Newsademic British English edition 260

parts o f South America, including 
the Atacama Desert.
El Nino means ‘the boy’ in Span­
ish. To Spanish speakers the words 
are used to describe the baby Je­
sus. The weather pattern was given 
this nickname many years ago by
people who fished in the Pacific 
off the coasts of Peru and Ecuador. 
They noticed changes when the sea­
water became warmer. There were 
fewer fish in the sea and much more 
rain on land. They called it El Nino, 
as the event seemed to begin just 
before December. In the Christian 
faith, this is when the baby Jesus 
came into the world.
Atacam a flow ering desert
If there is enough rain, hundreds 
of different plants will grow in the 
Atacama. In most years, the seeds 
remain in the ground. They do not 
germinate, or begin to grow, as it is 
far too dry. Yet, when the rains ar­
rive, the plants suddenly come to 
life. The most dominant is called the 
malva (or mallow). This small plant 
has a bright pink flower. So during a 
flowering desert, it looks as if a pink 
carpet covers the ground. □
A
f r ic a
'
s
 
v u l t u r e s
BirdLife International is a partner­
ship o f about 120 organisations. 
These organisations, which are based 
in different countries, work together. 
They monitor numbers and try to 
protect bird species that are threat­
ened. Normally, these threats are 
caused by human activity. Recently, 
BirdLife International has produced 
a report on African vultures.
Vultures are scavengers. They 
feed 
on 
dead 
animal 
bodies, 
or carcasses. The birds play an

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12th November 2015 
N e w s a d e m ic .co m ™