Best of our wild blogs: 12 May 09

The frog of human kindness
victim of animal release on the annotated budak blog

Surprises from Changi rocky shore
with otter sighting! on the wonderful creation blog and crabs of changi, also on the wild shores of singapore blog and nature calls

Only Underwater @ Pulau Hantu
on the colourful clouds blog

Lady Mygale
on talfryn.net

An end to lice
on the annotated budak blog and leaf monkey.

World Migratory Bird Day
on the Lazy Lizard's Tales blog

Turning Cars Into Nodes on the Net: Our Electric Car Future
on the Daily Galaxy: News from Planet Earth & Beyond

Pink-necked Green Pigeon swallows MacArthur palm fruit
on the Bird Ecology Study Group blog

Monday Morgue: 11th May 2009
on the Lazy Lizard's Tales blog

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Get students to play active role in protecting planet

Straits Times Forum 12 May 09;

I REFER to the article, 'Blue Plan to save Singapore's biodiversity-rich coral reefs ready' (April 24). I heartily approve of the Blue Plan. As much as possible should be done to protect various aspects of the environment.

However, not enough is being done. All these policies take a long time to implement. Global warming and destruction of the environment will not wait for man to do something to rectify his mistakes.

We should make environmental conservation and protection one of our primary concerns, and the Government should devote more effort and resources to this.

One way is to better educate the public. After all, is it not we who harm the environment? The Government should start with schools. Most schools have few, if any, programmes related to the environment.

Of course, the basic minimum is being taught, such as the need for recycling, reducing and reusing. And recycling bins have been set up. However, all these are repeated over and over and students become bored and consider these measures burdensome.

If schools do more in-depth teaching, and conduct more programmes and workshops, students will become more interested and play a more active role in helping to conserve and protect the environment. Global warming will become a more real issue to them.

Lhavanya Dharmalingam (Miss)

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A miracle wrought by ordinary people

Straits Times Forum 12 May 09;

I REFER to Thursday's report, 'Singapore's green trump card'.

While Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew stressed that 'clean and green' is Singapore's secret weapon and recalled his efforts to clean the 'smelly and dirty' Singapore as a priority amid myriad challenges shortly after independence, I cannot help admiring his vision and leadership that helped to build a nation from scratch and lift it from Third World to First within several decades.

The story began with the shocking news that Singapore was abandoned, with scarce resources and people different in colour, language, culture and religion. Indeed, there seemed to be no hope that Singapore could survive and become a nation. However, not only did it survive, but it also endured; not only did it endure, but it also prospered. Within decades, it became a nation where hardworking people, regardless of colour, race, religion and culture, live harmonious, affluent and happy lives.

Singapore's success is an undeniable miracle, but the Singapore story is not about how supermen transformed a nation, but how decent people built decent neighbourhoods that are clean, green and safe, and how these neighbourhoods bind a nation.

As Mr Lee said, what could be done immediately after Singapore left Malaysia, was 'to show investors that this was a well-organised place'. To build order, he and his people set out to clean the city and plant trees. Once the infrastructure was in place, they worked to improve people's manners. Meanwhile, they worked to build other pillars of community - rule of law, science, education, etiquette and culture. The rest is history.

It is hard to believe that simply by sprucing ourselves up, showing good manners, and cleaning and greening our neighbourhoods, ordinary people can build a nation or sharpen its competitiveness. But the Singapore story has proved it all.

Singaporeans will do well to carry on this legacy. And foreigners like me, born and raised in 'reform and open policy'-steered China, learn that there are other ways to spur economic growth than simply sacrificing the environment and relying on cheap labour.

Jessica Wang Jing (Ms)

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Giving new life to old wood: eco-friendly furniture

Tan Hui Leng, Today Online 12 May 09;

WHEN Ms Anita Sam (picture) started importing eco-friendly furniture five years ago, customers snapped up pieces based on their design and craftsmanship. Today, consumers consider the environmental sustainability of the furniture’s raw materials first, and design second.

“I think Singaporeans have reached a level of maturity where they love good design and quality, but they also want to be socially responsible,” said the Singapore Permanent Resident and furniture industry veteran.

“It’s the ‘feel-good’ factor ... not only does the furniture look good, it is also good for the environment.”

Last Friday’s official opening of the flagship d-Bodhi concept store, which Ms Sam said saw “very substantial sales”, is testimony to her passion for environmental sustainability. In fact, sales at the eco-friendly furniture business have grown almost 10-fold from 2004 when it would ship out two containers a month to the 18 to 20 containers monthly now. The company aims to expand its monthly exports to some 30 containers this year and 50 next year.

d-Bodhi is one of a few reclaimed wood industry players in Singapore. The furniture range was started in 2002 by Dutch national Raymond Davids, a partner of the company. It recently set up a 3,200-square-foot flagship store at Alexandra Industrial Estate here and hopes to have 200 d-Bodhi shops worldwide by 2015.

d-Bodhi uses reclaimed teak from Indonesia, with pieces salvaged from buildings and railway sleepers and can be up to 100 years old.

“Reclaimed wood poses other challenges, such as the tedious collection of wood,” said d-Bodhi’s co-owner and director Ms Sam. A team of 700 in Indonesia is involved in the business — from sussing out buildings for sale to collection of wood.

Unlike buying new wood by volume, reclaimed wood comes in all shapes and sizes. It has to be processed more arduously, as items like nails, nuts and bolts and screws have to removed before they can be stripped down. The planks then have to be sorted according to the type of furniture they are more suited to be in their next lifetime.

However, such teak has a special quality which Ms Sam and other aficionados love for the character its grain, natural finish and age lend.

The d-Bodhi line is marketed as a premium brand, with prices starting at $300 for chairs and over $3,000 for bedroom sets. d-Bodhi also distributes to 13 countries globally and aims to sell in 25 countries by next year.

It has been successful in getting the United States-based Forest Stewardship Council to start a new certification category, that is, “100 per cent recycled wood” for such furniture, different from new wood sourced from sustainable plantations.

“For many of our customers, it’s a conscious decision to buy from us rather than from other shops,” said Ms Sam.

“Some of them also tell me frankly that they entertain friends and business associates who are environmentally friendly.”

That d-Bodhi’s furniture come with an international “green” certification is the icing on the cake. The company has extended the eco-friendly aspect of the business to reuse sawdust generated during the furniture making process as they are pressed with a resin to be made into home accessories like tealight holders, coasters and table lamps.

