the overall diatom community. Of the 208 species observed, 82 species were retained for subsequent analysis (present in a minimum of 2 samples and had a relative abundance of >1% in at least 1 sample) (Table 3, next page).
Species richness, diversity and evenness differed significantly (Kruskal-Wallis, p < 0.05) among sampling sites, tending to be higher in upstream, relatively unpolluted and mainly agricultural and forested area, compared to downstream, polluted, mainly urban sites (Table 4). No significant differences (Kruskal-Wallis, p > 0.05) in S, H' and E were observed between the substrates sampled for the 4 sampling periods, except for species richness between the September and May and September and June samples (Table 5). Therefore, a pooled data set, consisting of diatoms sampled during 4 sampling periods and among 4 substrates, was used to investigate spatial trends in the composition of diatom communities.
Diatom community environment relationships
The results of the CCA are presented in Fig. 3. The first four axes of the species-environment plot accounted for 94.1% of the total variance in the community due to measured environmental variables (Table 6). Axis 1 and 2 explained 47.7% and 21.0%, respectively, of the diatom species variance. Monte Carlo unrestricted permutation test indicated that Axis 1 (99 permutations) and Axis 2 (99 permutations of Axis 2 with Axis 1 as a covariable) were statistically significant (p < 0.05). BOD5 and pH were positively associated with the first axis while DO and percentage canopy cover were negatively respectively associated with the first axis. pH was also positively associated with the second axis while stream velocity was negatively associated with the second axis.
CCA Axis 1 and 2 separated the sites into 3 groups along an agricultural to urban gradient (human-induced increase in nutrients and organic pollution and decrease in DO and percentage canopy cover). The first group consisted of forested and agricultural sites with good mean water quality, Sites 1, 2 and 3 that were negatively associated with the first and second axis in the bottom left quadrant (Fig. 3). These sites were associated with high canopy cover (which was negatively correlated to temperature, light intensity and mean stream width) and low BOD5 (which was positively correlated with TDS, TN, TP, nitrate, phosphate, conductivity and depth). Diatom species characterising these sites include species such as T. weissflogii, O. dentroteres, M. anceps, M. varians, Diatoma spp, D. contenta, E. papillo, E. bilunaris, E. intermedia, E. sudetica, A. alpigena, A. ambigua, C. naviculiformis and S. phoenicenteron.
The second group consisted of bad to medium water quality urban sites, Sites 4, 5 and 6, that were negatively and positively associated with the first and second axis, respectively, in the upper left hand quadrant. Site 7 was also placed in this group despite its good water quality. Diatom species characterising these sites include species such as D. dissimilis, F. rhomboids, S. robusta, N. scalaris, C. pseudostelligera N. ampliatum, E. silesiacum, E. neomesianum, N. affine, N. linearis, A. granulata, N. cryptotenella, P. legumen, P. gibba, P. divergens, S. linearis and A. minutissimum. The third group consisted of very bad water quality downstream, Sites 8, 9 and 10, positively associated with the first axis. These sites were associated with high nutrients and organic pollution, low percentage canopy cover and low DO. These sites were associated with such species as N. palea, G. parvulum, S. pupula,
N. praecipua, P. lanceolata, F. monoculata, P. subcapitata and G. accuminatum. These species have been reported to be pollution tolerant (Biggs and Kilroy, 2000; Potapova and Charles, 2003; Duong et al., 2006).
Diatom community structure showed a clear relationship with changes in water quality associated with changes in land-use pattern. For instance, species richness, diversity and evenness decreased along a forest and agricultural to urban land-use gradient (human-induced increasing nutrient and organic pollution gradient). Low pollution tolerant species, such as T. weissflogii, O. dentroteres, M. anceps, M. varians, Diatoma spp, D. contenta, E. papilla, E. bilunaris, E. intermedia, E. sudetica, A. alpigena, A. ambigua, C. naviculiformis and S. phoenicenteron were replaced by moderate pollution tolerant species such as D. dissimilis, F. rhomboids, S. robusta, N. scalaris, C. pseudostelligera N. ampliatum, E. silesiacum, E. neomesianum, N. affine, N. linearis, A. granulata, N. cryptotenella, P. legumen, P. gibba, P. divergens, S. linearis and A. minutissimum. The latter group of species was replaced by high pollution tolerant species such as N. palea, G. parvulum, S. pupula, N. praecipua, P. lanceolata, F. monoculata, P. subcapitata and G. accuminatu, which are known to be resistant to organic and high ionic strength and conductivity (Van Dam et al., 1994; Biggs and Kilroy, 2000; Potapova and Charles, 2003). These species have also frequently been recorded in waters that are nutrient rich and poorly oxygenated, with high electrical conductivity (Van Dam et al., 1994; Bere and Tundisi, 2009).
Researchers have reported different effects of land-use patterns on benthic diatom community structure, in terms of diversity and evenness. Cuffney et al. (1997) found that taxa richness of benthic-algal communities, with diatoms as a dominant component, did not show a strong relationship with land-use or water quality. Hill et al. (2001) concluded that diatom community structure has no predictable relationship with human-related watershed disturbances. However, Chessman et al. (1999) associated an increase in genus richness with increasing alkalinity, conductivity, hardness, and pH related to land-use pattern, and Hill et al. (2003) reported that diatom-species richness was positively correlated with total phosphorus and nitrogen also related to land-use pattern. This supports the results of the current study. Several other studies have also demonstrated the association of land-use with diatom community structure, in support of the present study (e.g. Morgan, 1987; Pan et al., 1996; Kutka and Richards, 1996; Leland and Porter, 2000; Carpenter and Waite, 2000; Salomoni et al., 2006).
Perhaps the study most relevant to the current study is that conducted by Gómez and Licursi (2001) on epipelic diatoms in the tropical streams of Argentina, in an environment similar to this study. They classified 88 diatom species frequently found in the epipelion of Pampean streams and rivers, based on ecological preferences according to water quality. Thirteen of these species were among the most frequently occurring species in our study (Table 3): A. minutisimum, A. copulata, E. silesiacum, F. capucina, G. angustatum, G. parvulum, H. amphioxys, N. cryptocephala, N. linearis, N. palea, N. recta, S. phoenicenteron, P. gibba and S. pupula. The distribution of all these species in relation to pollution was consistent with that described by Gómez and Licursi (2001).
The CCA results showed that BOD5 (also positively correlated with TDS, TP, TN, phosphate, nitrate, conductivity, turbidity, temperature and embeddedness) was important in structuring benthic diatom communities in the study area. Environmental monitoring studies in Southern Brazil (e.g. Oliveira et al., 2001; Lobo et al. 2002, 2004; Salomoni et al., 2006) showed that diatom communities in lotic ecosystems are a result of the interaction of variables characterising the process of organic contamination as well as eutrophication. In this study, highly eutrophic and high organic pollution sites, Sites 8, 9 and 10, had high relative abundances of such species as G. angustatum, G. parvulum, N. palea, N. praecipua and S. pupula. N. palea, G. parvulum, S. pupula, N. praecipua, P. lanceolata, F. monoculata, P. subcapitata and G. accuminatum. These species have been classified as typical for eutrophic and organically polluted environments (Kelly and Whitton, 1995; Van Dam et al., 1994). Numerous studies conducted on lotic benthic diatoms sampled in various countries have shown the influence of organic pollution (Sládecék, 1986; Salomoni et al., 2006), eutrophication (Kelly and Whitton, 1995; Ponader et al., 2007; Lavoie et al., 2008), and dissolved oxygen (Biggs and Kilroy, 2000; Potapova and Charles, 2003) in structuring of diatom communities.
Canopy cover (which was negatively correlated to temperature, light intensity, mean stream width and turbidity and is highly dependent on land-use patters) was also found to be important in structuring benthic diatom communities in the study area. This is because of the importance of light for diatom photosynthesis (Ter Braak and Van Dam, 1989; Biggs, 1990, 1995; Patrick and Hendrickson, 1993; Pan et al., 1996; Biggs and Kilroy, 2000; Carpenter and Waite 2000; Potapova and Charles, 2002, 2003, 2005). Diatom communities in forested agricultural sites were, thus, different from those from open urban sites.
However, stream velocity (not directly related to land-use pattern) was also found to be important in structuring diatom communities in the study area. Site 7 was grouped together with bad to medium water quality sites, Sites 4, 5 and 6, because of its low velocity, despite its good water quality. The importance of velocity in structuring benthic diatom communities has also been reported by other researchers (e.g. Biggs, 1990, 1995; Patrick and Hendrickson, 1993; Pan et al., 1996; Biggs and Kilroy, 2000; Potapova and Charles, 2005).
This study was made possible by the provision of funds from Third World Academy of Science (TWAS) through Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq). I also wish to thank the Instituto Internacional de Ecologia management and staff for their support during the course of this study.
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LOBO EA, CALLEGARO VLM, BENDER EP and ASAI K (1998) Water quality assessment of rivers of Southern Brazil using epilithic diatom assemblages. 15th Int. Diatom Symp. 28 September - 2 October 1998, Perth, Australia. [ Links ]
LOEZ CR and TOPALIAN ML (1999) Use of algae for monitoring rivers in Argentina with a special emphasis for Reconquista River (region of Buenos Aires). In: Prygiel J, Whitton BA, Bukowska J (eds) Use of Algae for Monitoring Rivers III. Agence de l'Eau Artois-Picardie, Douai, p. 72-83. [ Links ]
METZELTIN D and LANGE-BERTALOT H (2007) Tropical Diatoms of South America II. Iconographia Diatomologica 18 1-877. [ Links ]
METZELTIN D, LANGE-BERTALOT H and GARCÍA-RODRÍGUEZ F (2005) Diatoms of Uruguay. Iconographia Diatomologica 15 1-736 1-736. [ Links ]
MORGAN MD (1987) Impact of nutrient enrichment and alkalinisation on periphyton communities in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Hydrobiologia 144 233-241 [ Links ]
OLIVEIRA MA, TORGAN LC, LOBO EA and SCHARZBOLD A (2001) Association of periphytic diatom species of artificial substrate in lotic environments in the Arroio Sampaio basin, RS, Brazil: relationships with abiotic variables. Braz. J. Biol. 6 523-540. [ Links ]
OSBORNE LL and WILEY MJ (1988) Empirical relationships between land-use/cover and stream water quality in agricultural watershed. J. Environ. Manage. 26 9-27 [ Links ]
PAN Y, STEVENSON RJ, HILL BH, HERLIHY AT and COLLINS GB (1996) Using diatoms as indicators of ecological conditions in lotic systems: a regional assessment. J. N. Am. Benthol. Soc. 15 481-495. [ Links ]
PATRICK R and HENDRICKSON J (1993) Factors to consider in interpreting diatom changes. Nova Hedwigia Beihelf 106 361-377. [ Links ]
PLATTS WS, MEGAHAN WF and MINSHALL WG (1983) Methods for evaluating stream, riparian, and biotic conditions. General Technical Report INT-138, USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station. Ogden, UT. [ Links ]
PONADER KC, CHARLES DF and BELTON TJ (2007) Diatom-based TP and TN inference models and indices for monitoring nutrient enrichment of New Jersey streams. Ecol. Indic. 7 79-93. [ Links ]
POTAPOVA M and CHARLES DF (2002) Benthic diatoms in USA Rivers: distributions along speciation and environmental gradients. J. Biogeogr. 29 67-187. [ Links ]
POTAPOVA M and CHARLES DF (2003) Distribution of benthic diatoms in U.S. rivers in relation to conductivity and ionic composition. Freshwater Biol. 48 1311-1328. [ Links ]
POTAPOVA M and CHARLES DF (2005) Choice of substrate in algae-based water quality assessment. J. N. Am. Benthol. Soc. 24 415-427. [ Links ]
ROBBINS WG, FRANK RJ and ROSS RE (1983) Regionalism and the Pacific Northwest. Oregon State University Press, Corvallis. [ Links ]
ROCHA AA (1992) Algae as indicators of water pollution. In: Cordeiro-Marino M, Azevedo MTP, Santána CL, Tomita NY, Pastino EM (eds.) Algae and Environment: A General Approach. Sociedade Brasileira de Ficologia, CETESB, São Paulo. 34-55. [ Links ]
RÖRIG LR, TUNDISI JG, SCHETTINI CAF, PEREIRA-FILHO J, MENEZES JT, ALMEIDA TCM, URBAN SR, RADETSKI CM, SPERB RC, STRAMOSK CA, MACEDO RS, CASTRO-SILVA MA and PEREZ JAA (2007) From a water resource to a point pollution source: the daily journey of a coastal urban stream. Braz. J. Biol. 67 597-609. [ Links ]
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STEVENSON RJ and PAN Y (1999) Assessing environmental conditions in rivers and streams with diatoms In: Stoermer EF and Smol JP (eds.) The Diatoms: Applications for the Environmental and Earth Sciences. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. 11-40. [ Links ]
TER BRAAK CJF and VAN DAM H (1989) Inferring pH from diatoms: a comparison of old and new methods. Hydrobiologia 178 209-223. [ Links ]
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Received 1 March 2010; accepted in revised form 24 November 2010.
* To whom all correspondence should be addressed. 0055 (16) 3362 5400; fax: 0055 (16) 3362 5400; e-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com or firstname.lastname@example.com


