Pantanal

The Pantanal (Portuguese pronunciation: [pɐ̃taˈnaw]) is a natural region encompassing the world's largest tropical wetland area. It is located mostly within the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul, but it extends into Mato Grosso and portions of Bolivia and Paraguay. It sprawls over an area estimated at between 140,000 and 195,000 square kilometres (54,000 and 75,000 sq mi). Various subregional ecosystems exist, each with distinct hydrological, geological and ecological characteristics; up to 12 of them have been defined (RADAMBRASIL 1982).

Roughly 80% of the Pantanal floodplains are submerged during the rainy seasons, nurturing an astonishing biologically diverse collection of aquatic plants and helping to support a dense array of animal species.

The name "Pantanal" comes from the Portuguese word pântano, meaning wetland, bog, swamp, quagmire or marsh. By comparison, the Brazilian highlands are locally referred to as the planalto, plateau or, literally, high plain.

Geology, geography and ecology

Pantanal cat

The Pantanal cat (Leopardus braccatus) is a small feline of tropical South America. It is named after the Pantanal wetlands in central South America, but mainly occurs in grassland, shrubland, savannas and deciduous forests. It has traditionally been treated as a subspecies of the larger colocolo, but was split primarily based on differences in pelage colour/pattern and cranial measurements. This split is not supported by genetic work, leading some authorities to maintain that it is a subspecies of the colocolo, although others regard it as "likely [a] distinct species", and the validity of the genetic work has been questioned.

Description

Pantanal cats are small felines, roughly the size of a domestic cat. They have yellowish or brown fur with dark brown spots on the flanks, a whitish throat, two dark lines on each cheek, black stripes on the legs and chest, and black feet and tail-tip. The ears are large and pointed, with dark grey to black fur, and sometimes a pale marking on the posterior surface. There is a single report of a wild melanistic individual from Brazil, although this coat pattern has also been observed in some captive specimens.

Pantanal (telenovela)

Pantanal is a Brazilian telenovela which originally aired from March 27, 1990 to December 10, 1990 at 9 P.M. on Rede Manchete.SBT recently re-aired the telenovela from June 9, 2008 to January 13, 2009. It was set on the Pantanal region.

Pantanal is one of the best known ecological or environmental telenovela, a small sub-category of the genre whose purpose is to dramatize, and hence raise audience awareness of environmental degradation. It was written by Benedito Ruy Barbosa and directed by Jayme Monjardim, Carlos Magalhães, Marcelo de Barreto, and Roberto Naar.

Overview

Pantanal brings to the screen a visually lush and enticing product in which traditional telenovela storylines and plot-devices are wed with cinematic audiovisual techniques that make the production look more like a movie than a television program. It is this visual appeal, coupled with the introduction of female frontal nudity to Brazilian prime-time television that allowed TV-Manchete to dominate the audience share in this prime-time slot for the first time, overcoming perpetual ratings leader TV-Globo.