fuel'?

Question

Estoy buscando una palabra.
Pienso que debo hacer esto en Ingles!

In bushfire fighting we often used the term "fuel" or "fuel load" (which we measure in tonnes per hectare) for the forest litter that's on the ground, you know, as opposed to fuel like petrol or gasoline.With my limited Spanish I'm having trouble explaining this. Is there a Spanish word, or words that would help?

And while I'm on a roll and feeling quite brave - what's the best
equivalent for--
"bush" (perhaps 'forest' in other parts of the world)
"bushfire"
"hazard reduction",
and "dry as a chip".

Muchas grasias amigos. Me disulpo por una pregunta tan largo.

Annie.

Answer 1

I'll catch you out one day (wink)

Answer 2

Regarding the use of "tilde": I understand what you mean when you say that "all Spanish words have accent," but in English we don't use the word tilde for this meaning, and do use the word accent, which is actually an abbreviated form of "accent mark." When we do use the word tilde, we use it to refer to the ~ mark. Here is the definition of tilde.

A diacritical mark ( ~ ) placed over the letter n in Spanish to indicate the palatal nasal sound (ny), as in cañon, or over a vowel in Portuguese to indicate nasalization, as in lã, pão.

So, we don't call the mark in the word esdrújula a tilde.

Answer 3

Thanks for teaching me a fancy new word! (Two, actually, since I had never heard the English translation, proparoxytonic, either). I should have known that there would be a word for this in Spanish.

Answer 4

There is no accent in disculpen, but there is an accent in discúlpenme (as well as discúlpeme and discúlpame), because it violates the general rule that the penultimate syllable is accented.

Answer 5

Good call James. I agree about the plural imperative but according to our conjugator and the RAE, there is no accent in disculpen. Anyway, I am off to bed now. See you tomorrow, (so to speak).

Answer 6

Good call, Eddy, but if she is talking to her "amigos," then it should be "discúlpenme," and either way, it takes an accent.

Answer 7

Hi Anne

Muchas grasias amigos. Me disulpo por una pregunta tan largo.

Muchas gracias amigos. Disculpeme por una pregunta tan larga.

Answer 8

dry as a chip ? tan seco como una astilla

I don't think that is real Spanish (it gets virtually no hits).

Here are a couple of ways to express this:

más seco que una pasa
(tan) seco como un hueso

Both of those have real Web presence, although they don't seem to be common. I think this would probably be expressed simply as "totalmente seco" or something similar by a native speaker.

Answer 9

Izzy thank you. I will talk about it now with more confidence.

Annie.

Answer 10

fuel - combustible
bush - arbusto o maleza
bushfire - fuego de maleza
hazard reduction - reducción del riesgo
dry as a chip ? tan seco como una astilla