Looking ahead, d-Bodhi is open to using other types of reclaimed wood. It is also looking into working with more Singapore designers through Spring Singapore.

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Crude Oil spill unleash fear among endangered Olive Ridley turtles in Orissa coast

Anurjay Dhal, Odisha Today 11 May 09;

Bhubaneswar ( Orissa ) The Indian Oil Corporation officials manning the Paradip-Haldia pipe line in Orissa, have unleash fear among the endangered Olive Ridely turtles.

According to Biswajit Mohanty, chief of 'Operation Kachhapa', a major oil spill has occurred in the under sea portion of the Paradip- Haldia pipeline in the Paradip coast.

The oil was being received for piping to Haldia refinery through the single point mooring (SPM) system when the pipe broke.

Under SPM, an undersea pipeline is laid out for 4- 5 kms inside the sea to deeper waters where deep draught vessels carrying huge loads of crude oil can anchor and unload the oil without coming inside the port.

Indian Oil has been using the SPM since December, 2008 to unload and transport crude oil, Mohanty added on Monday.

Sources reveal that the pipeline broke and crude oil spilled when the crude was being unloaded from the crude vessel “NABHI” on the night of April 22. At least 2,000 to 3,000 tons of crude oil has leaked out in the mid sea.

The SPM pipelines are of extremely high quality and are regularly tested for weak spots and likely spillages. It is clear that Indian Oil officials have goofed up in carrying out such under sea inspections at regular intervals to maintain the safety protocols.

“Though the officials are duty bound to report the spill in view of its proximity to the marine sanctuary, no intimation was given and the Wildlife wing of Orissa Government was kept completely in the dark about this accident.

Similarly, the news of the spill was concealed and local media were unaware of it for a long time though this is the first major oil spill at Paradip coast,” he alleged.

Since the summer currents are in the northward direction of the coast, these crude spills are expected to wash up at Gahirmatha which is only 15 kilometers away from Paradip port. This shall irreversibly damage the turtle feeding grounds in the wildlife sanctuary.

Turtles feed on benthic fauna like mollusca, sea worms, star fish, anemones, sea cucumber, etc. Once the oil covers this area, the fauna will die out and the resulting pollution will prevent their regeneration for a long time.

Crude oil is a very persistent pollutant and marine oil spills in the past have lead to disastrous loss of marine wildlife and habitat. Fish breeding grounds are destroyed by such spills.

Operation Kachhapa has demanded that an expert team comprising of marine pollution experts and biologists should be rushed to Gahirmatha coast to carry out an impact study and identify and quantify the damage which has occurred.

Indian Oil should be asked to pay compensation to help the forest department to carry out the impact study and also adopt appropriate remedial measures to mitigate the impacts.

The crude oil should be collected and disposed off safely instead of being allowed to pollute the pristine Gahirmatha Marine sanctuary, Mohanty added.

The move of the IOC has invited sharp criticism from wildlife activists and turtle lovers in Orissa in particular and the World in general.

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Healthy reefs 'vital to humanity'

ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
ScienceAlert 11 May 09;

The lesson from Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is that we have to protect its biodiversity – because biodiversity in turn protects us.

That’s the message from Professor Sean Connolly from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies and James Cook University who today receives the Australian Academy of Science’s prestigious Fenner medal for his pioneering work in understanding how ecosystems develop and maintain their amazing diversity.

“The Great Barrier Reef is one of the richest systems of living things on the Planet. Understanding how it became so rich, and how to keep it that way, is essential for its survival – as well as for all our industries and activities that depend upon the Reef,” he says.

Professor Connolly says his research shows that that species diversity lies at the heart of stable ecosystems.

Since ecosystems help to support humanity in many ways – with food, clean air and water as well as livelihoods, industries and recreation – keeping them in a condition to continue to support us is vital, he argues.

“As a rule, ecosystems with many species are more stable over time. This is because, as conditions change, the system is more likely to have species that can cope with the new conditions. Having lots of species reduces the likelihood of a major ecological collapse.

“In other words, high biodiversity is nature’s insurance policy.”

“But it is also our insurance policy, because it protects and assures the many services that ecosystems provide us.”

Professor Connolly says that the many rare species the GBR contains make the system more robust overall. “If conditions change, then common species may become rare and rare species common – but the system as a whole survives. It’s very much on our interest to manage and care for it so this keeps on happening.”

Professor Connolly has specialized in linking observations and experiments in marine ecosystems with mathematical models of how populations of different species change and interact over time – and how this drives the dynamics of biodiversity itself, now and in the deep past.

Among his achievements he has produced a model that helped pinpoint a previously unknown impact of ocean acidification caused by high CO2 in the atmosphere – increased loss of coral species due to storm damage.

His work on the geographic ranges of coral species has challenged the conventional view that conservation should focus mainly on ‘hot spots’ of species diversity.

Sean was a co-author of the Townsville Declaration on Coral Reef Research and Management, hailed by The Australian newspaper as “a remarkable example of an increased willingness by governments to heed scientific advice.”

He has identified a continued collapse in the populations of reef sharks on the Great Barrier Reef from over-fishing and his work is now helping to improve shark management in Queensland.

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Rules Proposed To Save The World's Coral Reefs

ScienceDaily 12 May 09;

An international team of scientists has proposed a set of basic rules to help save the world’s imperiled coral reefs from ultimate destruction.

Their proposal is being unveiled at the World Ocean Conference 2009 in Manado, Indonesia, where leaders of six regional governments plus Australia and the United States are meeting to declare the largest-ever marine reserve in world history, the Coral Triangle Initiative.

“The catastrophic decline in the world’s coral reefs demands urgent management responses on two fronts,” say the researchers from the Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (CoECRS), The Australian Museum, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, James Cook, Perpignan and the United Nations Universities and The Nature Conservancy.

These are the “...reduction of immediate direct threats such as climate change, over-fishing and water pollution, and actions to protect or enhance the resilience of reef ecosystems in the face of existing and unavoidable future threats,” they say.

The key to saving threatened coral ecosystems is to maintain the links (connectivity) between reefs allowing larvae to flow between them and re-stock depleted areas, the team led by Pew Fellow Dr Laurence McCook of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) argues.