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More than 20 years after the end of the Cold War, a sense of déjà vu is raising anew issues once thought settled. In Moscow, demonstrators are once again filling the streets, calling for an end to authoritarian rule – this time aimed at Vladimir Putin instead of the Communist Party. In Europe, resolution of the sovereign debt crisis on Berlin's terms has retrieved the "German question" from the ash can of history.
What happens next in Russia's version of the Facebook-driven Arab Spring will take some time to play out. German dominance of Europe, however, is already enough of a fact to prompt British Prime Minister David Cameron to opt out of any role in the future of a German-run European Union that would constrain British sovereignty.
Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher long ago saw the challenge Mr. Cameron would be facing. In a candid roundtable discussion about German unification and the end of the cold war with Francois Mitterrand, George H.W. Bush, and Mikhail Gorbachev published in the journal NPQ in 1995, Ms. Thatcher minced no words. "I was opposed to German unification from early on for the obvious reasons. To unify Germany would make her the dominant nation in the European community. They are powerful, and they are efficient," she said at the time.
Addressing Mr. Bush and Mr. Gorbachev, she continued: "President Mitterrand and I know. We have sat there at the table [with Germany] very often indeed. Germany will use her power. She will use the fact that she is the largest contributor to Europe to say, 'Look, I put more money in than anyone else, and I must have my way on things which I want.' I have heard it several times. And I have heard the smaller countries agree with Germany because they hoped to get certain subsidies. The German parliament would not ratify the Maastricht Treaty unless the central bank for a single currency was based there. What did the European Union say? Yes, you shall have it."
Thatcher said then what is surely on Cameron's mind today: "All this is flatly contrary to all my ideals. Some people say you have to anchor Germany to Europe to stop these features from coming out again. Well, you have not anchored Germany to Europe, but Europe to a newly dominant Germany. That is why I call it a German Europe."
In the 1995 discussion, neither Bush nor Gorbachev shared Thatcher's alarm. "I felt German unification would be in the fundamental interest of the West," Bush said. "I felt the time had come to trust the Germans more, given what they had done since the end of World War II." Despite the Soviet Union's early opposition to German unity, Moscow ultimately agreed. As Gorbachev put it: "President Bush was right about Germany. The Germans had accepted democratic values. They had behaved responsibly. They had recognized their guilt. They had apologized for their past, and that was very important. So, as difficult as it was to accept, it was inevitable that the Soviet leadership took decisions consistent with this reality."
The ultimate retort to Thatcher's historical anxiety has come from Poland, the country that suffered most at the hands of Germany. For Poland's current foreign minister, Radoslaw Sikorski, German strength is a welcome anchor for Europe as it faces down the global bond market and the specter of slowing growth.
"The biggest threat to the security and prosperity of Poland," Sikorski said in Berlin recently,"is not terrorism, not the Taliban, not German tanks, nor Russian missiles, but the collapse of the eurozone. ... I will probably be the first Polish foreign minister in history to say so, but here it is: I fear German power less than I am beginning to fear German inactivity. You have become Europe's indispensable nation. You must not fail to lead."
Thatcher and Sikorski are both right; their views are the flip side of the same euro coin. A Europe in which Germany is the indispensable nation is, in effect, a German Europe.
But a Germany ruled as it is today by the kind of democratic rectitude Thatcher would admire, not the maniacal recklessness of the Reich, is precisely the kind of anchor Europe needs.
Nathan Gardels is editor-in-chief of the Global Viewpoint Network/Tribune Media and NPQ. He is also a senior advisor to the Berggruen Institute.© 2011 Global Viewpoint Network/Tribune Media Services. Hosted online by The Christian Science Monitor.

