Wild elephants being rounded up by a Malaysian wildlife team on Pulau Tekong. First sighted there by NSmen in May 1990, they had apparently swum across from Johor. They were later relocated to the Endau Rompin National Park in Malaysia.PHOTO: SINGAPORE ZOO
Jungle giants revealed a hidden aspect of Singapore
The creatures seemed to have materialised from nowhere, on Pulau Tekong, an island used by the Singapore Armed Forces for training. They were clearly not denizens of the sea: Trampled grass showed large footprints, coconut trees lay uprooted and big droppings had been left behind. A group of national servicemen first spotted the jungle giants around the end of May 1990 and reported the sighting to incredulous officers. Officials from the Defence Ministry and the Singapore Zoo made several trips to the island, but saw nothing.
The Zoo analysed the dung and confirmed it had come from elephants - which, it emerged, had swum the 1.5km expanse from Johor. The three wild elephants had probably been driven away by forest-clearing and logging in Johor, the officials surmised.
For the Singapore Armed Forces, these animals in their training ground were a jumbo-sized problem. But Singaporeans could not get enough of the unexpected visitors. The solution, in the end, was a new home in a Malaysian forest reserve. After a brief stay here, from late May to June 10, the bull elephants were captured with the help of Malaysian wildlife experts and taken by lorry to Endau Rompin National Park on the border of Johor and Pahang, where they were released.
The visitors left, but revealed a hitherto hidden aspect of Singapore. "Singaporeans do care - some even passionately - about conservation of wildlife even though they live in a highly urbanised country," The Straits Times observed in a report on June 18.
A soft spot for the Republic's diverse flora and fauna has often motivated Singaporeans to launch conservation campaigns, such as the one in 1986 to save the bird haven of Sungei Buloh, home to more than 200 avian species, as well as a few saltwater crocodiles. In another instance, passionate nature lovers worked with the authorities to preserve Chek Jawa in 2001, an oasis on Pulau Ubin so untouched that it offers a glimpse of what Singapore's shores might have looked like before the 1950s.
Meticulous planning as well as research, public education, reforestation and clean-up projects have also led to a few success stories for local wildlife.
The oriental pied hornbill, for example, had disappeared at one time. But it was taken from captivity to help strengthen numbers of Singapore's native creatures and is now a fairly common sight in parks here.
In recent years, families of the critically endangered, smooth-coated otter have begun charming visitors with their antics in mangroves, coastal areas and even urban parks and drains. But perhaps the honour of being the most frequently mentioned animal in The Straits Times should go to the tiger. Singapore's first zoo, established on the grounds of the Singapore Botanic Gardens in 1875, housed a tiger. On May 18, 1896, a reader wrote in to The Straits Times to complain of animal cruelty. But he did not mean the tiger - he was distressed about a live dog being put in the cage to feed it. "Can you not break a lance in your much-read paper for our faithful quadruped friends?" the writer asked.
More often, however, stories in The Straits Times were about tigers of the uncaged variety.
"Excursionists to Changhie may, if so inclined, have a tiger hunt," began an article on April 3, 1875. It was a short report, unusually so given its grave content, about the appearance of the "Pulo Obin man-eater", who had already killed a man. The animal had been seen by a policeman as he went about "trimming the lamp". In days when there was no electricity, this meant trimming the wick of street lamps, to keep the flame burning clean and bright.
An escape & a sit-in
Straits Times 15 Jul 15;
WILD TIMES
Sightings were not uncommon at the time.
"We have had reports of a tiger being seen about Singapore; first he was seen on two or three occasions near Changhie; then he was heard of at Siglap; and then there were signs of him near the Botanical Gardens, and there seemed ground for hope, that H.R.H would exhibit himself, if not among the animals at the Gardens, at least as a mark for some of our sportsmen," said a report on Nov 6, 1875. "We now hear of him at Seletar."
On March 24, 1935, the king of the jungle earned prime billing: a banner headline across Page 1 that screamed: TRACKER FINDS SINGAPORE TIGER. A small blurb assured The Sunday Times readers that it was NOT A MAN-EATER.
A "beat" was organised to hunt down Mr Stripes, as The Straits Times had dubbed him.
In the early 20th century, a tiger reportedly visited the iconic Raffles Hotel for tea. The wild feline hid beneath a billiard table, and was shot square between the eyes by the school principal of Raffles Institution, The Straits Times reported on Aug 13, 1902.
Not as majestic as the tiger, but feared nonetheless, were crocodiles and sharks. In February 1904, a column titled Singapore's Excitements highlighted a macabre haul. "There are few cities for instance which can boast like Singapore of having had two crocodiles captured and a tiger killed within the limits of one week."
In 1965, a sword-nosed shark weighing more than half a tonne was caught off Pasir Panjang. Two years later came the grisly discovery of a man's limbs inside a shark's stomach, along with part of his torso. The shark had been bought by an Ellenborough Market fishmonger at a fish auction in Boat Quay. It had reportedly been caught at a kelong off Pasir Panjang. The police concluded that the victim was not Singaporean and had probably hailed from a neighbouring island.
In 1969, the police issued a "missing" report with a difference. The description read: Height 4ft, 6 in. Has a dark brown head, black beak, blue neck, double red wattles, brown legs and black feathers.
The description was of a rare cassowary bird that had been stolen - along with two peacocks and a pair of storks - from the Jurong Bird Park. It eventually turned up at a Chua Chu Kang farm.
Another great escape took place four years later when the Singapore Zoo's black panther, Twiggy, made a bid for freedom in March 1973. It remained at large until the following February, and was eventually cornered and killed in a monsoon drain.
Then there was the time that Singapore's much-loved star orang utan was on a film shoot at MacRitchie Reservoir in 1982. The plan was to shoot Ah Meng half-way up a tree.
But the Zoo's poster girl had other ideas. Ah Meng climbed to the top, and stayed there for three days before falling off and breaking an arm.
"Ah Meng stages sit-in" was the paper's front page headline on March 30, 1982.
The last wild tiger here is believed to have been shot in Choa Chu Kang in the 1930s.
But in the late 1990s, the big cat made a fleeting appearance in The Straits Times, although perhaps not in Singapore. On April 29, 1997, the paper reported the police advising people to stay away from Pulau Ubin after a grandmother hunting for clams claimed to have seen a tiger.
Exhaustive searches yielded nothing.
When the newspaper visited the island at the year end, the story was being described as the tallest "tail" of the year. "The only tiger here is Tiger beer," joked one visitor. • ST