“Ecological connectivity is critically important to the resilience of coral reefs and other ecosystems to which they are linked,” says Dr McCook. “The ability of reefs to recover after disturbances or resist new stresses depends critically on the supply of larvae available to reseed populations of key organisms, such as fish and corals. For reefs to survive and prosper they must in turn be linked with other healthy reefs.”

The researchers propose six ‘rules of thumb’ for keeping coral ecosystems viable, based on the results of research carried out in the Bohol Sea in the Philippines, the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, and Kimbe Bay in Papua New Guinea.

These rules are:

1. allow margins of error in extent and nature of protection, as insurance against unforeseen threats;
2. spread risks among areas;
3. aim to create networks of protected areas which (a) protect all the main types of reef creatures, processes and connections, known and unknown; (b) achieve sufficient protection for each type of reef habitat type, and for the whole region; (c) achieve maximum protection for all reef processes (d) contain several examples of particular reef types to spread the risk;
4. protect whole reefs where possible; place buffer zones around core areas.
5. allow for reef species to spread over a range of distances, especially 20–30 km; and
6. use a range of conservation approaches, including marine protected areas.

The rules are designed to operate in a range of situations, including where detailed scientific knowledge of local coral reefs and their species is sparse, the team says in a review article in the journal Coral Reefs.

Protecting reef connectivity and allowing reef species to freely recharge depleted areas is vital to ensuring that coral reefs remain resilient in the face of mounting human and climatic pressures. To ignore the protection of connectivity until sufficient scientific data was available on all reefs would mean allowing reefs to continue to degrade for many decades to come.

“The risks of inadequate management arising from ignoring connectivity are greater than those associated with any scientific uncertainty,” the researchers say.

The work was funded jointly by the World Bank Coral Reef Targeted Research program and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies.

“The Coral Triangle Initiative is one of the most important marine conservation measures ever undertaken anywhere in the world and the first to span several countries. It involves the six nations of Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and the Solomon islands, and is as much about nation building and food security as it is about reef conservation” says Professor Terry Hughes, Director of the CoECRS, attending the Coral Triangle meeting today in Manado.

The ‘rules of thumb’ proposed in the research paper were an example of the sort of science being carried out across the region which will assist the Coral Triangle Initiative to achieve its goals, he said.

Journal reference:

1. L. J. McCook, G. R. Almany, M. L. Berumen, J. C. Day, A. L. Green, G. P. Jones, J. M. Leis, S. Planes, G. R. Russ, P. F. Sale and S. R. Thorrold. Management under uncertainty: guidelines for incorporating connectivity into the protection of coral reefs. Coral Reefs, (in press)

Adapted from materials provided by ARC Centre of Excellence in Coral Reef Studies.

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World Ocean Conference: Time for countries to speak out on marine issues

The Jakarta Post 11 May 09;

As the biggest archipelagic country in the world, Indonesia has called on the global commu-nity to speak out on the need and significance to preserve the ocean, which plays a key role in food security.

Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Freddy Numberi told a press briefing Sunday that many countries were affected by global warming, including rising sea levels and sea temperatures.

"What about the people affected by the impacts *of global warming* caused by developed countries? Should we remain quiet?" he said a day before the start of the May 11-15 World Ocean Conference.

"It's time for us to speak out. about the absorption, about the emissions. These issues need further discussions."

He added many countries had to deal with rising sea levels, which in some places have already submerged some small islands.

The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicts that climate change will raise sea levels by nearly 60 centimeters by 2100 if nations do not make a concerted effort to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

One of the examples is the Maldives, which are currently 1.5 meters above sea level and is at serious risk of being inundated by rising sea levels.

Freddy said Indonesia had received support from Pacific countries to speak out on the ocean-related issue, especially on preservation and food security.

He added the country had begun the preservation of its marine ecosystem in a bid to show the global community that Indonesia was taking real action.

"We've begun to create marine protected areas (MPAs), especially in the Savu Sea in East Nusa Tenggara. Our move was previously challenged by the local people because they observe the lamalera *whaling* tradition," he said.

"With the Savu Sea becoming a conservation area, they were afraid they would no longer be able to hunt whales. They only catch two whales a year. So we've kept the sea a conservation area, but we ensure they can still perform their traditional fishing rights."

The Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) - to begin on May 14 - is expected to come up with an action plan to preserve 75,000 square kilometers of coral reefs spread out between six countries: Malaysia, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Timor Leste and Indonesia. The six countries will get international funding worth US$250 million.

The coral triangle is located between the Pacific and Indian oceans, making the spot a breeding ground for numerous species of fish, which makes it a potentially lucrative fishing industry.

WOC ignores main problems in ocean sector: Activists
Adianto P. Simamora and Jongker Rumteh, The Jakarta Post 11 May 09;

A long history of illegal fishing, the dumping of tailing from mining companies into the sea, and poor support for traditional fishermen are the three main problems in Indonesia's ocean sector. Unfortunately, those issues remain excluded from the agenda at the World Ocean Conference (WOC) that begins Monday.

Activists grouped under the Manado Alliances said their presence here was to observe the WOC and the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) Summit. They said they wanted to remind both national and foreign delegates about the real problems in the ocean sector.

"We see the conference falls short of critical and real problems that were excluded from the WOC agenda, namely rampant illegal fishing, tailing from mining into the sea, and the fate of small fishermen," coalition coordinator Reza Damanik said Sunday.

The coalition comprises the People's Coalition for Equal Fisheries (Kiara), the Mining Advocacy Network (JATAM), the Hijau Indonesia Institute, the Center for Ocean Development Institute Maritime Civilization Studies, the Anti-Debt Coalition (KAU) and the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi).

Reza, who is also the Kiara coordinator, said the WOC would not guarantee sustainable fishery resources if the host country failed to be "courageous" about discussing the illegal fishing problem at the international meeting.

He added data from the coalition showed Indonesia's fisheries potential was slashed by 30 to 50 percent because of illegal trade practices.

"The conference also falls short on discussing issues related to mining tailing being dumped into the sea," Reza said.

"Many mining firms from industrialized nations operating in Indonesia still dump their mining wastes directly into the ocean."

He added the WOC did not answer the need to protect key fishing areas for the country's traditional fishermen.

"It is the government's responsibility to protect the rights of traditional fisheries from the impacts of global climate change," he said.

Outspoken mining activist Siti Maimunah insisted that participants from NGOs did not intend to disturb the WOC and CTI summit.

"We are here to insist on the substances of the WOC and CTI, which do not answer the root causes of problems in the ocean sector," she said.

