Malaysia pt deux

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Part Deux

Hello again!

So since my last blog so much has happened. I left off after just getting to the primary rainforest at Bukit Rengit. We stayed there for 4 nights, foraying in and out of the jungle. Our main focus here was insects. Outside of our dorms (I think rustic is a generous term although we warmed up to them a little) were dozens of rhinoceros beetles that liked to flip themselves onto their backs and writhe around uselessly before ants “cleaned them up”. We took to flipping some of them over and rescuing them but to no avail most of the time. Another visitor to the outside of our dorm was an atlas moth, the largest species in the world. Beautiful critter with fake snake head at the tips of its wings.

The first day we were there we walked through the jungle learning all of the traditional uses for the plants and herbs. Many “enhance” body parts while others can make you sterile for a couple of years. Makes me happy that kids in Canada don’t have access to these plants when they might be inclined to prank one another. The next day we headed to the Kuala Gandah Elephant rehab centre. Most of us were skeptical going in as we had already been to an orangutan centre owned by a land developer that seems tourist trappy, but we were pleasantly surprised by the elephants. They were all Asian elephants (smaller and hairier than the African variety) that came from problem areas where they were interfering with crops or settlements. Some of the elephants that had been domesticated help them translocate other individuals into national parks by accompanying them on their journey and calming them down using some good old fashioned elephant therapy. We got to feed the domesticated ones sugarcane and go for a short ride on their backs. Definitely made us feel better about rehabilitation centers in Malaysia in general.

The next morning we walked down to the waterfall (yes there was another jungle waterfall here…not quite as nice as the first and there were some nippy fish and prawns in there). Just downstream we collected aquatic insects using all sorts of nets, rock flippage, and skill. Well maybe not skill for me. We put the insects in ethanol and brought them back to the lab to identify them in order to judge how clean the stream was. Aquatic insects are a good measure of stream health because many of the species need clear water to breath through their gills. Luckily the mountain stream we were testing came out to be fairly clean.

That night we set up white sheets with a powerful light in the middle to attract a diversity of flying insects. Apparently we were not as successful as we could’ve been on other nights but we still caught a heck of a lot of insects that I certainly had never seen before. Some of the most interesting are definitely the termites. In the forest they live in huge colonies and are all wingless. They play an integral role in the forest by digging tunnels through the ground that allow water penetration and nutrient cycling. In areas where the forest has been cut down and there are no termites, this lack of water penetration causes massive mudslides. So basically termites prevent mudslides. Back to the night insect collection…termites that get too crowded grow wings and fly to find a new colony so we caught a number of those. Lots of moths were attracted too ranging from the size of my hand to a fingernail. Two of the more bizarre insects were found in the forest floor using headlamps. One was a beetle larva about 6 cm long with plates on its back and a glowing tail. The tail flashes kind of like a firefly and probably means “I don’t taste good”. The other insect was unlike anything I had seen before. It looked like an insect got sprayed with white silly string. Just an outlandish species all around.

We left Bukit Rengit and headed east about 2 hours to the city of Jerantut. We were back in a hotel (with an attached karaoke bar no less) which allowed us to have a nice warm shower for the first time in weeks. We spent a day traveling around a palm oil plantation and learning the full process of transforming palm fruitlets into the oil that is in most of the processed foods people eat. We are constantly reminded of the palm oil when traveling through Malaysia as most of the countryside is covered with row upon row of tropical palm. It is strange to see a tree that we associate with tropical paradise grown in monoculture across the whole countryside.

Taman Negara

After Jerantut we journeyed to Taman Negara (translated this means national park so calling it Taman Negara national park is redundant). It is apparently the oldest tropical rainforest in the world and has never been logged. We took a 2.5 hour boat ride up the Pahang River through picturesque jungle only to reach one of the more touristy places we have been on the entire trip. There were little shops and restaurants and other tourists walking around. As spoiled as it sounds when we see other tourists we usually don’t enjoy the place as much. Luckily this wasn’t the case with Taman Negara.

We hopped on a boat that rides incredibly low in the water and headed up a tributary zipping back and forth along the river to find the only suitable spot deep enough for the boat to pass through. Kind of like boating through an obstacle course. After about 20 minutes we reached the animal hide, a small building with rudimentary wooden bunks and open windows overlooking an open salt lick where large animals come. After a quick dip in the river before it got dark, we settled in to watch for animals. The moonlight was enough to catch a glimpse of animals as they walk across the field and then we could shine a bright light on them to get a better look. Unfortunately all we saw were two sambar deer that walked by around 10:00 pm. Other than that we just listened to the deafening sounds of cicadas, crickets, frogs, hornbills, gibbons etc. On a night walk in the jungle one of our guides did find a nice big green and black striped poisonous spider and a Smith’s green-eyed gecko about the size of my forearm. No elephants or tigers but great nonetheless.

The next morning we woke up and headed over to the world’s longest canopy walk. Even though I am not afraid of heights it was a bit too wobbly for me to be fully comfortable. Pretty neat to be up in the tops of the trees though. You get a whole different appreciation for the forest from high up above it. After the canopy walk we hopped back on the bus and drove for seven hours to get to the east coast of peninsular Malaysia. The city we are staying in is called Kuala Terengganu (or KT). We are spending two nights here and have a free day today. In the morning we went to a large market with all sorts of colourful fabrics, fruits, fish, and trinkets. It is more of a local market and we ended up being some of the only tourists there which was kind of nice. I then feasted on an assortment of fruit including mangos, mangosteens, and rambutans. A full sliced mango for 1 ringit (33 cents Canadian) is something that needs to be brought back to Canada. I also will reiterate my love for mangosteens in all of their delicious glory. I’d consider planting a mangosteen tree if I thought it would survive in Victoria.

KT is our jumping off point for Pulau Redang (Pulau means island) to go to stay on a turtle beach where they come to lay their eggs. We are headed there tomorrow and I’m just a tiny bit excited. Snorkeling, diving, turtles…enough said. Now I need to go catch up on my field journal before I get too far behind.

Hope all is well wherever you are.

Josh

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Photos

Aquatic insect survey in a mountain stream at Bukit Rengit
Photo courtesy of Alex Bolton

Atlas moth outside of our dorm
Largest moth in the world with this one being just larger than my hand.

Yet another leech that I "collected" while going after frogs
Notice the culprit getting away

Smith's green-eyed gecko
Roughly the size of my forearm