subset: commoncrawl


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Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Neha got into a conversation with the horsemen, and finally struck the deal: eleven points to be covered at Rs 900 for two.
After the price was negotiated, we headed off to see the points. It was already 4pm and we had three hours in hand before darkness set in.
Our first halt was Artist Point. There was no signpost to indicate the location. Had we opted to walk here, we would not have been able to find it.
According to our guide-cum-horseman, the point used to be a source of inspiration for painters, hence the name Artist Point. There was a small podium here, offering a view of the lush jungle below. It was certainly a
sight that might inspire a painter to paint. Didnt find anything interesting to click, hence no fotos :(
We then headed off to see Pay Master Park. I wondered what was the story behind that name.


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Monthly Archives: July 2016
The Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchison – a Book Review
The Butterfly Garden by Dot Hutchison
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Dark Twisting, Thought Provoking. I loved this book.
How the story starts at the police station, and the way the story unravels by Maya sharing her experiences in the butterfly garden. The story line only reveals the shocking events, interwoven into the telling of her life story before and during her capture.
The Gardener as their capturer is known, is a complex man. Cherishing each girl and believing he is taking care of them, and that it is for the best for each of his butterflies to be in his garden. They will be loved, and kept forever young. He loves them and cherishes them, but also unleashes his sons on his garden.
Enter Desmond and Avery.
Two brothers who could not be more different in personality and temperament. The story unfolds into a very unusual kidnapping story, full of twists and turns that makes one question the morality and sanity of almost every character, and sometimes even of yourself. The story is complex, and will leave you with thoughts about the book for days afterwards. The whole book is too complex to unravel in your mind when the book ends.


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Check out the many benefits of partnering with Spherion to find your next job!
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Chill Me LUXE DRINK BOTTLE 500ML
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The brake light and anti lock light came on, what are some the causes so that I may
correct the problem ? Thank you in advance for any help you can give me .
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Meet our latest Barbershop Girl. Rachel loves animals and aspires to work in a animal shelter. With just below shoulder length hair, our resident Barber takes Rachel through 7 haircuts including a tapered blunt wedge, 1 inch pixie and the BSG signature high & tight clipper cut. This video is guaranteed to knock your socks off with over 70 minutes of exquisite haircut playtime.
Duration: 75 minutes
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Who could forget the first insane image from Superman Lives, the Tim Burton and Nic Cage Superman movie that never was. Cage was wearing the shiny skin of a 1990s action figure, his brown mane cascading down his shoulders. It was exactly the kind of wrong we craved from a Cage and Burton superhero project. Alas, it was not meant to be.
Recently, a Kickstarter page has been formed hoping to fund a documentary that will reveal the secrets behind the lost 1998 Superman movie. Which leads us to the above photograph. We can only assume that the recent hype around the proposed documentary has either led to some quality Cage photoshopping, or new leak of new Superman Lives images. As you can see this new photograph from DCU Movie Page is vastly different from the previous shots. We're pretty dubious, so we thought we'd leave it in your hands.


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Josh James Start-Up Domo Says Arigato to IVP in $20 Million Funding Round
It's been a little while since we heard from Josh James. Having raised boatloads of money, the Omniture founder who bolted Adobe last year bought a small start-up in his native Utah and transformed it into Domo Technologies, a data analytics company.
That was July. Wednesday, Domo will announce that it has raised another batch of money, and is bringing in a new investor. The company has closed a $20 million round led by Institutional Venture Partners.
IVP, which had invested in Omniture and so has a history with James, is joining an all-star cast of investors including Benchmark Capital; Andreessen Horowitz; Ron Conway and David Lee of SV Angel; and Hummer Winblad, plus a bunch of personal investments. The round — which is being described as an A-1 round, brings Domo's total capital raised to date to $63 million.
IVP general partner Todd Chaffee said Domo is an example of a dynamic management team going after a high-growth market. "We know Josh has the experience to build Domo into a disruptive and dominant player in a growing $10 billion market," he said in a statement. Aside from Omniture, IVP has backed HomeAway, MySQL, Twitter and Zynga.
James wouldn't tell me the implied valuation, but he did concede that it's upward of "a couple hundred million." And if that's not surprising enough, what's equally surprising is one possible use for the money: Acquisitions. Well, maybe.
"Let's just suppose, and this is 100 percent supposition," he told me over the phone Tuesday, "that we want to buy someone. We've thought about it. We've had potential targets cross the email threads. It's not the right time to do that stuff just yet. But it's nice to know we have the flexibility when the time comes."
So where's Domo, the business intelligence software-as-service play he was building? It's running as a demonstration with a few early customers, he says. And he'll have more to say about it publicly in about three to four months.
"We have a few thousand people who say they want to see a demo, and we're working through that list," James says. "The feedback has been more positive and at a higher rate than I would have thought possible. I think we're going to have to figure out how to do a lot of installations all at once."
That's what we call a good problem to have.


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- Date:
- 2 October 2020
- Address:
- Po Tat Estate, Po Lam Road, Sau Mau Ping, Kowloon
- International | English
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- 대한민국 | 한국어
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- Россия | русский
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- España / América Latina | Español
Monkey God Festival
The Monkey God Festival falls on the 16th day of the eighth lunar month. You can find the Western calendar date here.
Since the mischievous Monkey God first appeared in the Ming dynasty (1386–1644) novel Journey to the West, he's become a popular character in East Asian stories, with his antics even crossing over into Western television in more recent times.
In mythology, he was born of a mystical stone on the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, and through Taoist practices, acquired spectacular supernatural powers. But the Monkey God rebelled against heaven and was punished by Buddha, who trapped him under a mountain. He was later freed and redeemed himself by escorting the legendary monk Xuanzang on a perilous journey to India to bring Buddhist scriptures back to China.
The Monkey God has since become revered in Chinese culture and, in bygone days, his festival was celebrated with demonstrations of seemingly supernatural acts. It's been said that a possessed medium could run barefoot over hot coals and climb a ladder of knives without sustaining any injuries.
Today, people remember the Monkey God by burning incense and paper offerings on his festival. The best place to see these rituals take place is at the Monkey God Temple at Po Tat Estate in Sau Mau Ping in Kowloon, where hundreds of people will turn up to present offerings.