Senior officials from 80 countries are slated to begin negotiations to reach a target of collective consensus on the role of the ocean in climate change during the five-day conference.

Organizers say the conference is aimed at raising commitment from international bodies and intergovernmental organizations to protect and conserve fisheries resources to ensure food security.

It is also targeted at drawing global attention to the need to save small islands and coastal areas as part of facing up to the threat from global climate change.

"But there are no representations from *real' stakeholders at the forum, and no consultations have been held to develop the concept of the WOC agenda," Glenn Ismael Ymata, from the regional Assembly of Artisans and Fishermen Trade Conference, said at the coalition meeting.

Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Freddy Numberi has repeatedly said Indonesia has other forums to discuss issues such as illegal fishing.

He added climate change had become a real problem for mari-time countries as it threatened to raise sea levels and sea temperatures, which could kill fishes and threaten the livelihoods of coastal communities.

The police in Manado said they were forced to disband a meeting of traditional fishermen and civil society on Sunday. They declined to comment on the reasons for not allowing the fishermen to camp out in a reclaimed area of Kalasey Beach.

Walhi executive director Berry N. Forqan said the alliance was still negotiating with the National Police in Jakarta to obtain a permit for the meeting.

WOC and Indonesia's sustainable ocean development
Rokhmin Dahuri, The Jakarta Post 11 May 09;

Perhaps there is no country in the world that might have a greater need than Indonesia to be concerned about its ocean space and resources. After centuries of being at the epicenter of international trade and commerce due to its geo-strategic location on the the Asia Pacific Rim, Indonesia, which forms the world's largest archipelago (more than 17,500 islands) and possesses the greatest marine biodiversity of any region of the world, should be recognized as one of the most significant maritime nations.

Indeed, prior to the colonial era, Indonesia was one of the strongest maritime powers in the Asia-Pacific region. Moreover, at times when the Law of the Sea was negotiated, Indonesia was respected as one of the most outstanding leaders, especially in ensuring the archipelagic concept (the 1957 Djoeanda Declaration) was incorporated into the 1982 UNCLOS.

However, from the beginning of colonialism until the fall of the New Order government (1998), Indonesia has turned its back on the oceans and has not dealt effectively with coastal and ocean development as a sustainable source of its competitiveness, prosperity and sovereignty. For more than three and a half centuries, most Indonesians had perceived the oceans as "a marginal land" with insignificant economic potential and no strategic value for the nation.

Such a misleading perception was obviously reflected in the allocation of government funds, credit loans, human resources, science and technology, infrastructure and other management input into coastal and ocean development sectors that have been much smaller than those for land-based development sectors.

It is no coincidence the pattern of coastal and ocean resource development in the past was characterized by low technological content, inefficient and highly extractive, with no regard for environmental and resource sustainability. As a corollary, the physical destruction of vital coastal ecosystems (coral reefs, sea-grass beds, mangroves, estuaries and beaches), pollution, overfishing, biodiversity loss and other environmental stresses in some coastal areas (such as parts of the Malacca Strait, Jakarta Bay, the south coast of South Sulawesi, Buyat Bay and Aijkwa estuary in Papua) has reached a level that threatens their sustainable capacity in supporting further economic development.

Indonesian seas actually have tremendous economic, socio-cultural, and ecological functions, which are invaluable not only to Indonesia but also to the rest of the world. Indonesia is blessed with abundant and diverse coastal and ocean resources ranging from non-renewable resources such as oil and gas, iron ores, tin, bauxite, gold, copper and other minerals, and renewable resources including fish, marine organisms, mangroves, coral reefs and seaweed. Moreover, Indonesia's coastal and ocean ecosystems have many other roles and functions in people's daily lives and the economic development of the nation including tourism, sea transportation and communication, ports and harbors, maritime industries and services, cooling water for industries, waste assimilation and conservation.

In 2007 the contribution of coastal and ocean development sectors to the Indonesian economy was estimated at $100 billion (one-quarter of GDP), which is much lower than the total potential estimates of US$800 billion annually. Those coastal and ocean sectors represent a significant source of economic and social welfare, supporting directly or indirectly 60 percent of the Indonesian population who currently live in the coastal zone. Preliminary estimates indicate these activities provide employment opportunities for about 16 million people. Thus, if we could boost coastal and ocean development to up to 50 percent of the national GDP, then new employment opportunities for about 15 million people would be created.

Meanwhile, Indonesian seas and oceans determine the dynamic of world's climate including El-Nino, La-Nina, and global warming. Although scientifically still debatable, Indonesian seas and oceans as the center of global marine biodiversity (Coral Triangle) are strongly believed to have a greater sink function of greenhouse gases, particularly CO2.

Indonesia is also uniquely located as the only country on Earth where an exchange of marine life between the Pacific and Indian oceans occurs. Cetacean (whale and dolphin) movements between the tropical Pacific and Indian oceans take place through the passages between the Lesser Sunda Islands, which span over 900 kilometers between the Sunda and Sahul shelves. Skipjacks, tuna and other large pelagic fishes also use the Indonesian marine waters as their spawning grounds, nursery grounds, feeding grounds, and migratory routes from the Pacific Ocean to the Indian Ocean, and vice versa.

The challenge for Indonesia is therefore how to develop coastal and ocean resources on an optimal and sustainable basis for the utmost benefit of the Indonesian people and the world by proportionally achieving economic growth, social equity, ecological sustainability while also managing the impacts of global warming.

As far as marine conservation is concerned, Indonesia has been in the lead by establishing more than 8 million hectares of its territorial waters as MPA (marine protected areas) from 1977 to 2007. Since 2002 it has been planned the MPA will be enlarged to 10 million hectares by the end of 2010, making it the largest of its kind in the world.

If through the WOC, world leaders are fully committed to conserving the "Coral Triangle Ecosystem", the function of Indonesian seas as carbon sinks and the center of global marine biodiversity and gene pools will be strengthened. In return, world nations, especially industrialized countries and neighboring countries, should help Indonesia overcome chronic problems of high unemployment and poverty rates through the transfer of sustainable ocean technology, capacity building, productive investment, combating illegal fishing and trans-boundary environmental destructions, and free and fair international trade.

The writer is professor of coastal and marine resource management at the Bogor Institute of Agriculture.

WOC needs scientific help
Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post 11 May 09;

Lack of scientific support may deter representatives and experts from 90 ocean countries from bringing up the significance of oceans in climate change to the UN talks in Copenhagen in December.

