Sciency Thoughts: Kelantan State

Showing posts with label Kelantan State. Show all posts

Sunday, 19 November 2023

Authorities in Kelantan State, Malaysia, begin capturing wild Tigers after a spate of attacks.

Authorities in Kelantan State, Peninsula Malaysia have begun capturing wild Malaysian Tigers, Panthera tigris jacksoni, following a series of attacks on workers and others on Rubber plantations in the northeast of the country. Traps have been set in forests close to plantations, with two Tigers captured to date, both of which have been sent to a wildlife sanctuary.

A Tiger captured in a trap set by wildlife rangers in Gua Musang, Kelantan. Wildlife Protection and National Parks Department.

The first death occurred on 9 May 2023, when Halim Asin, a member of the Orang Asli indigenous community, was attacked while fishing on the Sg Aring River with his nephew, and later found dead. On 5 October, when another Orang Asli man, Pisie Amud, 25, was attacked and killed why on a fishing trip in the Pos Pasik Forest. On 10 November, Lalu Sukarya Yahya, 42, an Indonesian migrant worker employed as a rubber tapper on a rubber plantation in Kuala Wok near Pos Pasik. The following day, another migrant worker, Ahka Soe Ya, 22, from Myanmar, was attacked by a Tiger while working on Rubber plantation in Kampung Meranto alongside his wife. He was taken to hospital by four Myanmar nationals, thought to be his wife and their friends, but died of injuries to his head and neck. Between 2017 and 2022 only four Tiger attacks were recorded in the state, two of which were fatal.

Police officers recovering the body of Lalu Sukarya Yahya, 42, who was killed in an apparent Tiger attack on a Rubber plantation in Kuala Wok. New Straits Times/Royal Malaysian Police.

The attacks have been blamed upon male Tigers roaming in search of and mates, or else young Tigers learning to hunt and looking for territories of their own. However, it is likely that a change in forest use by Humans in the region is as much to blame. Since the 1980s logging in Malaysian forest reserves has been selective, with loggers only allowed to remove certain trees, leaving the essential structure of the forest unchanged. This changed in 2007 when a new government policy has allowed for the clearing of areas of natural forest for plantation forestry, in which trees are grown on a cycle of felling and replanting. These plantations typically comprise monocultures of trees such as Rubber, Acacia and Eucalyptus, which support far less wildlife than natural forests, providing less food for Tigers, and causing them to roam further afield, and consider non-preferred food items, such as Humans.

Newly planted trees on a plantation in Kelantan, following a cycle of clearing. Malaysialand.

The status of Malaysian Tigers is subject to some dispute. The population in Peninsula Malaysia, which comprises about 200 adult individuals, has been considered to be a separate subspecies, Panthera tigris jacksoni (sometimes Panthera tigris malayensis) since 2004, with that subspecies regarded as Critically Endangered under the terms of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species. However, it is also argued that Malaysian Tigers are not sufficiently distinct to merit this status and that they should be regarded as a population of the Asian Tiger, Panthera tigris tigris, which is regarded as Endangered, a lower threat of extinction, with a much larger population, found from Malaysia to Siberia.

Friday, 24 August 2018

Vatica najibiana: A new species of Dipterocarp from Peninsula Malaysia.

Dipterocarps are tropical forest trees in the Mallow Family, Malvales, found predominantly in Southeast Asia, where they often form the dominant part of the flora, as well as in South Asia and Africa, and, to a lesser extent South America. The name Diptrerocarp means 'winged fruit', the distinguishing feature of these trees, nuts with distinctive 'wings' which enable them to glide long distances after being shed, aiding distribution of the trees, Members of the genus Vatica are small-to-medium sized trees with smooth bark and leaves found in Southeast Asia.

In a paper published in the journal PhytoKeys on 10 May 2018, Abdul Rahman Ummul-Nazrah, Mohd Amin Mohd Hairul, Imin Kamin, Ruth Kiew and Poh Teck Ong of the Forest Research Institute Malaysia, describe a new species of Vatica from Kelantan and Pahang states in Peninsula Malaysia.

The new species is named Vatica najibiana, in honour of the Prime Minister of Malaysia, Dato’ Sri Mohd Najib bin Tun Abdul Razak, for his interest in nature conservation and protection of the environment. It is a small tree, reaching 5-7 m in height, with a bole width of 15-17 cm. The trunk is a smooth dark brown with faint horizontal bands, and large patches of white Lichen. The leaves are elliptical to lance shaped, and the nuts 7-10 mm in diameter.

Vatica najibiana. (A) Plant in its natural habitat. (B) Bole. (C) Inner bark. (D)–(E) Leafy shoots with infructescences (F) Fruit. Imin Kamin & Abdul Rahman Ummul-Nazrah in Ummul-Nazrah et al. (2018).

Vatica najibiana was found at only two locations, one in the Relai Forest Reserve in Gua Musang District, Kelantan State, and one near Merapoh in Gua Tanggang District, Pahang State, both on the summit of isolated karst limestone hills, and about 40 km apart. The total known habitat of the trees covers less than 10 km², with the Gua Tanggang location having no protection, and the Relai Forest Reserve location, while in theory protected, is considered to be threatened by encroachment by oil palm plantations, which are often expanded by burning other vegetation. For this reason the species is considered to be Endangered under the terms of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species.