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On Tuesday Kinley Bugs turned 13 months old. This month has been new territory for us. Our sweet laid back bugs has turned into a feisty fireball. It's shocking, and at times funny, to see her just fall apart. I had forgotten about the "throwing myself to the floor stage" that Micah Claire went through. But the first time I saw Kinley do it I was immediately taken back to those days. Micah Claire never learned to do it softly; but after a few hard hits Kinley learned to throw herself to the floor but then gently lay her head down (smart cookie!).
It took about two weeks for Kinley bugs to get use to not nursing every morning. Now she is use to getting up and having her big girl milk out of her big girl sippy cup!!!! This month she cut her two top 12 month molars. She can now show you where her hair is, her belly is, and her nose is. And her daddy has been working super hard to teach her that the cow says moo. And yesterday she finally said moooo (really it was more like boooo) when he asked her. I think he was more proud than she was;lol! She is turning into such a big girl; it's amazing and at time exhausting to keep up with her!
And she is climbing like crazy these days. She LOVES to climb up her and MC's step. It makes MC sooooo mad that Kinley climbs up to the top where it has her name written. It cracks me up to hear MC say.... MOM tell Kinley to get off my step.... Tell her Ms. Courtney painted my name on top and her name on the bottom and that's where she needs to stand. Nothing like sisterly love; lol!And Kinley is into everything and anything that her big sister does. So these days she is loving coloring in coloring books and reading books!My little Picasso ;)And even more climbing up onto sister top step again; can you tell she's proud of herself!!!
And the week after Kinley turned one, she officially moved up to the 1-1 1/2 year old class at school. She has done great and she loves her new teachers, classmates, and all the new toys and fun things like going outside that she gets to do in her new class!


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The House Veterans' Affairs Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs heard testimony from Verna Jones of The American Legion during a Sept. 11 update on how well the Department of Veterans' Affairs (VA) program for fully developed benefits claims (FDCs) is being implemented.
Because they require no further documentation from claimants, FDCs move through VA's claims processing system much faster than traditional claims, thus helping to reduce the backlog. According to VA, nearly 150,000 FDCs have been received during fiscal 2013. So far, more than 25 percent of all claims received since July 1 have been FDCs. As of Sept. 9, the backlog stood at about 457,000 claims – down from 633,000 last March.
Jones, director of the The American Legion's Veterans Affairs & Rehabilitation Division, told the subcommittee the Legion has taken a leading role in the FDC program because it was such a natural fit for its service officers, who "are already trained to put together as much of the information, up front, for every claim for VA. They're doing the same work that we've always done, but now the VA is moving faster" and veterans are involved in the processing of their own claims.
When VA gets these FDCs, Jones said, they can do a better job "because they have everything they know the veteran wants to give to them and they know the claim is in good order."
The American Legion has spearheaded the FDC program since last December, visiting VA regional offices in Pittsburgh, Denver, Indianapolis, Baltimore, Nashville, Oakland, Calif.; Reno, Nev.; and Togus, Maine. During each site visit, teams of Legion experts reviewed the FDC implementation process, identified best practices, and provided additional training to its service officers.
From these visits, Jones said the Legion has found the FDC program works best when all the stakeholders buy into the process. "If the VA leadership in an office does not believe in the program, then you're not going to see as much success," Jones said. "By the same token, we've had to do a lot of work with our own service officers. We looked at the FDC claims, and we found training opportunities to make sure that we were giving the VA a better-quality product to work with."
When FDCs are submitted, many veterans get decisions on their claims within 125 days – the official time limit before a claims goes into backlogged status. Jones told the subcommittee she has seen some FDCs adjudicated in less than 90, 60 and even 30 days.
"We're working hard to commit our service officers to this program, because it gets better results for veterans," Jones said. "And we're hoping that VA is making the same push to their leadership, to get more consistent results from all of the (regional) offices."
While the VA regional office in Indianapolis was noted by Jones as a model of outstanding work, she said the Baltimore office "was aggressively excluding veterans from the FDC program…. They spent more time trying to exclude a Pentagon 9/11 veteran out of the FDC program than the time it would have taken to adjudicate that claim."
Are FDCs going to help America's veterans? Jones' answer to the subcommittee was "Yes." But some things can be done better, such as including veterans of the National Guard and reserve in the program.
"The last decade has certainly shown the men and women of the National Guard and reserve are just as involved in defending this nation as the active-duty troops," Jones said. "We should be working to make sure they don't get left out."
To read Jones' written testimony by going to http://www.legion.org/legislative/testimony/217127/implentation-update-fully-developed-claims


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Video game sales still slump despite 'Black Ops II'
- 'Black Ops II' hits $1 billion mark
- Surpasses 'Modern Warfare 3' with Black Friday assist
- November video game sales expected to be down
Even another record-setting Call of Duty launch can't snap the video game industry out of its sales funk.
Call of Duty: Black Ops II generated more than $1 billion in sales in its first 15 days in stores, publisher Activison says. The game, launched Nov. 13, made the fastest sprint yet to the $1 billion mark for the multibillion-dollar first-person shooter franchise.
Black Ops II eclipsed by one day last year's record set by Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, which hit $1 billion in sales after 16 days, based on sales figures from Activision's internal estimates and retail data from Chart-Track. The 2010 release Call of Duty: Black Ops topped the $1 billion mark after about a month.
Still, analysts expect a drop in video-game sales from November 2011, when market researcher The NPD Group releases its November 2012 report tomorrow.
Console game sales have declined as fewer hit games have been released and, says Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter, the popping of a "bubble" created by an influx of casual gamers who bought Nintendo Wiis.
Last November, video-game software sales rose 15%, to $1.67 billion, thanks to hit titles, including Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Battlefield 3 and Modern Warfare 3.
This month's drop comes despite the Call of Duty franchise and other multi-million sellers like Halo 4 and Assassin's Creed III -- plus the launch of Nintendo's new console, the Wii U. Consumers snapped up 400,000 Wii Us in the first week of the system's availability.
But that's not enough for this November, says Stern Agee analyst Arvid Bhatia, who lowered the firm's estimate from a 5% drop for November to 15% below last year. He also says that Call of Duty: Black Ops II sales are high, but not as good as they could have been.
"Both difficult comparisons and slower than expected sales of Call of Duty are factors in our November estimate being lowered," Bhatia says.
Pachter estimated November sales would fall about 2% below last year. And he agreed that Black Ops II could technically be tracking behind Modern Warfare 3 because this year's $1 billion march included Black Friday, while last MW3, which launched Nov. 8, 2011, did not. That indicates, he said in a report Wednesday, "that the game's sales for the month of November were in fact down year-over-year."
BMO Capital Markets analyst Edward Williams said that although initial sales of Black Ops II at mass-market retailers were lighter, "we believe demand for the game has picked up."
Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick countered that Black Ops II revenues surpassed the current worldwide box office receipts to date for the year's top 10 films combined, as well as the box office record of $1 billion -- set by Avatar in 2009 -- in 17 days.
"The release of Call of Duty has been one of the most significant entertainment events of each of the last six years," Kotick said.


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Black Knights do a lot for the community
If word hasn't gotten out yet, it should. The Black Knights Car Club of Estherville has done an incredible amount to help local organizations and persons in need.
A recent compilation shows the Black Knights as an organization have given $9,650 to 58 worthy groups and individuals.
Here are just a few of the groups that have benefitted:
n ELC Youth Wrestling.
n Estherville Community Christmas Project.
n Dunnell Fire Department.
n Wallingford Fire Department.
n Shayla Bee Fund.
n Estherville Halloween Association.
n Friends of the Estherville Public Library.
n Estherville VFW.
n Iowa Lakes Community College scholarships.
n Girl Scouts.
n City of Gruver.
n Terril Fire Department.
n Estherville Fire Department.
n Northwest Iowa Community College scholarship.
On top of that, dozens of persons have benefitted.
Most recently, the black Knights pledged a $10 donation for each member as of Dec. 31, 2013, resulting in $1,060 to the Estherville Fire Department for a new truck. They would like to challenge other clubs and organizations to a similar challenge to pledge $10 per member.
The Black Knights are always looking for new members – anyone who loves antique or classic cars. You don't have to own one. You just need to love them.
Meetings are 7 p.m. the first Tuesday of every month at the Estherville Post 3388 VFW trophy room.


