A farm in Bolivia's Andean plains grapples with hotter climate

ORURO, Bolivia, June 3 (Reuters) - Bolivian ranchers Elizabeth and Edwin Churata are learning how to survive in a drier, hotter climate. They are adapting new water-storage techniques as their traditional ponds dry up, and changing how they feed their cattle and sheep.

They've had to adjust fast. In the past few years, the Churatas' farm in the highland Andean region of Oruro has been hit by climate phenomena known as La Nina and recently the reverse El Nino, the strongest one in 20 years.

El Nino is associated with a disruption of wind patterns that means warmer ocean surface temperatures in the eastern and central Pacific. Around Oruro, it brought lower rainfall and higher temperatures, drying up feed crops, which led to around half of the region's livestock dying.

As the local climate has heated up over decades, rivers and lakes have also shrunk.

"At the moment there's no water because the Desaguadero River has got much lower. It's what provides us with water beca...
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