Bringing ocean issues to the UN talks is crucial as it will attract global attention and funding from bilateral and multilateral agreements, with developing countries likely to get funding for their adaptation and mitigation programs in dealing with the impacts of climate change, observers say.

Mitigation programs involve taking action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to enhance sinks aimed at reducing carbon dioxide levels, while adaptation refers to activities and policies to cope with the changing environment.

The conference's declaration draft clearly acknowledges "the crucial role of the ocean in regulating the world's climate. will contribute to both accelerating and dampening the rate of climate change", while also recognizing that marine ecosystems have "significant potential for addressing the adverse impact of climate change, including trough carbon sequestration and carbon storage".

With the ocean's underlining role, participating countries ask the UN secretary-general in the draft declaration to "integrate ocean considerations into the UN's climate change adaptation and mitigation measures, and invite parties of the UN Copenhagen meeting to consider the ocean dimension in the post 2012 framework".

The Copenhagen meeting will discuss a new regime on climate change to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which will expire in 2011.

With mitigation referring mostly to the ability to absorb carbon dioxide, the main contributor to global warming, and special adaptation funds for oceans requiring proof of concrete impacts of climate change on ocean countries, the conference needs solid support from scientific research to win over the UN's influential and developed member states, including the US and the EU.

However, scientists here remain divided over the role of oceans on climate change, with some saying oceans are in reality carbon emitters, rather than carbon sinks.

"We have no conclusive and final research on the role of oceans on climate change. In general, oceans are naturally carbon dioxide emitters," Iwan Eka, an oceanography expert at the Agency for the Assessment and Application of Technology (BPPT), said Sunday.

"With climate temperatures getting higher, more carbon dioxide will be released into the atmosphere."

Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Minister Freddy Numberi has repeatedly said Indonesia's 5.8 million square kilometers of sea could absorb around 245 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.

"It's too soon to conclude, as we are yet to conduct comprehensive research on the relation between climate change and the oceans," Iwan said.

On the sidelines of the WOC and CTI Summit, some 1,500 experts will also hold an international symposium on ocean policies and science and technology to try to reach a consensus on the role of the oceans in climate change.

The Indonesian government says it hopes the symposium will come up with the consensus to support the political decision in the Manado Ocean Declaration, saying it will table the scientific support at the 31st session of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that runs from Oct. 26 to 29 in Bali.

The IPCC is the world's only authoritative body on scientific climate matters. It was established by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), and is currently working on its fifth assessment report, including on the ocean. The report will be complete in 2014.

The IPCC's fourth report has fully convinced the world to unite to address the impacts of climate change.

Saving our ocean
The Jakarta Post 11 May 09;

The first ever World Ocean Conference (WOC) begins today to be followed with the Coral Triangle Initiatives (CTI) on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security Inaugural Summit in Manado, North Sulawesi. Some 3,500 participants from 120 countries are expected to attend the event.

The government has ensured that all infrastructure in a city previously only known for its Bunaken marine park will be ready for the May 11-15 event. The fact that water covers 72 percent of the world's surface shows the significance of the event.

The WOC will focus on the Manado Ocean Declaration, which calls on those managing adaptation programs to consider the provisions for funding so as to integrate coastal and ocean management into the context of climate change. The declaration also stresses the need to promote the transfer of environmentally sound technologies for oceans from developed countries to developing countries to help the latter mitigate the impacts of climate change.

Indonesia hopes to convince the United Nations to adopt the declaration in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) meeting in Copenhagen by the end of the year. Indonesia argues the ocean has the ability to absorb carbon and should therefore be included in the UNFCCC. With the country's 5.8 million square kilometers of sea, the water could absorb around 245 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) every year.

Besides the WOC, Indonesia and five other countries grouped in the CTI - Malaysia, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Timor Leste - will not only talk about preserving coral reefs, but will also discuss the role of the coral triangle as an abundant resource of tuna. If the six countries are able to maintain the coral triangle conditions, they will receive a multi-billion US dollar benefit from the tuna industry.

Food security is another factor of focus at the CTI. Despite abundant resources, the coral triangle faces threats from overfishing and destruction of marine life from pollution and increasing demands for fish and marine resources.

We hope marine experts can contribute their research and ideas to help keep the ocean safe. Our seas have long suffered from mankind's ignorance; it is time to recognize their importance.

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Biological Diversity: Islands Beat Mainland Nine To One

ScienceDaily 11 May 09;

Rare and unique ecological communities will be lost if oceanic islands aren't adequately considered in a global conservation plan, a new study has found. Although islands tend to harbor fewer species than continental lands of similar size, plants and animals found on islands often live only there, making protection of their isolated habitats our sole chance to preserve them.

Many conservation strategies focus on regions with the greatest biodiversity, measured by counting the number of different plants and animals. "Normally you want to focus on the most diverse places to protect a maximum number of species," said Holger Kreft, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California, San Diego and one of the two main authors of the study, "but you also want to focus on unique species which occur nowhere else."
Biodiversity and rarity of plants. The map with its 90 regions shows both in a combined index. It reveals that oceanic islands are particularly valuable. Among the mainland areas with the highest values are tropical mountains and regions with a Mediterranean climate. (Credit: Image courtesy of University of California - San Diego)

To capture that uniqueness, Kreft and colleagues at the University of Bonn, UC San Diego and the University of Applied Sciences Eberswalde used a measure of biodiversity that weights rare species more than widespread ones. They carved the terrestrial realm into 90 biogeographic regions, calculated biodiversity for each, then compared island and continental ecosystems. By this measure, island populations of plants and vertebrate animals are eight to nine times as rich.

The southwest Pacific island of New Caledonia stands out as the most unique with animals like the kagu, a bird with no close relatives found only in the forested highlands that is in danger of extinction, and plants like Amborella, a small understory shrub unlike any other flowering plant that is thought to be the lone survivor of an ancient lineage.

Fragments of continents that have broken free to become islands like Madagascar and New Caledonia often serve as a final refuge for evolutionary relicts like these. The source of diversity is different on younger archipelagos formed by volcanoes such as the Canary Islands, the Galápagos and Hawaii which offered pristine environments where early colonizers branched out into multiple related new species to fill empty environmental niches. The new measure doesn't distinguish between the two sources of uniqueness, which may merit different conservation strategies.