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May 8, 2010Imams Path From Condemning Terror to Preaching JihadBy SCOTT SHANE and SOUAD MEKHENNETWASHINGTON In the weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, the eloquent 30-year-old imam of a mosque outside Washington became a go-to Muslim cleric for reporters scrambling to explain Islam. He condemned the mass murder, invited television crews to follow him around and patiently explained the rituals of his religion. We came here to build, not to destroy, the cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki, said in a sermon. We are the bridge between Americans and one billion Muslims worldwide. At first glance, it seemed plausible that this lanky, ambitious man, with the scholarly wire-rims and equal command of English and Arabic, could indeed be such a bridge. CD sets of his engaging lectures on the Prophet Muhammad were in thousands of Muslim homes. American-born, he had a sense of humor, loved deep-sea fishing, had dabbled in get-rich-quick investment schemes and dropped references to Joe Sixpack into his sermons. A few weeks before the attacks he had preached in the United States Capitol. Nine years later, from his hide-out in Yemen, Mr. Awlaki has declared war on the United States. America as a whole has turned into a nation of evil, he said in a statement posted on extremist Web sites in March. Though he had spent 21 of his 39 years in the United States, he added, I eventually came to the conclusion that jihad against America is binding upon myself, just as it is binding on every other able Muslim. His mix of scripture and vitriol has helped lure young Muslims into a dozen plots. He cheered on the Fort Hood gunman and had a role in prompting the attempted airliner bombing on Dec. 25, intelligence officials say. And last week, Faisal Shahzad, who is charged in the attempted bombing in Times Square, told investigators that Mr. Awlakis prolific online lectures urging jihad as a religious duty helped inspire him to act. At a time of new concern about the attraction of Western Muslims to violent extremism, there is no figure more central than Mr. Awlaki, who has harnessed the Internet for the goals of Al Qaeda. Counterterrorism officials are gravely concerned about his powerful appeal for many others who are following his path to radicalization. Hes a magnetic character, said Philip Mudd, a veteran of the C.I.A.s Counterterrorism Center who just stepped down after nearly five years as a top F.B.I. intelligence adviser. Hes a powerful orator in a revolutionary movement. Convinced that he is a lethal threat, the United States government has responded in kind. This year Mr. Awlaki became the first American citizen on the C.I.A.s list of terrorists approved as a target for killing, a designation that has only enhanced his status with admirers like Shahidur Rahman, 27, a British Muslim of Bangladeshi descent who studied with Mr. Awlaki in London in 2003. Other clerics equivocated about whether terrorist violence could be reconciled with Islam, Mr. Rahman said, but even seven years ago Mr. Awlaki made clear that he had few such qualms. He said suicide is not allowed in Islam, Mr. Rahman said in an interview, but self-sacrifice is different. There are two conventional narratives of Mr. Awlakis path to jihad. The first is his own: He was a nonviolent moderate until the United States attacked Muslims openly in Afghanistan and Iraq, covertly in Pakistan and Yemen, and even at home, by making targets of Muslims for raids and arrests. He merely followed the religious obligation to defend his faith, he said. What am I accused of? he asks in a recent video bearing the imprint of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. Of calling for the truth? Of calling for jihad for the sake of Allah? Of calling to defend the causes of the Islamic nation? A contrasting version of Mr. Awlakis story, explored though never confirmed by the national Sept. 11 commission, maintains that he was a secret agent of Al Qaeda starting well before the attacks, when three of the hijackers turned up at his mosques. By this account, all that has changed since then is that Mr. Awlaki has stopped hiding his true views. The tale that emerges from visits to his mosques, and interviews with two dozen people who knew him, is more complex and elusive. A product both of Yemens deeply conservative religious culture and freewheeling American ways, he hesitated to shake hands with women but patronized prostitutes. He was first enthralled with jihad as a teenager but the cause he embraced, the defeat of Soviet troops in Afghanistan, was then Americas cause too. After a summer visit to the land of the victorious mujahedeen, he brought back an Afghan hat and wore it proudly around the Colorado State campus in Fort Collins where he studied engineering. Later, Mr. Awlaki seems to have tried out multiple personas: the representative of a tolerant Islam in a multicultural United States (starring in a WashingtonPost.com video explaining Ramadan); the fiery American activist talking about Muslims constitutional rights (and citing both Malcolm X and H. Rap Brown); the conspiracy theorist who publicly doubted the Muslim role in the Sept. 11 attacks. (The F.B.I., he wrote a few days afterward, simply blamed passengers with Muslim names.) All along he remained a conservative, fundamentalist preacher who invariably started with a scriptural story from the seventh century and drew its personal or political lessons for today, a tradition called salafism, for the Salafs, or ancestors, the leaders of the earliest generations of Islam. Finally, after the Yemeni authorities, under American pressure, imprisoned him in 2006 and 2007, Mr. Awlaki seems to have hardened into a fully committed ideologist of jihad, condemning non-Muslims and cheerleading for slaughter. His message has become indistinguishable from that of Osama bin Laden except for his excellent English and his cultural familiarity with the United States and Britain. Those traits make him especially dangerous, counterterrorism officials fear, and he flaunts them. Jihad, Mr. Awlaki said in a March statement, is becoming as American as apple pie and as British as afternoon tea. Skinny Teenager With Brains Twenty years ago, long before the Sept. 11 attacks and the wars that followed, a shy freshman named Anwar turned up at the little mosque in a converted church a short walk from the Colorado State campus. His American accent was misleading: born in New Mexico in 1971, when his father was studying agriculture there, he had lived in the United States until the age of 7. But he had spent his adolescence in Yemen, where memorizing the Koran was a matter of course for an educated young man, and women were largely excluded from public life. His father, Nasser, was a prominent figure who would serve as agriculture minister and chancellor of two universities and who was close to President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the countrys authoritarian leader. Anwar was sent to Azal Modern School, among the countrys most prestigious private schools. I recall Anwar as a skinny teenager with brains, said Walid al-Saqaf, a neighbor in the 1980s in Sana, the Yemeni capital. For boys of their generation, Afghanistan and its fight to oust the godless Soviet Army was the greatest cause. There was constant talk of the heroes who were leaving Yemen to join the fight and become martyrs and go to paradise, recalled Mr. Saqaf, now a doctoral student in Sweden. In the Awlakis neighborhood, families would gather to watch the latest videotapes of the mujahedeen, he said. But Nasser al-Awlaki had other ideas for his son, who studied civil engineering in Colorado in preparation for the kind of technocratic career his father had pursued. There was one odd note, given the familys relative wealth: just after arriving, Anwar applied for a Social Security number and claimed falsely he had been born in Yemen, evidently to qualify for scholarship money reserved for foreign citizens. Yusuf Siddiqui, a fellow student who was active with Mr. Awlaki in the mosque and the Muslim Student Association, said there were regular reminders of his Yemeni upbringing. If you made some pop culture reference, he might not recognize it, Mr. Siddiqui said. Once, Anwar astonished his Americanized friends by climbing a nearby mountain barefoot. He just said, Thats how we do it in Yemen, Mr. Siddiqui recalled. Accustomed to Yemeni mores, he was not comfortable interacting with women. Once, when a female American student stopped by the Muslim Student Association to ask for help with math homework, He said to me in a low tone of voice, Why dont you do it? Mr. Siddiqui said. Still, Mr. Awlaki was neither among the most conservative Muslim students nor among the libertines who tossed aside religious restrictions on drinking and sex. He ran successfully for president of the Muslim Student Association against a Saudi student who was far stricter. I remember Anwar saying, He would want your mom to cover her face. Im not like that, Mr. Siddiqui said. His vacation trip to Afghanistan, around the time the Soviet-backed Communist government fell from power, appears to have brought a new interest in the nexus of politics and religion. He wore an Eritrean T-shirt and the Afghan hat and quoted Abdullah Azzam, a prominent Palestinian scholar who provided theological justification for the Afghan jihad and was later known as a mentor to Osama bin Laden. Meanwhile, at the Islamic Center of Fort Collins, the little mosque where volunteers took turns giving the Friday sermon, Mr. Awlaki discovered a knack for preaching. If he could boast of no deep scholarship, he knew the Koran and the sayings of the prophet, spoke fluent English and had a light touch. He was very knowledgeable, said Mumtaz Hussain, 71, a Pakistani immigrant active in the mosque for two decades. He was an excellent person very nice, dedicated to religion. He expressed no anti-American sentiments, said Mr. Hussain, whose son served in the National Guard. This is our motherland now. People would not tolerate sermons of that kind, he said. Years later, on his blog, Mr. Awlaki would compare Thomas Gradgrind, Charles Dickenss notoriously utilitarian headmaster in Hard Times, to some Muslim parents who are programmed to think that only medicine or engineering are worthy professions for their children. It sounds like a hint at his own experience, and some family acquaintances say there was tension between Anwar and his father over career choices. But in 1994, Mr. Awlaki married a cousin from Yemen whom by custom he did not introduce to his male friends left behind engineering, and took a part-time job as imam at the Denver Islamic Society. He Had a Beautiful Tongue Like many an evangelical Christian pastor, Mr. Awlaki preached against vice and sin, lauded family values and parsed the scripture, winning fans and rising to successively larger mosques. In Denver, however, there was an episode that might have been an omen. A Saudi student at the University of Denver told an elder that he had decided, with Mr. Awlakis encouragement, to travel to Chechnya to join the jihad against the Russians. The elder, a Palestinian American in his 60s, thought it ill advised and confronted Mr. Awlaki in a loud argument. He had a beautiful tongue, recalled the elder, who asked not to be named. But I told him: Dont talk to my people about jihad. He left two weeks later. At 25, he landed for five years at Arribat al-Islami, a stucco building with blue-green tile under a towering palm tree at the edge of San Diego. He lit up when he was with the youth, said Jamal Ali, 40, an airport driver. He played soccer with younger children and took teenagers paintballing. I saw him evolving in trying to understand where he fit into Islam, Mr. Ali said. Lincoln W. Higgie III, 71, an art dealer who lived across quiet Saranac Street from the mosque and the small adjoining house where Mr. Awlaki lived with his wife and two toddlers, recalls an engaging neighbor who apologized about parking problems that came with the flood of Friday worshipers. On Thursdays, Mr. Higgie remembered, Mr. Awlaki liked to go fishing for albacore, and he would often bring over a sample of the catch, deliciously prepared by his wife. The Awlakis son and daughter would play on Mr. Higgies floor, chasing his pet macaw, while the men compared notes on their travels. I remember he was very partial to the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, Mr. Higgie said. He