Best of our wild blogs: 15 Aug 13



Our SG Conversation for the Green Community – Summary Report
from Green Future Solutions

Hantu Blog on National Radio!
from Pulau Hantu

Dunman High begins a third year of sharing about our shores from wild shores of singapore

Waveflowers
from The annotated budak

Butterflies Galore! : King Crow
from Butterflies of Singapore

Moulting of the Black and Golden Cicada
from Macro Photography in Singapore and Spider Leg Regeneration

Pied Fantail feeding a pair of chicks in the nest
from Bird Ecology Study Group

Mandai Mangrove and Mudflat Workshop 2013, Sat 31 Aug 2013: 9.00am – 5.00pm from Otterman speaks


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Good haze meeting with Malaysia, Indonesia: Shanmugam

Today Online 14 Aug 13;

HUA HIN (Thailand) — Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia have agreed on an outcome document for their leaders on the haze issue.

Singapore’s Foreign Minister K Shanmugam said a meeting with his counterparts from Malaysia and Indonesia has yielded an agreement on a number of haze-related issues.

The document was agreed upon at a trilateral meeting on the sidelines of an ASEAN Foreign Ministers meeting in the Thai resort town of Hua Hin.

The two-day ASEAN meeting was to prepare the agenda for strategic talks between the grouping and China later this month.

The choking haze that engulfed Singapore and Malaysia in June - the worst since 1997 - led to diplomatic tension in the region.

It highlighted the renewed need for cooperation among Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia - the three countries most affected.

As illegal slash-and-burn practices continue predominantly on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, there has been little progress made to hold international palm oil and pulp wood companies responsible.

One thorny issue that came up at the last high-level meetings on the haze last month was Singapore’s request for concession maps to identify exactly which areas the haze comes from in both Indonesia and Malaysia.

Issues of information security and transparency were cited as reason for not furnishing the maps. At the meeting this week, both countries maintained their stance, saying they risk competitiveness and legal issues if detailed maps are given out.

Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natelegaw said: “Indonesia has its own national monitoring system. Malaysia no doubt has one. Singapore is developing a system as well. Overarching all this, we have the ASEAN monitoring system. So we must all contribute to ASEAN’s capacity in this area.

“So it’s not a question of providing data to this and that. It’s just us utilising the national system that we have.”

But for now, Singapore is satisfied with the cooperation going forward.

Mr Shanmugam said: “The only difficulty that we have is the concession maps are based on Internet and what people have been able to find.

“Of course, the official concession maps will be in Indonesia and that is something that we will have to work through.

“I think we have a common target, all of us, to deal with the issues. And in Singapore we have indicated that we are intent on moving forward.

“So, we have developed a haze monitoring system. That’s a fact. That’s the one that the environment ministers in July were presented with and they welcomed our efforts in developing it and agreed that it should be presented to the leaders.

“I think our primary objective is to take steps in a cooperative way between the three countries to reduce the possibility of this happening and that can’t be done just by Singapore.

“The fires originate elsewhere...in this case, in Sumatra and that has to be dealt with. We have put forward our proposals.”

A major issue not discussed at the Hua Hin meeting was a Code of Conduct (COC) under the ASEAN Declaration on disputed islands in the South China Sea agreed upon by the parties involved.

Despite the gestures of goodwill and friendship, much more needs to be hammered out ahead of the 10th celebration of the China-ASEAN strategic partnership later this month. CHANNEL NEWSASIA


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Over six tonnes of rare live pangolins found in Vietnam

(AFP) Google News 15 Aug 13;

HANOI — Vietnamese customs officials said Wednesday they had found more than six tonnes of live protected pangolins inside a shipping container sent from Indonesia.

The rare creatures -- known as "scaly anteaters" for their unusual appearance and prized in China and Vietnam as an exotic meal -- were discovered last week during an inspection at the northern port of Hai Phong, a customs official told AFP, declining to provide further details.

The container, which was due to be shipped onwards to an undisclosed final destination, provided documents claiming it contained frozen fish, fins and fish bones, according to a report on the Vietnamese government's website.

Authorities have not specified what will happen to the pangolins.

Naomi Doak of wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC estimated there were several hundred of the mammals in last week's haul and told AFP there were no rescue centres in Vietnam equipped to deal with such large numbers.

"They're hard to keep in captivity and feed, they only eat termites... my guess is they'll be killed and sold," she said.

Since the start of the year, more than 10 tonnes of pangolin -- both live and frozen -- have been confiscated at Hai Phong port, the government report said.

Authorities have also seized 1.2 tonnes of pangolin scales -- which are sought after in traditional Vietnamese and Chinese medicine as a remedy for allergies and to help male potency.

The small mammals are nearly entirely covered with scales, made of keratin -- the same protein that makes up human hair.

Pangolins sell for between eight to ten million dong ($380 - $480) per kilogram at restaurants in Vietnam, according to state media reports.

Trade in pangolins is banned by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).


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Coastal seagrass could be latest weapon in the fight against climate change

Humble plants may save the planet
Marea Martlew Sydney Morning Herald 15 Aug 13;

Coastal seagrass could be latest weapon in the fight against climate change.

Marine ecologists call them seagrass meadows. They once wrapped Australia’s coastline providing sanctuary and food for dugongs and turtles, habitats for fish to breed and myriad other ecosystem services such as nutrient recycling and sediment stabilisation.

Now scientists believe these humble plants could be crucial in the fight to address climate change. Seagrass, it turns out, is 35 times more efficient at locking up, or “sequestering” carbon than rainforests.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are now so high they risk damaging our ecological life-support systems and seagrass could play a vital role in helping reverse the earth’s dangerous warming trend, says University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) scientist, Dr Peter Macreadie.

