Category Archives: Mammals

Family Tour – Judean Foothills

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A hands on educational experience for all the family

Tel Socho also known as “Lupine Hill”

The “Shfeila” or Judean Foothills is the area between the Jerusalem Hills and the Coastal Plain. It has been the battlefield of Judea for more than 2000 years. The soft chalk hills crowned with grassy meadows are a perfect home for many plants and animals. Join me on a fun family adventure, exploring the Foothills of Judea.

Itinerary:

  • Nature Walk in Tel Soho (pictured above). The first part of the David and Goliath Story. In the spring the best place to view flowering Lupines.
  • Dramatic Enactment of David and Goliath at Tel Azeikah.  Bringing the Bible and archaeology to life at a classic archaeological site.

 

Khirbet Midras Bar Kochba Caves

  • Crawl the Bar Kochba Caves.  A system of crawl caves where Judeans held out against the forces of Roman Emperor Hadrian.
  • Lunch in area

  • Underground Adventure at the Soreq Stalactite caves.
  • Animals and The Bible explore the nature in the Holy Land at the Biblical Museum of Natural History.

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Spotlight on Nature: Latest Safari Map Update

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I’ve been preparing for a new tour and part of this preparation has been mapping the wildlife in the southern suburbs of Jerusalem. My recent astounding sightings have been;

Graceful Prinia (bird)

Eurasian Jays

Kuhl’s Pipistrelle Bat

European Green Toad

Common Gazelle (!)

You can check regular updates on this map:

It was a wonderful experience seeing the gazelle at 5:30 am as the sun rose over the Jerusalem hills.  I’m going to be preparing this tour for the next few months, if your interested in booking me for a tour you can contact me here.

Spotlight on Nature: Urban Safari Map of Southern Jerusalem

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This is the map that I will be updating regularly as part of my ‘Suburban Safari’ project. I will record the animals that I have identified, there location and the date I identified them.  There is a key in the description section and hover your cursor over the markers on the map to see what has been identified so far.

There’s probably going to be a few kinks to iron out at first, but check back here regularly for new sightings.

Coming Soon: The Suburban Safari Tour!

Email me here for details

Spotlight on Nature: The Camel, The Hare and the Hyrax.

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This little animal is happily perched on one of the scariest cliffs in Israel. (Hyrax in Rosh Haniqra)

This Post is a cunning combination of this weeks Torah Portion (Re’eh) and the Monthly Spotlight on Nature.

‘But this you can’t eat… the Camel, the Hare and the Hyrax’.(Deuteronomy  / Devarim 14:7)

Not a Badger or a Rabbit

A little note (or rant) on my translation and what animals you can actually expect to see in Israel. The King James translation of the Bible renders this the ‘Camel, the hare and the coney’. This is patently ridiculous as ‘Coney’ means a rabbit.

Exciting Nature Fact of the Day: THERE ARE NO WILD RABBITS IN ISRAEL.

The Bible was written for a people intended to live in the land of Israel. The fauna spoken of in the Bible are all animals indigenous to Israel. As there are no naturally occuring wild Rabbits in Israel. Some translations such as the ‘New American’ translate the second animal, in hebrew ‘Arnevet’, as rabbit too. This is equally wrong even though in modern Hebrew a similar word ‘Arnav’ means rabbit and ‘Arnevet’ means lady rabbit.

Exciting Nature Fact of the Day number 2:

THERE ARE NO BADGERS EITHER.

All the translations that call ‘Shaphan’ (the last animal) a badger are clearly mistaken, there are no badgers in Israel at all.

Common Israeli anmals

The first animal mentioned ‘Gamal’ in hebrew is easy to translate and spot, there are, suprisingly enough, quite a lot of camels in this part of the world.

The second animal; ‘Arnevet’, well I have n’t yet seen a hare in Israel, but apparently there are quite a number.

(Oh yes, incidentally the difference between a Rabbit and a Hare is that Hares are non gregarious, they do n’t live in communities and they are larger than Rabbits.)

The third one, ‘Shaphan’, is a hyrax, the little fuzzy beast depicted above. They can be seen all over the place, in the desert in Ein Gedi, in the Galilee and up on the Coast at Rosh Haniqra. Psalm 104 describes them as hiding in rocks, and its pretty much a rule in Israel, anywhere there’s rocks, there’s bound to be a hyrax or two poking around.

(This Word of Torah is dedicted to the Health of Zlata bat Sima)

Spotlight on Nature: Coypu the Fuzzy Invader

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httpv://youtu.be/o2Ajqoqs-es

This is the South American Coypu, what is it doing in the Hula valley in Northern Israel?

So the story goes…

A number of years ago an enterprising Israeli farmer wanted to start a fur farming business. The problem is that mink and ermine do n’t do too well in the hot winters in the middle east. So he found this charming South American rodent that produces wonderfully thick fur every winter.

There was but one snag…

Israeli winters are not cold enough for these little fellas. So what did he do … he released them into the wild.

Big Mistake!

These fellas eat up the roots of plants and do a great job at messing up the local attempts to re – invigorate the wetlands by eating through irrigation pipes and messing up canals.

I think they are very cute and look forward to the day when we will be able to live side by side with these fuzzy invaders.