Patrick Lam

Back to nature landscapes! #mosstodon

The last bunch of bird pictures this month. #BirdsNZ #Birds

Some more urban birds and ex-birds. #BirdsNZ #Birds

I do have more animal pictures, but let's have a Dunedin intermission. In August 2024 we went to the Catlins via Dunedin. We stopped by Tunnel Point, which does have impressive rocks. #GeologyPics

Time for the birds segment! Starting with a hoiho/yellow-eyed penguin at OPERA outside Dunedin, plus a pied shag. #BirdsNZ #Birds

And here are some summits from the top of Cascade Saddle.

And yet another submission, this time on the NZ Conservation Amendment Bill:

https://patricklam.ca/post/20260706-submission-conservation-amendment-bill/

As I write this on 6 July, a rainfall gauge in Dunedin reports 160mm of rain in the last 48 hours. Conservation lands and the Department of Conservation are a key tool that we have in terms of adaptation and resilience. Reducing our climate actions is the opposite of mitigation, and we cannot afford to do so, looking beyond the purely economic lens to the one where we need a planet that is hospitable to humans.

#NZPol

There was a decent amount of birds on the Travers-Sabine. #BirdsNZ #Birds

Some of the birds, again mostly from Cascade Saddle, including takahē, kea, korimako/bellbird, and tūī. #BirdsNZ #birds

Reposting to not break the thread. This is a lot of pictures. I've posted them before, I think, but here are the pictures from the main Cascade Saddle part again, since they appeared in the May photos post. #tramping

Vegetable sheep isn't a sheep, it's a plant. Here are more wild plants. #botany

I once wondered whether fungi are flora. I mostly found out that the term "flora" is outdated. #fungi #fungiFriday

@dbattistella@mstdn.ca @paulh@cloudisland.nz @Phil_Tanner@mastodon.philtanner.com yep, have been told "go back to China" on the street in Canada. Actually my Vietnamese ancestors were pretty keen on kicking out the Chinese, but, well. We can talk about "society" and I wouldn't disagree that the overall "society" sure is racist, but some members of society will do the work to be anti-racist and anti-colonial. The proportion will vary among countries. The anti-Treaty Principles Bill hikoi in Aotearoa was broadly supported though.

That night we stayed at the Refuge de Nant Borrant, which is not that far from town, but it is uphill. #hiking #Alps

More animals (mostly), including a vertebrate.

I just read the David Attenborough book on invertebrates. They get up to all sorts of shenanigans. Anyway, here are some invertebrates; the blue butterfly is from the Tour du Mont Blanc, while the orange butterfly and outside grasshopper are from the Travers Sabine. The cicada was inside my place.

Here is Blue Lake and Lake Constance (which is just a bit after Blue Lake). The Waiau Pass is after Lake Constance, but we did not go there. #tramping #HutLife

Back to Aotearoa: I don't think I have posted these pictures from the Travers-Sabine back in February 2024. #tramping #HutLife

Raspberry Creek to Cascade Saddle to Dart to Muddy Creek is one day with epic views and 3 days with pretty good views, plus takahē. The Tour du Mont Blanc has a lot more epic views, though it is easier, more civilized, more crowded (at least on the normal route), and much further from Aotearoa. I am still working through that, but I managed to do one more TMB day in May. #hiking #Alps

People and a cat. #tramping

As a contrast, some urban pictures next.

Two more posts from Travers-Sabine. This one will be some more landscapes from the post-Blue-Lake part, going back to Robert Ridge. (This is not far from Angelus Peak where I had that cellphone adventure). The last Travers-Sabine post will have to wait a few hours.

@RedRobyn@mastodon.nz @BobLefridge@mastodon.nz @jeremy_pm@mastodon.nz is he clever enough to do that?

@paulh@cloudisland.nz that's infuriating!

Moving along, this is kind of how I feel about Christchurch...

Oops, I broke the thread. Let's try again. Here's some pictures from the Eastern Townships of Quebec in December 2026. Quebec is significantly less flat than Ontario, but that's not saying much. The St. Lawrence Valley, in particular, is pretty flat; when I used to drive to Boston, the mountains would noticeably get (a bit) higher across the border in New Hampshire. #Quebec

What? Power in the Upper Travers hut? Yeah, nah. psst @clement@social.explorewilder.com here is a different tarn from a different part of the South Island, but I did get reflections in this one. #HutLife

Blue Lake is not actually on the Travers-Sabine Circuit but it's worth an extra day at Blue Lake Hut to visit. That sentence is misleading advertising, though: here are the pictures from just before Blue Lake. #tramping

@RonjaBiernat@chaos.social I'm chairing a conference and my co chair found software to verify references. (Ironically it was vibe coded but anyways). We desk rejected papers with over 10% fake references and asked reviewers about the borderline cases.

@exlibrarykris@cloudisland.nz this is definitely not how my spouse feels about snow!

It is true that Wellington has carparks too. Sometimes there are dragon dances on them, though.

@huskify @mu the Ontario Society of Professional Engineers has a lot of material at different levels of technical depth and COVID aware: https://ospe.on.ca/advocacy/government-relations/indoor-air-quality/

@Happyfishmedia@cloudisland.nz to be fair I understand their problems with printing, very plausible

Less landscape-y, more tramping-infrastructure-y, on the Travers-Sabine. #HutLife

@irix@cloudisland.nz @Happyfishmedia@cloudisland.nz also tenured faculty; there is a power issue here, and when things don't work like they should, that's an issue.

@georgepenney@sunny.garden we kind of had a fly infestation and could have used more spiders!

@ygathgoch@cloudisland.nz the new Minister for Land Information replied: Dear Patrick Thank you for your email, dated 7 April 2026, regarding the decision not to correct the spellings of the three glacier names in Mount Aspiring National Park. I acknowledge your disappointment at the decisions and your desire to correct such historical misspellings of these personal names. However, the formaer Minister for Land Information's decisions are final under the New Zealand Geographic Board (Ngā Pou Tauhana o Aotearoa) Act 2008. Thank you for taking the time to write and express your concerns, which I have noted. Sincerely Hon Mike Butterick Minister for Land Information

@cwebber@social.coop was just talking yesterday about how computer scientists stopped SDI even earlier than that, and where people are these days.

@mattwillis@hachyderm.io @joshjacobsen@hachyderm.io @AlexsandraSmart@mastodon.nz supported by the "country budget is same as household budget" mindworm, sigh

@grizolda @georgepenney I have a picture of a knobbled orbweaver from February but I'll keep it to myself...

@rogerparkinson I'm usually pretty good and only have leftover mugs from the night before

@bluewave_kiwi@mastodon.nz @aligorith@mastodon.nz @BobLefridge@mastodon.nz many existing NZ work visas are currently at "median wage" minimum, though a couple are at 15% above median for job. https://www.immigration.govt.nz/work/requirements-for-work-visas/wage-rates-for-work-visas/

From the position and shape of that unidentified peak, it's got to be Mount Barff, but it looks like no pictures of Barff that I can find on the Internet.

@azonenberg@ioc.exchange I've found that bedrooms do get quite stuffy and high CO2 (easily over 1000) with doors closed, would be interesting to see what you find.

@bluewave_kiwi@mastodon.nz @aligorith@mastodon.nz @BobLefridge@mastodon.nz that's why National is historically more pro immigration than Labour, yes, though then we can mix up racism with this to get to a less pro immigration National.

Link: https://www.letstalk.wellington.govt.nz/mahere-tau-annual-plan-202627 deadline 10 May at midnight.