“If the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere reaches 450 parts per million, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – the world’s ‘climate change referee’ – estimates we will only have a 50 per cent chance of avoiding the drought, famine and widespread species extinction that is expected from a two degree increase in temperature,” Dr Macreadie says.
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“I don’t want to leave this legacy for my children. Through my research, and that of my colleagues, I’m looking for ways to maximise carbon sequestration with seagrasses and minimise the amount of carbon leaking into the atmosphere.

“What seagrasses are doing is not complex. They are simply capturing and storing carbon through photosynthesis and by trapping particles in the water column. This process – known as biosequestration – is what created fossil fuels in the first place.”

The ability of seagrass to absorb CO2 could be worth as much as $45 billion, based on the current carbon price of about $23 per tonne, Dr Macreadie says. It is a conservative estimate based on only one species of seagrass, Posidonia australis.

It is a compelling reason to protect seagrass meadows around the world, which are under threat from coastal development and nutrient runoff. NSW alone has lost 50 per cent of its seagrass, he says.

Ironically, it was one of Australia’s more audacious development proposals that helped Dr Macreadie tap into the value embedded in seagrass meadows.

In 1969, the Australian and NSW governments explored the possibility of building a large nuclear power station at Jervis Bay on the NSW coast. Studies were carried out including seismic testing that blew away large areas of seagrass. It could take another 100 years for seagrass to refill the massive holes, which are so big they can be seen from space. But the holes have allowed Dr Macreadie to take sediment samples from the damaged area and measure the carbon that was lost.

“The vast majority of carbon in seagrass meadows is actually stored in the sediment and can remain there for thousands of years,” Dr Macreadie says.

“The danger is that by destroying seagrass not only are we pulling less carbon out of the atmosphere, there is a risk that millennia-old carbon stocks could be released back into the environment. We are talking about amounts likely to be in excess of three times Australia’s annual greenhouse gas emissions. This would mean seagrasses would shift from being carbon sinks to carbon sources, thereby accelerating climate change.

“Our research will help quantify some of the unknowns about carbon leakage and, I’m hoping, add weight to having carbon sinks like seagrass included in the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory [the Federal Government’s compilation of Australia’s emissions data].”

If that happens, seagrass could help Australia meet its global obligations to reduce greenhouse gases and help regain control of the planet’s thermostat, he says.

This story written and produced by the University of Technology, Sydney, for Brink, a publication distributed monthly in The Sydney Morning Herald.

Seagrass may save the planet
University of Technology Sydney Science Alert 16 Aug 13;

Marine ecologists call them seagrass meadows. They once wrapped Australia’s coastline providing sanctuary and food for dugongs and turtles, habitats for fish to breed and myriad other ecosystem services such as nutrient recycling and sediment stabilisation.

Now scientists believe these humble plants could be crucial in the fight to address climate change. Seagrass, it turns out, is 35 times more efficient at locking up, or “sequestering” carbon than rainforests.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are now so high they risk damaging our ecological life-support systems and seagrass could play a vital role in helping reverse the earth’s dangerous warming trend, says University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) scientist, Dr Peter Macreadie.

“If the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere reaches 450 parts per million, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – the world’s ‘climate change referee’ – estimates we will only have a 50 per cent chance of avoiding the drought, famine and widespread species extinction that is expected from a two degree increase in temperature,” Dr Macreadie says.

“I don’t want to leave this legacy for my children. Through my research, and that of my colleagues, I’m looking for ways to maximise carbon sequestration with seagrasses and minimise the amount of carbon leaking into the atmosphere.

“What seagrasses are doing is not complex. They are simply capturing and storing carbon through photosynthesis and by trapping particles in the water column. This process – known as biosequestration – is what created fossil fuels in the first place.”

The ability of seagrass to absorb CO2 could be worth as much as $45 billion, based on the current carbon price of about $23 per tonne, Dr Macreadie says. It is a conservative estimate based on only one species of seagrass, Posidonia australis.

It is a compelling reason to protect seagrass meadows around the world, which are under threat from coastal development and nutrient runoff. NSW alone has lost 50 per cent of its seagrass, he says.

Ironically, it was one of Australia’s more audacious development proposals that helped Dr Macreadie tap into the value embedded in seagrass meadows.

In 1969, the Australian and NSW governments explored the possibility of building a large nuclear power station at Jervis Bay on the NSW coast. Studies were carried out including seismic testing that blew away large areas of seagrass. It could take another 100 years for seagrass to refill the massive holes, which are so big they can be seen from space. But the holes have allowed Dr Macreadie to take sediment samples from the damaged area and measure the carbon that was lost.

“The vast majority of carbon in seagrass meadows is actually stored in the sediment and can remain there for thousands of years,” Dr Macreadie says.

“The danger is that by destroying seagrass not only are we pulling less carbon out of the atmosphere, there is a risk that millennia-old carbon stocks could be released back into the environment. We are talking about amounts likely to be in excess of three times Australia’s annual greenhouse gas emissions. This would mean seagrasses would shift from being carbon sinks to carbon sources, thereby accelerating climate change.

“Our research will help quantify some of the unknowns about carbon leakage and, I’m hoping, add weight to having carbon sinks like seagrass included in the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory [the Federal Government’s compilation of Australia’s emissions data].”

If that happens, seagrass could help Australia meet its global obligations to reduce greenhouse gases and help regain control of the planet’s thermostat, he says.


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