detected no hostility to non-Muslims, no simmering resentment against America. In his private life, he was not always puritanical. Even as he preached about the sanctity of marriage amid the temptations of American life (especially in Western societies, every haram is available, he said, using the Arabic word for the forbidden), he was picked up twice by the San Diego police for soliciting prostitutes; he was given probation. He displayed a very American entrepreneurial streak, exploring a possible business importing Yemeni honey and attending seminars in Las Vegas focused on investing in gold and minerals (and once losing $20,000 lent by relatives). Eventually a regular at the mosque proposed a venture that would prove hugely successful: recording Mr. Awlakis lectures on CD. Starting in 2000, Mr. Awlaki would record a series of highly popular boxed sets three, totaling 53 CDs, devoted to the Life of Muhammad alone; others covering the lesser prophets of Islam (including Moses and Jesus), the companions of the prophet and an account of the hereafter. The recordings appear free of obvious radicalism. (IslamicBookstore.com has added a notice to its Web listings of Mr. Awlakis work, saying the recording has been reviewed and does not contain any extremist statements.) Shakir Muhammad, a Fort Collins engineer who is active in the mosque there, said he became a fan of the CD sets, finding them enthralling even on repeated listening. Only once did a passage give him pause; Mr. Awlaki discussed suicidal violence and did not quite condemn it. I thought, This guy may be for it, Mr. Muhammad said. It bothered me. A Mysterious Goodbye One day in August 2001, Mr. Awlaki knocked at the door of Mr. Higgie, his neighbor, to say goodbye. He had moved the previous year to Virginia, becoming imam at the far bigger Dar al-Hijrah mosque, and he had returned to pick up a few things he had left behind. As Mr. Higgie tells it, he told the imam to stop by if he was ever in the area and got a strange response. He said, I dont think youll be seeing me. I wont be coming back to San Diego again. Later on youll find out why, Mr. Higgie said. The next month, when Al Qaeda attacked New York and Washington, Mr. Higgie remembered the exchange and was shaken, convinced that his friendly neighbor had some advance warning of the Sept. 11 attacks. In fact, the F.B.I. had first taken an interest in Mr. Awlaki in 1999, concerned about brushes with militants that to this day remain difficult to interpret. In 1998 and 1999, he was a vice president of a small Islamic charity that an F.B.I. agent later testified was a front organization to funnel money to terrorists. He had been visited by Ziyad Khaleel, a Qaeda operative who purchased a battery for Osama bin Ladens satellite phone, as well as by an associate of Omar Abdel Rahman, the so-called Blind Sheik, who was serving a life sentence for plotting to blow up New York landmarks. Still more disturbing was Mr. Awlakis links to two future Sept. 11 hijackers, Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaq Alhazmi. They prayed at his San Diego mosque and were seen in long conferences with the cleric. Mr. Alhazmi would follow the imam to his new mosque in Virginia, and 9/11 investigators would call Mr. Awlaki Mr. Alhazmis spiritual adviser. The F.B.I., whose agents interviewed Mr. Awlaki four times in the days after the Sept. 11 attacks, concluded that his contacts with the hijackers and other radicals were random, the inevitable consequence of living in the small world of Islam in America. But records of the 9/11 commission at the National Archives make clear that not all investigators agreed. One detective, whose name has been redacted, told the commission he believed Mr. Awlaki was at the center of the 9/11 story. An F.B.I. agent, also unidentified, said that if anyone had knowledge of the plot, it would have been the cleric, since someone had to be in the U.S. and keep the hijackers spiritually focused. The 9/11 commission staff members themselves had sharp arguments about him. Do I think he played a role in helping the hijackers here, knowing they were up to something? said one staff member, who would speak only on condition of anonymity. Yes. Do I think he was sent here for that purpose? I have no evidence for it. The separate Congressional Joint Inquiry into the attacks suspected that Mr. Awlaki might have been part of a support network for the hijackers, said Eleanor Hill, its director. Theres no smoking gun. But we thought somebody ought to investigate him, Ms. Hill said. Alarmed about Mr. Awlakis possible Sept. 11 connections, a State Department investigator, Raymond Fournier, found a circuitous way to charge Mr. Awlaki with passport fraud, based on his false claim after entering the United States in 1990 that he had been born in Yemen. A warrant was issued, but prosecutors in Colorado rescinded it, concluding that no criminal case could be made. Mr. Awlaki returned from a trip abroad in October 2002 an act some colleagues say was evidence for his innocence of any 9/11 role for what would prove to be his last stay in the United States. During that trip, he visited Ali al-Timimi, a Virginia cleric later convicted for encouraging Muslims to join the fight against American troops in Afghanistan. Mr. Awlaki attempted to get al-Timimi to discuss issues related to the recruitment of young Muslims, according to a motion filed in his criminal case. Mr. Timimi wondered if Mr. Awlaki might be trying to entrap him at the F.B.I.s instigation, his friends say. But if Mr. Awlaki was cooperating with the government, it would have astonished his associates. As the American authorities rounded up Muslim men after 9/11, he had grown furious. After raids in March 2002 on Muslim institutions and community leaders in Virginia, Mr. Awlaki led a chorus of outrage, noting that some of the targets were widely viewed as moderates. So this is not now a war on terrorism, we need to all be clear about this, this is a war on Muslims! Mr. Awlaki declared, his voice shaking with anger. Not only is it happening worldwide, but its happening right here in America that is claiming to be fighting this war for the sake of freedom. Around that time, Johari Abdul-Malik, a former Howard University chaplain who was joining the staff at Mr. Awlakis Virginia mosque, met him at a cafe. Mr. Awlaki said he planned to leave the United States. I tried to convince him that the atmosphere was not as bad as he thought, that it was a positive time for outreach, Mr. Abdul-Malik recalled. But Mr. Awlaki was shaken by what he saw as an anti-Muslim backlash. And always fond of the limelight, Mr. Abdul-Malik said, Mr. Awlaki was looking for a bigger platform. He said he might have a TV show for the gulf, Mr. Abdul-Malik said. He might run for Parliament in Yemen. Or he might teach. Never Trust a Kuffar In a bare lecture room in London, where Mr. Awlaki moved after leaving the United States, he addressed his rapt, young followers, urging them never to believe a non-Muslim, or kuffar in Arabic. The important lesson to learn here is never, ever trust a kuffar, he said, chopping the air, his lecture caught on video. Do not trust them! The unbelievers are plotting to kill this religion, he declared. Theyre plotting night and day. If he had the same knowing tone and touches of humor as in earlier sermons, his message was more conspiratorial. You cant believe CNN, the United Nations, or Amnesty International, he told his students, because they, too, were part of the war on Islam. We need to wisen up and not be duped, Mr. Awlaki said. Malcolm X said, Weve been bamboozled. Many of his young British Muslim listeners, accustomed to preachers with heavy accents and an otherworldly focus, were entranced by his mix of the ancient and the contemporary, his seamless transition from the 29 battles of the Prophet Muhammad to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He was the main man who translated the jihad into English, said Abu Yahiya, 27, a Bangladeshi-British student of Mr. Awlakis lectures in 2003. At a personal level, said Mr. Rahman, one of the students who studied with Mr. Awlaki in 2003, Mr. Awlaki made it clear that they could no longer pretend to be Muslims while going clubbing at night. I could not be Mohammed in the morning and Mo in the evening, he said. Mr. Awlakis demand that they make a choice, devoting themselves to a harsh, fundamentalist strain of Islam, offered clarity, he said. It would hit the audience automatically in their hearts and minds, Mr. Rahman said. When others claimed the popular cleric was brainwashing them, Mr. Rahman said, When you got a lot of dirt in your brain, you need a washing. I believe he did brainwash me. Mr. Awlakis fame grew, his CDs kept selling, and he traveled around Britain lecturing. But he had a hard time supporting himself, according to people who knew him, and in 2004 he had moved to Yemen to preach and study. In mid-2006, after he intervened in a tribal dispute, Mr. Awlaki was imprisoned for 18 months by the Yemeni authorities. By his later account on his blog, he was in solitary confinement nearly the entire time and used it to study the Koran, to read literature (he enjoyed Dickens but disliked Shakespeare) and eventually, when it was permitted, to study Islamic scholarship. Notably, he was enraptured by the works of Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian whose time in the United States helped make him the father of the modern anti-Western jihadist movement in Islam. Because of the flowing style of Sayyid I would read between 100 and 150 pages a day, Mr. Awlaki wrote. I would be so immersed with the author I would feel Sayyid was with me in my cell speaking to me directly. Two F.B.I. agents questioned him in the Yemeni prison, and Mr. Awlaki blamed the United States for his prolonged incarceration. He was right; John D. Negroponte, then the director of national intelligence, told Yemeni officials that the United States did not object to his detention, according to American and Yemeni sources. But by the end of 2007, American officials, some of whom were disturbed at the imprisonment without charges of a United States citizen, signaled that they no longer insisted on Mr. Awlakis incarceration, and he was released. He was different after that harder, said a Yemeni man who knows Mr. Awlaki well. Mr. Awlaki started his own Web site, reaching a larger audience than ever. But finding that he was constantly followed by Yemeni security in Sana, the capital, he moved to the house of an uncle in Shabwa, the rugged southern province and his tribes traditional turf. Last October, friends said, he heard the distant whine of a drone aircraft circling overhead. Worried that he was endangering his relatives, he fled to the mountains. While his role is unclear in Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the terrorist networks Yemeni affiliate, American officials believe he has become operational, plotting, not just inspiring, terrorism against the West. From his hide-out, Mr. Awlaki sends out the occasional video message. But his reported influence on the Times Square bombing suspect, Mr. Shahzad, suggests that no matter what happens to him, his electronic legacy is secure. His message will endure in hundreds of audio and video clips that his followers have posted to the Web, a mix of religious stories and incitement, awaiting the curious and the troubled. Mr. Awlakis transformation has left a trail of bewilderment, apprehension and fury among many people who knew and worshiped with him in the United States. Mr. Siddiqui, his college friend, said he was surprised and disappointed. Hes turning his back not only on the country where he was born but on his Muslim brothers and sisters in this country, he said. Mr. Abdul-Malik said that his former fellow imam at the Virginia mosque is a terrorist, in my book and that Mr. Awlaki and his like-thinkers were trying to reduce Islam to a medieval narrative. Its the Hatfields and the McCoys: you hit me, I hit you. Some Muslim families have asked whether they should keep Mr. Awlakis scriptural CDs, Mr. Abdul-Malik said. He tells them it is their decision, but he has advised shops not to carry even the earlier, benign Awlaki material. Scott Shane reported from Washington, and Souad Mekhennet from London. Robert F. Worth contributed reporting from Sana, Yemen.http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/09/world/09awlaki.html?pagewanted=all
Thanks for posting, I hadn't heard of this individual before.


