Blogs from Tawau, Sabah, Malaysia, Asia

Geo: 5.01965, 117.746Breakfast was at 7am, and considering some of our other starts, this was not too bad. A quick piece of watermelon, a cup of tea and a chat with a couple from Norwich, we were loaded into the boat to go down to Abai Village lodge for our village visit and to plant another tree, as we did in Brazil. We were shown to our cabin by our guide known as bones (Erdy). Pretty much identical to the last lodge we stayed in, although there was air con of you fancied paying £20 for the night. We didn't!! Such cheap skates!! After a nap, we met the other 9 people in our group and went to plant our tree. It was a type of umbrella tree, each given their own ID number, etched into ... read more

Geo: 5.01965, 117.746Breakfast was at 7am so we could make a good start on our trek up to the lookout point before it got too hot. Breakfast was extensive, fruits, cereal, toast, omelettes and cooked both western and Malaysian. There were pancakes with bacon and syrup.... I/we could not resist.The trek took us up, very up. We saw a mock viper snake on the path. Abt a foot long and actually spotted by Emily, not our guide!! Our guide actually nearly stood on it!! And yes it was poisonous!!! Oh good!! We followed a termite colony moving house, a steady stream of them, all in a line for around 400m. Up trees, backdown trees, across roots and leaves and branches!!! It was incredible for bugs and so many millions of them. The first bit we stopped ... read more

Sabah likes to advertise itself as some kind of real life Eden, a nature paradise full of wild and fantastic creatures. And to reinforce that image you have the Lonely Planet, which has this to say about Sabah: ‘Malaysia’s state of Sabah proves that there is a God, and we’re pretty sure that he’s some sort of mad scientist. Sabah was his giant test-tube, the product of a harebrained hypothesis. You see, on the seventh day, God wasn’t taking his infamous rest, he was pondering the following: ‘What would happen if I took an island, covered it with impenetrable jungle, tossed in an ark’s worth of animals, and turned up the temperature to a sweltering 40˚C? The result? A tropical Eden with prancing mega-fauna and plenty of fruit-bearing trees. This ‘land below the wind’, as it ... read more

Amazingly, I have completed 3 surveys of each of my study streams, which means I have already completed more than 3 weeks of data collection. While my first week in camp was largely rained out and I spent more forced days in camp and in town getting supplies than I would have liked, the past two weeks have been a whirlwind of field work. This is my second year at this field camp, and I quite enjoy the camaraderie of the group of scientists that are here. The exact composition seems to change constantly, but for the majority of my time so far, there have been about 10-12 of us in camp. Myself and my new field assistant Josh are the only Americans, the rest being largely British. There are two of us post-docs here at ... read more

June 22nd Today we're heading to Tawau, a town two and a half hours west of Semporna. After breakfast we packed the last of our things and walked to the mini-bus station. These buses only leave when full so we were prepared to wait a while. We didn't sit for more than 5mins before we left, even though there was only three other passengers on board. We drove around the block and picked up another three people. Then we stopped again near the mini-bus station and sat in the boiling vehicle for 10mins while we waited for more people to join our little gang. The bus filled slowly but surely and before we were totally boiled we left again, this time with a full load of passengers. We were excited to be moving on again. The ... read more