Wild boar causes flight delays at Spain's main airport

February 14, 2015 9:46 AM

MADRID (AP) — Spain's airport authority says a wild boar that broke through a perimeter fence at Madrid's international airport caused runways to be shut briefly and two landings to be delayed.

The beast set off security alarms late Friday and when cameras focused on the spot, operators observed it turning around and loping off through the hole it had made.

The incident happened 100 meters (330 feet) from the nearest stretch of runway. It delayed an incoming flight from London 20 minutes and a domestic flight from A Coruna 10 minutes, the airport authority's statement said Saturday.

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Spanish shepherds guide 2,000 sheep across Madrid

MADRID (AP) — Shepherds guided a flock of 2,000 sheep through Madrid's streets on Sunday in defense of ancient grazing, droving and migration rights increasingly threatened by urban sprawl and modern agricultural practices.

Tourists and city-dwellers were surprised to see the capital's traffic cut to permit the bleating, bell-clanking parade to pass the city's most emblematic locations.

Shepherds halted at the old town hall so the chief herdsman could hand authorities 25 maravedies — copper coins first minted in the 11th century — as payment for the crossing.

They then continued past Puerta del Sol — Madrid's equivalent of New York's Times Square — and past the Bank of Spain headquarters on their way to Retiro Park.

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Spanish shepherds guide 2,000 sheep through Madrid

MADRID (AP) — Shepherds led a flock of 2,000 sheep through Madrid on Sunday in defense of ancient grazing, droving and migration rights increasingly threatened by urban sprawl and modern agricultural practices.

Tourists were surprised to see downtown traffic cut to permit the ovine parade to bleat — bells clanking — across some of Madrid's most upmarket urban settings.

Since at least 1273, shepherds have had the right to use droving routes that wind across land that was once open fields and woodland before Madrid mushroomed to the great metropolis it is today.

Every year, a handful of shepherds defend that right in Spain's capital city. Following an age-old tradition, they paid 25 maravedis — coins first minted in the 11th century — to city hall officials to use the crossing.

Shepherds have a right to use around 78,000 miles (125,000 kilometers) of ancient paths for seasonal livestock migrations from cool highland pastures in summer to warmer and more protected lowland grazing in winter.

The movement is called transhumance and in Spain up until recently involved close to 1 million animals a year, mostly sheep and cattle.

Modern farming practices and the use of faster road transport are increasingly confining animals to barns or trucks, because shepherding is costly and time-consuming, according to the Ministry of Agriculture, which has promoted the colorful annual Transhumance Fiesta in Madrid since 1994.

Spaniards are proud of their centuries-old sheep rearing traditions and hold the native Merino breed of sheep in high esteem.

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300 pet turtles take refuge in Atocha railway station, Madrid - via Herp Digest

By Anne Sewell, Digital Journal, 7/29/13 in Travel 

Madrid - Anyone traveling through Madrid's main Atocha railway station in the last twenty years will remember the beautiful, tropical garden in the station's main concourse. What they might not know is that around 300 turtles have happily taken refuge there.

Basically the tropical garden has now become a welcoming refuge to homeless turtles.

There are many reasons for them being there. Some were brought there because children lost interest in them. Others because for some reason or another they could no longer keep them as pets.

Another major reason is that people might not have been prepared, or able, to pay the 40% ticket price to take the turtle on a train and found a quick solution to the problem.

Whatever the reason for them being there, the station's indoor wetlands have been populated with approximately 300 turtles, giving a little glimpse of nature to passengers passing through the station.

The state railway company, Renfe, has employed Aurora Peña to look after the turtles.

She told El País: “We give them animal feed, to make sure they are properly nourished.”

Indicating the turtles, grouped on rocks and other platforms in the water, surrounded by fine white sand, she said: “This is the area we have set aside for them to lay their eggs.”

Explaining that normally turtles living in a tropical sea would head to a remote and protected beach to lay their eggs, and then incubate them, she said that the little expanse of sand in the tropical garden is the closest they will get to a beach in the Spanish capital.

At the last count of the turtles in 2012, when there were 275 animals.

“We take them out one by one, we count them and we tidy them up a bit,” says Peña.

According to Peña, the population has stayed relatively stable over the years. Those that have died have been replaced by people's former pets.

Not a bad place for a turtle to end up these days, and as we can see from the video above, definitely a distraction from the boredom of waiting for your train.

The gardens alone are worth the visit. With over 7,000 plants in neatly manicured garden beds, with some reaching the station's domed ceiling, its like another world in the center of the busy city.

There are reportedly around 260 different tropical species among the plants, and they even include towering palm trees.

Normally a railway station is somewhere you just pass through when on vacation, but Atocha railway station has actually received reviews on Tripadvisor, mainly for its tropical garden and inhabitants.