Although islands account for less than four percent of the Earth's land area, they harbor nearly a quarter of the world's plants, more than 70,000 species that don't occur on the mainlands. Vertebrate land animals – birds, amphibians, reptiles and mammals – broadly follow this same pattern.

"Islands are important and should be part of any global conservation strategy," Kreft said. "Such a strategy wouldn't make any sense if you didn't include the islands."

Threats to biodiversity may also rise faster for islands than for mainlands, the team reports. Scenarios based on a measure of human impact projected to the year 2100 warn that life on islands will be more drastically affected than mainland populations.

"That threat is expected to accelerate particularly rapidly on islands where access to remaining undeveloped lands is comparatively easy" said Gerold Kier, project leader at the University of Bonn and lead author of the study. Expanding farmlands, deforestation, and other changes in how people use land are among the alterations expected to cause the greatest damage.

The researchers also considered future challenges posed by climate change and report mixed impacts. Rising sea levels will swamp low-lying areas and smaller islands, but the ocean itself is expected to moderate island climates by buffering temperature changes. "Although disruptions to island ecosystems are expected to be less severe than on the continents, climate change remains one of the main threats to the biodiversity of the Earth," Kier said. "If we cannot slow it down significantly, protected areas will not be much help."

"We now have new and important data in our hands, but still have no simple solutions for nature conservation," Kreft said. "In particular, we need to answer the question how protected areas with their flora and fauna can complement each other in the best way. The part played by ecosystems, for example their ability to take up the green-house gas carbon dioxide, should be increasingly taken into account."

Co-authors included Tien Ming Lee and Walter Jetz of UC San Diego; Pierre Ibisch and Christoph Nowicki of the University of Applied Sciences Eberswalde; and Jens Mutke and Wilhelm Barthlott of the University of Bonn.

The Academy of Sciences and Literature Mainz, the Wilhelm Lauer Foundation, and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research funded the research. Holger Kreft holds a Feodor-Lynen Fellowship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

Rare island species 'undervalued'
BBC News 12 May 09;

Rare species on islands are at risk of being lost forever because they have been generally overlooked by current conservation models, a study suggests.

Although islands had less diversity of species compared to mainland sites, a greater proportion were unique to the remote habitats, researchers concluded.

Yet the impact of human activities was relatively greater on islands because space was at a premium, they added.

The findings appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The team from Germany and the US wrote: "Islands are well-known centres of range-restricted species and thus high levels of endemism.

"However, they are also acknowledged for their lower species richness compared to mainland areas," they added.

"Hence, an index combining both endemism and species richness can provide insight into the question of relative conservation value of islands and mainlands."

But to date, the team observed, no study had focused on the differences between mainland areas and islands.

While some islands, such as the Galapagos archipelago and Madagascar, were well known for their biodiversity richness, the team said the habitat's biological value had not been quantified.

"Normally, you want to focus on the most diverse places to protect a maximum number of species," said co-author Holger Kreft, a post-doctoral fellow from the University of California, San Diego.

"But you also want to focus on unique species that occur nowhere else."

To understand the level of endemic species found in particular areas, the team used a measure of biodiversity that weighted rare species more heavily than widespread ones.

When they calculated the level of weighted biodiversity, they then compared island ecosystems with continental habitats.

Using this measurement, the team found that islands' populations of flora and fauna were eight to nine times as rich.

The team observed: "Island floras and faunas are usually recognised to maintain a high degree of endemism because of their geographic isolation and the limited interchange with neighbouring mainland or island biota."

"Islands are important and should be part of any global conservation strategy," Dr Kreft added.

"Such a strategy wouldn't make any sense if you didn't include the islands."

The team also noted that islands were at the centre of "past and imminent species extinctions, stressing even more the need for information on both biodiversity and specific threats in this part of the world".

Lead author Gerold Kier, project leader at the University of Bonn, warned that threats to islands' biodiversity were likely to rise more sharply in the coming decades.

"That threat is expected to accelerate particularly rapidly on islands where access to remaining undeveloped lands is comparatively easy," he explained.

As a result, expanding farmlands, deforestation and other changes in how human populations use land were likely to be more stark than on the mainlands.

"We now have new and important data in our hands," said Dr Kreft, "but still have no simple solution for nature conservation."

Invest in islands to save most species
Emma Young, New Scientist 16 May 09;

LOOKING for a sound investment to combat the biodiversity crisis? Spend your cash on an island. It turns out they are about nine times as valuable as an equally large piece of mainland. So says the first worldwide analysis of the importance of different regions for maintaining global biodiversity.

While it is common knowledge that islands generally house ahigh number of species that live only in that location, the total diversity of life on most islands is relatively low compared with mainland areas. As a result, their importance for conservation efforts hasn't been clear, says a team from the Universities of Bonn and Eberswalde, Germany, and the University of California, San Diego.

To settle this question, they calculated a new combined index which takes into account both the number of unique species in a given region and the total number of different species living there. This "endemism richness" scale measures how much a given area of land contributes to global biodiversity. The team evaluated the endemism richness of plants and vertebrate land animals for 90 regions covering most of the Earth's surface. They discovered that values for islands were 9.5 times higher for plants and 8.1 times higher for vertebrates, compared with similarly sized regions of mainland (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0810306106). Tropical islands scored highest, with New Caledonia topping the list.

"The results should lead to an increased investment in conservation on tropical island biodiversity hotspots," says Thomas Brooks, head of Conservation Priorities and Responses at Conservation International's Center for Applied Biodiversity Science in Arlington, Virginia.

To some extent, this is already happening. For example, the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund, run partly by Conservation International, is in the process of preparing a multimillion dollar investment in the Caribbean islands.

Increased investment in islands should be doubly worthwhile because they are likely to lose more habitat from human impact this century than mainland regions, say the researchers.

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Paradise lost: Islanders prepare for the flood

Gaia Vince, New Scientist 11 May 09;

TWO years ago, the Maldives became the first nation in the world to open an embassy on a virtual island in Second Life. What started as a gimmick could become a tragic reality in coming decades, as sea level rise reduces the entire country to a virtual state. Global greenhouse gas emissions have already committed the residents of the Maldives to a watery future: ocean expansion due to warming has raised sea levels enough to regularly deluge the islands, and melting glaciers will only make matters worse.