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It used to be that a homepage on the web was a good place to introduce yourself to people. But there's arguably better places to do that now.
For example, if you want to learn more about my professional career then of course, my LinkedIn profile, is best. I've worked as an engineer, product manager, programme manager, consultant, and CTO. The thing that ties all that together is a love of technology, learning, and the web. Open Data and Linked Data have both been strong recent themes in everything I've worked on. You can read more about my recent Open and Linked Data consulting projects on my consulting website.
If you're interested in what's been on my mind recently, then @ldodds is probably a good measure, as are my bookmarks. I'm still using Flickr too, but not as much as I used to. I don't know why.
In terms of creative output I guess github and my blog are the best starting points. I've been blogging in various ways since 1999, but not always consistently. These days I'm finding my blog is turning into more long-form essays, which means they tend to be less frequent. I've written for other places on the web too and I've pulled together a list. But, inevitably, it's out of date.
My musical taste is being catalogued and dissected for me by Last.fm. I've still yet to hit on a good way to do the same for books. Or food.
Probably the only other thing to tell you is that I'm based in Bath in the UK, which is a place I love.


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What are the Nine Days? For ashkenazim that grew up with the concept nine days, it's kinda strange to have the question asked. Basically the nine days are the first 9 days of the month of Av culminating with the fast of Tisha B'av. The Nine Days inaugurates an even greater level of communal and personal mourning in recognition of the many tragedies and calamities that befell the Jewish people at this time. As part of the mourning we refrain from eating meat and drinking wine. However, we all still need to eat, so here is a selection of pastas, fish and food ideas to fill the void.
Some of our pasta picks:
Roasted Red Pepper Cream Pasta
Our Fish Picks:
Individual Braided Fish Wellingtons
Some odds and ends to complete the meal:
What are your favorites? Leave a comment with your favorite recipe on Cook Kosher. (Write # with recipe number so that it can easily be searched.)
One more thing, can you believe we don't have an eggplant parmesan recipe? If you make a mean eggplant parmesan please post it.
Photos by Dan Engongoro
how about falafel?
This is a really good list!
Wow! what a great list... will definitely be a help because I've been having trouble coming up with a menu.
Does anyone have the recipe for Penne pasta in pink sauce?
We have a couple of recipes: http://bit.ly/q6pHOU
Another great option for the nine days are cheese blintzes,cheese latkes,potato blintzes, all kinds of soups and of course homemade rolls, croissants... Recipe #583 which a cheese blintze soufflé is really a terrific option. What is so great is that if you are lazy, you can use any store bought cheese blintzes and the recipe still comes out delicious. Of course, homemade blintzes are always the tastiest. Add a soup to this and you have a fab meal.


