Divers, Fishers and Scientists Map Sharks and Rays to Save Them
Knowing where different sharks and rays reproduce, feed, hang out, and rest, is important for conservation. But it is hard to do – unless everyone joins in. Now, a new atlas of these areas is sparking optimism for these threatened fishes.
(Feature video: Scalloped Hammerheads (Sphyrna lewinii) gather in Sipadan and Layang-Layang; where do they come from, and where are they going? (Credit: www.scubazoo.com)
(Feature video: Scalloped Hammerheads (Sphyrna lewinii) gather in Sipadan and Layang-Layang; where do they come from, and where are they going? (Credit: www.scubazoo.com)
THE CORAL reef wall at Hanging Garden, Sipadan, is colourful, popping with yellow crinoids, purple table corals and orange-and-white clownfish. But the scuba divers ignore it. Instead, they drift in the deep blue, away from the reef that plunges to a depth of 600 m.
Suddenly, they see them, a shiver of sharks with unmistakable hammer-like heads. And the divers whoop in celebration.
IN OCTOBER 2023, ecologist Izereen Mukri received a phone call and a photo about a “weird monkey” in the urban park near his house called Taman Subang Ria in Selangor.
Izereen glanced at the photo. Greyish black with a long tail – it was a Selangor silvery langur, Trachypithecus selangorensis, a primate species classified as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List. These langurs live in mangroves or by rivers, not in a park surrounded by roads and buildings.
He went to observe the langur. It was a female that must have felt terribly alone as the species naturally lives in a group. It was not eating its natural diet of shoots, but the apples and bananas left by park visitors. It was also relaxed when humans got close. Izereen, who spoke to Macaranga in his personal capacity, suspects that it used to be someone’s pet.
(Feature image: The lone female Selangor silvery langur found lingering in an urban park in Subang Jaya, Selangor. “It was a beautiful shot. But I rather not have it,” said wildlife photographer Izereen Mukri of this January 2024 photo. | Photo by Izereen Mukri)
AT 7pm JUST after dinner, Sam* would walk his dog around his neighbourhood block in Petaling Jaya, come home and feed the dog. Then he would either play online video games with his friends or scroll through social media sites such as TikTok and Instagram right before bed.
And once every few weeks, he adds something to this routine. After feeding his dog he would feed his other pets: a ball python (Python regius), a bearded dragon (Pogona spp.) and a sulcata tortoise (Centrochelys sulcata).
(Feature image: Screenshot of exotic pet content on popular social media platform TikTok. | Image by Macaranga)
Inadequate protection of precious urban forests is shrinking them, warns community researcher and organiser Peter Leong.
TAPAN KUMAR Nath’s recent article in Macaranga,Support community efforts to better manage urban green spaces, shines an important light on the urgent need for community based organisations to gain a role in the governance of urban green spaces (UGS).
A 2019 study which found that KL “lost about 88% of its UGS between 2007 and 2017″ is most alarming – it highlights that the door of meaningful opportunity for these organisations’ impact in UGS governance is closing.
(Feature pic: In the densely built-up Klang Valley, remaining forest patches are precious to local communities | Photo by Dorothy Woon)
The Asian arowana is a fish, a paradox, and an ongoing test of how commercial trade of an endangered animal could help conserve it.
The fish, once a common food fish for locals from Cambodia to Indonesia, shot to stardom among pet fish enthusiasts and was hunted to rarity in rivers and lakes. But fish breeders learned to rear Asian arowanas in muddy ponds. Every year, hundreds of thousands of farmed Asian arowanas are exported worldwide, many of them from Malaysia.
(Feature image: A golden Asian arowana. | Photo by Eric Chiang/Macaranga)
Horticulturists say producing lots of pitcher plants can conserve wild plants. Is it enough though, when ever more new species whet buyers’ appetites?
IN JULY 2023, a Filipino Facebook post appeared advertising the sale of a Malaysian tropical pitcher plant, Nepenthes berbulu. What was on sale were seeds, purportedly harvested on July 15. The thing is, this is a newly discovered species of pitcher plant from Malaysia’s Titiwangsa Mountains.
Its existence was made public a mere 4 months earlier in a scientific publication. The plant’s exact location was not disclosed and specimens were also only supposedly collected for research.
(Feature photo: Flooding the market with affordable propagated Nepenthes helps reduce pressure on wild plants. | Image: Bryan Yong)