The Maldives are not about to give up without a fight, however. As leading climate models predict that sea level rise will make the islands uninhabitable by 2070, 2050 or even as early as 2030, the country is striking back with an ambitious programme of island restoration. But will it be enough to keep the ocean at bay? I visited the archipelago earlier this year to find out.

The islands that make up the Maldives have always led a precarious existence. According to Charles Darwin's theory of island formation, published in 1842, the islands started out as a string of volcanoes, fringed by coral reefs. As the volcanoes subsided and sea levels rose at the end of the last ice age, they were gradually submerged, leaving only the reefs behind. These began growing upwards to remain in warm, sunlit water, eventually forming circular reefs, or atolls, encircling shallow lagoons. Over time, coral debris and sand accumulated on and around the reefs to form low-lying islands. Today, 26 such atolls house the 1196 islands of the Maldives. Of these, 200 are permanently inhabited.

Many of these islands are mere sandbars that come and go with the changing currents. In fact, local people call their country "Woden adhi Girun", which roughly translates as "the nation of appearances and disappearances".

In the past 15 years, though, coastal erosion and rising sea level have meant that more and more of the islands are disappearing permanently. Rising waters, combined with coral growing more slowly or dying as warmer temperatures lead to bleaching, has left the reefs less able to shelter the islands. As a result, waves and storms are rapidly eroding away the coastline of the islands.

These changes are already having devastating effects on the population. Roads and houses are crumbling into the sea, coconut palms are being washed away, and groundwater has become so polluted with seawater that on many islands it is undrinkable. The resort islands, which bring in a third of the nation's income, have also been affected. "Some resort bungalows have been abandoned because they kept getting flooded. And the beach where we used to sunbathe has completely gone," says Sue Gregory from Bath in the UK, who has holidayed in the Maldives since 1999.

So far 20 islands have been abandoned, some of them after the 2004 tsunami gave residents a shocking taste of what higher waters mean for the islands. On one of the worst-hit islands, Kandholhudhoo, the highest tsunami wave was just 2.5 metres, but when it receded minutes later, three people were dead, not a single house was habitable, and residents had to leave the island for good. With rising sea levels and more frequent storms forecast, it may not take a tsunami to inflict similar damage in future.

Ironically, earlier attempts to solve some of the Maldives' problems may only have made them worse. In the 1990s, the then-president, Maumoon Gayoom, set about building artificial sea walls outside the reefs on some islands as a barricade against the rising tide and storms. But while the sea walls have been effective against storms in many places, including protecting the capital Malé from the tsunami, they have also reduced currents flowing over the reefs. Without a flow rate of around 10 metres per second the corals die, removing the islands' natural barrier to coastal erosion. The construction of a dozen or so new harbours during Gayoom's presidency have had similar effects, as did the dredging of the lagoons to build them.

The current president, Mohamed Nasheed, who was elected in November 2008, has other plans. He is focusing on bolstering the islands' natural defences by restoring coral reefs and coastal vegetation. The question is, is it too little too late?

There are some indications that coral can be saved - at least from the effects of warming. In experiments, Robert Tomasetti, a marine biologist employed by the Banyan Tree Resort on Vabbinfaru Island, has found that heat-tolerant corals grafted onto concrete frames or a low-voltage electrical carapace that stimulates growth are better able to endure temporary warming, and can survive when other corals bleach. Done on a larger scale, this could keep enough of the reef alive to delay erosion and buy the islanders some more time.

So far, though, progress has been frustratingly slow. "I would like to be able to find out whether we can transplant heat-tolerant ones to parts of the reef where it is more exposed and so build coverage there," says Tomasetti. "We don't have that level of equipment, so at the moment we're really just growing pretty reefs for the tourists."

Resources aren't the only issue. According to Bruce Hatcher, a marine ecologist at Cape Breton University in Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada, who has studied the Maldivian reefs, large-scale coral rehabilitation is not feasible. "There is no current technology that allows thousands of kilometres of reef to be regrown, so in terms of mitigating sea-level rise in the Maldives, it is of very limited value," he says.

Restoring coastal vegetation, however, could make more of an impact. Part of the reason that Kandholhudhoo suffered so badly during the tsunami was that the reef had been dredged for building materials, and mangrove swamps had been plundered for timber, exposing the coast to the elements. With no tree roots to bind the topsoil it washed away. Properly managed mangrove plantations could restore this barrier, and since some species can mature in five to 10 years, it could have relatively immediate benefits.

With time running out, though, some feel restoration will not be enough to save the Maldives. Local NGO Bluepeace believes that the nation needs to think bigger. Much bigger. It argues that what is really needed is a series of raised artificial islands, dotted around the archipelago. Bluepeace suggests that seven islands, perhaps paid for by the international community by way of compensation for causing the climate to change, could allow the entire Maldivian population to stay ahead of the rising waters.

The idea is not entirely far-fetched. One artificial island, called Hulhumalé, has already been built to the north-west of the capital, and was officially opened in 2004. While it was designed mainly as a commercial port and to reduce pressure on the overcrowded capital, it was built 3 metres above sea level, enough to ensure it lasts the century, at least by conservative estimates.

Nasheed's government has no plans to build more islands like Hulhumalé, though, arguing that raised islands "cost a fortune to build" and that Hulhumalé has actually increased erosion in adjacent islands by disrupting natural currents. Nevertheless, it does admit that sooner or later the waters will get too high, too often, for the population to stay (see "How long have they got?"). To this end, Nasheed has pledged to divert much of the annual tourist revenue into a "sovereign fund", to enable the country to buy land elsewhere in the world when the time comes. It is an idea that some say is impractical, but one that he believes will be necessary if they are to avoid becoming climate refugees.

Whatever the ultimate solution, the fate of the Maldives lies in the hands of the rest of the world. The emissions we pump out and where we choose to spend our hard-earned cash could make or break the fate of the lowest, and perhaps most beautiful, nation on Earth.

Higher ground

As well as restoring the islands' natural defences, the Maldivian government is relocating vulnerable populations to houses built further inland on previously uninhabited islands. The first such "designer island", Dhuvaafaru Island in Raa Atoll, was unveiled in March this year. Formerly an uninhabited forest, the entire island was razed, and a new village built from scratch for 4000 survivors from Kandholhudhoo, an island left uninhabitable by the 2004 tsunami.

Along with new, spacious homes, the island also features a community centre built on stilts that is large enough to shelter its entire population during high tides, storms or future tsunamis (see photo, left).