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What I know about buying a mattress I've learned from the best: Insiders who have retired from the sleep product industry.
CONFUSION FACTOR. It is impossible to compare by make and model from one store to another. No wonder mattress retailers are so quick to promise that if you can find the same mattress at a lower price, they'll give it to you for free. They know that will never happen because no other store carries that exact mattress.
SHOP BY LEVEL. Each mattress manufacturer makes "levels" of mattresses for the stores that sell their brand: Very cheap, decent cheap, good and best. That's not what they call them, but you can tell by the pricing within each manufacturer's line of products.
PRICE MATTERS. A very cheap mattress is about 10 percent materials (foam, steel, padding) and 90 percent air. A mid-level mattress is about 40 percent materials and so on. The more material, the better the product and the higher the price. A high-quality mattress will be 90 percent materials, which means it will be the heaviest of those you try to lift. Go ahead, lift the corner of a mattress. If it's light as a feather, you can be sure it is a very cheap, low quality mattress.
WEIGHT MATTERS. The heavier the person(s) who will be sleeping on the mattress, the heavier you want the mattress to be. You spend 30 percent of your life on your mattress. It makes a lot of sense to spend twice the price of a cheap mattress to have it last four times as long.
NO PILLOW TOP. A pillow top mattress is a normal mattress with a layer of extra padding on top. The pillow top will wear out and flatten down long before the actual mattress begins to show a dent. But it is attached permanently. You'll pay at least $150 more for a pillow top (double that if it has a pillow top on both sides). Buy a great mattress pad instead. Then throw it away when it mashes down and buy a new one. Using this technique, you will have a mattress that lasts many years longer.
TAKE A NAP. Once you've narrowed your choices to two or three, get comfortable for at least 15 minutes on each of the beds you are considering. Do not be shy about taking a short nap on the beds you are considering. Do not make a decision based on the way it looks or by sitting on it for 30 seconds.
NEGOTIATE. At the very least, you should get free delivery and removal of your old mattress as part of the deal you make in a mattress or department store. And at the most? You could get a price reduction, a mattress cover, sheets and pillows too.
Remember the first rule of negotiating: Always ask for more than you're willing to accept. That way, when your opponent comes back and agrees to only some of your counter offer, both of you have the opportunity to come out winners.
Mary invites questions at [email protected], or c/o Everyday Cheapskate, P.O. Box 2099, Cypress, CA 90630. This column will answer questions of general interest, but letters cannot be answered individually. Mary Hunt is the founder of www.DebtProofLiving.com, a personal finance member website and the author of "The Smart Woman's Guide to Planning for Retirement," released in 2013. To find out more about Mary and read her past columns, please visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.


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CGX Announces Finalists for the Third Annual Encore Awards
HOUSTON—February 21, 2013—Consolidated Graphics (CGX), one of North America's leading commercial printing companies and the world's largest digital printer, is honored to announce the 27 marketing and business leaders that have been named Crystal Award finalists in the third annual Encore Awards, presented by International Paper.
The Encore Awards were created in 2011 to showcase the innovative ideas of Consolidated Graphics' customers and demonstrate the many ways Consolidated Graphics delivers creative and effective print and marketing solutions to the markets it serves. International Paper—manufacturer of such paper brands as Accent Opaque, Carolina, Hammermill, Springhill and Williamsburg Offset—joined the program in 2013 as the presenting sponsor. The awards are part of emerge, Consolidated Graphics' annual customer conference and business expo, scheduled for April 30 to May 3, 2013 in Las Vegas.
"Our customers are diverse, ranging from local businesses to some of the most powerful brands in the world, and the Encore Awards recognize their excellence in marketing communication solutions," said Aaron Grohs, executive vice president, sales and marketing, for Consolidated Graphics. "This year we saw a particular trend in the innovative use of unique papers and substrates, and a creative use of finishes to add depth and luster to design, proving yet again how effective the print medium can be."
An independent panel of five judges from around the country met January 15, 2013, in Houston, to review and discuss the merits of each entry, and three Crystal Award finalists were selected for each of the nine award categories, recognizing excellence in the concept, design and production of print materials from more than 400 submissions. The Encore Award winner for each category will be selected from the announced finalists on May 2 at the Encore Awards presentation in Las Vegas.
The nine categories and finalists are:
Books & Annual Reports:
Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore: An Artist's Guide to Choosing a College
Progressive Corp., Mayfield Village, OH: Personalization Annual Report - FSC
Dominion Resources, Richmond, VA: Dominion Resources 2011 Annual Report


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GM sees new Impala appealing more to buyers than renters
DETROIT - General Motors Co. expects the new version of the Chevrolet Impala to lure more retail buyers, allowing the U.S. automaker to ditch the large car's image as king of the car rentals, a top company official said on Monday.
"We see the mix shift going from about 70 percent fleet and 30 retail, really turning that around, becoming 70 percent retail," Don Johnson, Chevrolet vice president of sales, told reporters at the company's assembly plant in Detroit-Hamtramck, where the Impala is built. Fleet customers include car rental companies.
Jim Hall, managing director of automotive consulting firm 2953 Analytics, said the key to GM achieving its goals is making sure consumers know about the new car, and that means spending the money to advertise it.
"When was the last time you saw an Impala commercial?' he said. "When you market a car, you keep the public interested in it. The longer you keep the intensity on marketing the car the more retail you're going to get."
"This is a segment that demands marketing intensity as far as paying attention to it," Hall added. "You've got to keep it in consumers' minds."
Johnson said GM sees Impala's U.S. sales rising from last year's total of about 169,350, while also increasing the large-car segment's overall reach and GM's share of that. Sales growth will come largely from consumers moving up from the mid-sized car segment, followed by crossovers and near luxury.
GM officials said the new 2014 Impala, which competes with the Ford Taurus and Toyota Avalon, will attract younger, more male, more affluent, more educated buyers than the current model, helping drive down the average age for the nameplate, which currently is in the upper 50s.
Johnson said the portion of new Impalas sold on lease is also expected to jump to the segment average of about 35 percent from its current rate of almost none.
He doesn't see Chevy's push to make Impala more attractive to consumers cutting into Cadillac sales. The new Impala is larger and longer than the current version.
GM's first Impala TV commercial ran on opening day of the Major League Baseball season on March 31, but the full marketing campaign will hit in mid-May, officials said.
Chevy will continue to sell the current version of the Impala, the Limited, as long as the demand is there, but it will be sold only to fleet customers, largely rental car companies, Johnson said.
Impala is also assembled at GM's Oshawa plant in Ontario, Canada. The new model is built on the global epsilon platform, which also is used for the Buick Regal and LaCrosse, Cadillac XTS and Chevy Malibu cars.


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Hot video: PBS brings back Mr. Rogers as an animated tiger
Hard to believe it�s been 11 years since Mr. Rogers last welcomed us to his neighborhood. PBS brings back the late children�s show host this fall ... in the shape of an animated tiger in �Daniel Tiger�s Neighborhood.� Watch the video report at http://landing.newsinc.com/shared/video.html?vcid=23795894&freewheel=90108&sitesection=gatehouse.
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What to watch: PBS brings back Mr. Rogers
Hot video: PBS brings back Mr. Rogers as an animated tiger