The Maldives' current president, Mohamed Nasheed, has plans to build more of these kinds of communities. "We need to bring some of the more isolated villages into the 21st century so that they are better able to deal with the challenges ahead," he says.

How long have they got?

The Maldives is the lowest lying country in the world: 80 per cent of the islands are less than 1 metre above sea level, and the highest point is just 2.3 metres.

Clearly, even a small rise in sea level is bad news for such low-lying land. But predicting when the islands will become uninhabitable is far from simple.

Sea level has risen 52 millimetres on average in the past 15 years. Much of this can be put down to thermal expansion of the water, in which the molecules become agitated and move further apart as temperature rises. We know this is happening because sea level rise has so far been directly proportional to global warming. Some scientists, however, are concerned that melting ice may now have overtaken thermal expansion as the leading cause of sea-level rise. "How these factors will influence regional sea rise over the century is the great unknown," says Steve Nerem at the University of Colorado in Boulder, who monitors sea-level rise.

While we wait for data, we are left with an array of models that vary widely in when they estimate sea level rise will swamp the Maldives. In its latest assessment, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted a rise of up to 59 centimetres by the end of 2100 - a figure that does not include glacial melting. At the other end of the scale, James Hansen's group at NASA Goddard predicts a global sea-level rise of up to 25 metres by 2100, assuming that feedback mechanisms will accelerate melting in Greenland and Antarctica. More conservative models without feedback scenarios, such as that by Stefan Rahmstorf at the Potsdam Institute in Germany, put it at 1.4 metres by 2100.

None of these estimates are comforting for the Maldives. "Even a 1-metre rise would be devastating," says Nerem.

Gaia Vince is a science writer who is travelling the world to investigate the effects of climate change www.wanderinggaia.com

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WWF tags more tuna, while stocks last

WWF 12 May 09;

Straits of Gibraltar, Spain – WWF’s On the Med tuna trail bluefin tuna tagging project is resuming its activity today in the waters near Barbate off southern Spain.

Through this three-year project – among the most ambitious bluefin tuna tagging work seen so far in the Mediterranean – WWF scientists are mapping tuna migrations around the basin, seeking answers to key mysteries on the migratory behaviour of this most valuable but also most imperilled fish.

WWF is tagging tuna this week with fishermen from Spain’s traditional tuna trap, the almadraba. This method for fishing bluefin tuna has existed around the Mediterranean for over 3,000 years and is intrinsically sustainable given the low vulnerability of tuna stocks to the trap. The fishery supports the livelihoods of hundreds of families but is in jeopardy – the fishermen have seen a drop in catches of over 80% during the past two decades, given the exponential growth in industrial tuna fishing.

“While there are still tunas to tag, WWF hopes to shed light on the migrations of this incredible species,” said Dr Pablo Cermeño, WWF Mediterranean’s Tuna Officer. “Relatively little is known about the behaviour of Mediterranean tuna, yet it is repeatedly subject to rampant overfishing.”

On the Med tuna trail is a race against time to gather data before the overstretched fishery collapses. WWF recently released a new analysis showing that the reproducing population is collapsing now and could effectively disappear by 2012 if there is no change to current mismanagement and overfishing.

WWF’s tagging project is collecting information such as position and depth of the high-speed fish by fitting adult tunas (over 35kg) with ‘pop-up’ tags that are released from the fish at a specified time and float to the surface for the data to be read by satellite. Lifecycle information will also come from juvenile tuna tagged with ‘archival’ tags and recovered at point of catch.

“The plan behind this project to fill the significant gaps in knowledge of bluefin tuna’s migratory behaviour in the Mediterranean is starting to bear fruits,” said Dr Sergi Tudela, Head of Fisheries at WWF Mediterranean. “The first data gathered through WWF’s tagging project, soon to be released, will reveal surprising results.”

WWF is calling for a recovery period moratorium on bluefin tuna fishing in the current absence of effective rules for a sustainable fishery, lack of enforcement, and the high degree of illegal fishing.

The global conservation organization is also supporting calls to suspend international trade of Atlantic bluefin tuna by getting it listed on Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) when contracting parties meet in early 2010.

WWF’s tuna tagging activities – planned in partnership with key international scientific institutions and fishing stakeholders in the Mediterranean, and made possible thanks to financial help from the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation – runs to the end of 2010.

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Project launched to fight frog-killing fungus

Brett Zongker, Associated Press Yahoo News 12 May 09;

WASHINGTON – Zoos in the U.S., Panama and Mexico are deploying researchers in Central America to develop new ways to fight a fungus blamed for wiping out dozens of frog and amphibian species as part of a project announced Monday.

The Smithsonian Institution is leading six other zoos and institutes in the Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project, which aims to raise $1.5 million to fight the fast-spreading chytrid fungus.

Their protection efforts will focus on a small slice of Panama that is the only area in Central America that appears to be untouched by the disease, said Dr. Karen Lips, a University of Maryland researcher. Lips said it's only a matter of time, though, before even that area is hit with the fungus — perhaps five years.

The speed at which the fungus has spread is "absolutely incredible," she said. "It's probably much worse than we even appreciate."

Scientists say the chytrid fungus threatens to wipe out a vast number of the approximately 6,000 known amphibian species and is spreading quickly. Already, 122 amphibian species are believed to have gone extinct in the last 30 years, primarily because of the fungus, conservationists say.

"We're looking at losing half of all amphibians in our lifetime," said Brian Gratwicke, the Smithsonian's lead scientist on the project.

The fungus has been found in 87 countries, including the United States.

Scientists involved in the project will work on implementing recently published research from James Madison University in Virginia that shows bacteria in frogs' skin can be used to fight the fungal infection.

Frogs bathed in a mixture containing the bacteria and then exposed to the fungus had a 100 percent survival rate in the study published in the International Society for Microbial Ecology Journal, said Professor Reid Harris. The survival rate was low for another set of frogs that didn't get the bath.

Applications for the research could include a spray to help build frogs' resistance to the fungus or a benign, fungus-fighting bacteria strong enough to pass from one frog to another.

"It's a very exciting discovery," Gratwicke said. "It's really the only thing we've got going."

Other groups involved in the project include Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo.; Zoo New England in Stoneham, Mass; Washington, D.C.-based Defenders of Wildlife; Africam Safari in Mexico; Houston Zoo; and Summit Municipal Park in Panama.

Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project: http://amphibianrescue.com

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