Climate change exposes secret reef in Australia

Narelle Towie, Perthnow.com 5 Jan 08;

WA has arguably the most pristine coral reef remaining on the planet - and it's not Ningaloo.

Just 260km off Broome are Rowley Shoals, three atolls on the edge of one of the widest continental shelves in the world.

But with climate change, cyclones and illegal fishing all posing a risk, marine scientists have embarked on a three-year mission to protect one of our best-kept underwater secrets.

Just back from their first trip, the researchers found the reef was in excellent condition, but they feared illegal fishing was already happening.

They spotted suspicious-looking boats just days into their trip, but the vessels' origin could not be confirmed, WA Department of Environment and Conservation marine scientist Suzanne Long said.

Despite these sightings, organisms such as sea cucumbers, giant clams and trepang -- which are usually the first to suffer from illegal fishing -- were found in abundance, Dr Long said.

The DEC and Institute of Marine Science have put $450,000 towards protecting the area which they hope will put Rowley Shoals on the global map for coral reef conservation.

Armed with video cameras and diving gear, a team of 12 scientists spent 17 days collecting images and video footage to take back and study.

"We aim to collect information to manage the reefs better. This is critical in this era of climate change,'' Dr Long said.

The coral islands are bursting with silvertip and grey reef sharks, a species dangerously exploited just north of Rowley Shoals where shark fishing is permitted.

For the first time, tags have been attached to the dorsal fins of some of the sharks that will allow researchers to monitor their movements.

Researchers hope their studies will help them better manage species that are dwindling, as a result of poaching, on other reefs such as Ashmore and Scott.

A formal report of what researchers found at the atolls will not be issued for six months.

"The excellent condition of this marine wilderness is something that you don't see elsewhere,'' Dr Long said.

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Jellyfish sales to China keep Gulf of Mexico fishermen afloat

Tony Bridges, Miami Herald 6 Jan 07;

Somewhere in China right now, there's a cannonball jellyfish from the waters off Panama City just waiting to be eaten.

Shrimpers trying to stay afloat during the off-season have been scooping them out of the Gulf of Mexico by the thousands since September. The gelatinous masses have turned out to be a profitable commodity on the Asian market, once they are processed into crispy protein wafers.

"Cannonball is a whole new business to us," said 68-year-old shrimp boat operator Steve Davis. "We used to run from them when we were shrimping because they would fill up the nets. Now we run to 'em."

The Panama City operation is run by Roger Newton, owner of Gulf Jellyfish. He was on the dock at the St. Andrews Marina recently, watching crews unload their cannonball catch.

He said he has been in the business about seven years, more of them good than not. The cannonballs, rounded, non-stinging jellyfish that can grow to nearly a foot wide, start showing up around September and usually stay about three months, though he never can be certain, Newton said.

"If I could play God, I wouldn't be in the fish business," he said.

Davis, from Apalachicola, said the cannonballs seem to move west along the Gulf in the fall, with the shrimpers following them from Port St. Joe to Panama City. After 40 years of catching shrimp, he still is learning his way around jellyfish, Davis said.

"What we know about them wouldn't fill but about half a page in a one-page book," he said, with a wry grin.

But what he does know is that they are a good way to make money, especially at a time when Asian imports are keeping wholesale shrimp prices low. A day's work and about $70 in fuel can bring in $1,000 worth of jellyfish, he said.

Two trawlers were busy netting cannonball in the bay within sight of the marina, while another boat was tied up to the dock to unload. A large vacuum hose sucked the jellyfish off the boat's sunken deck and delivered them to a conveyor belt, where a crewman with a shovel scooped them into plastic bins.

Though they don't sting, they are slimy, and their mucus-like covering will cause a burning sensation if it gets in your eyes, Davis said.

"You can hardly pick them up. We were going to call that man that's got the dirtiest jobs on television," he said, referring to the Discovery Channel's Mike Rowe.

Another worker with a forklift loaded the bins into a pair of waiting tractor-trailers.

The jellyfish go to a processing plant in Georgia where they are dried out and the salt is removed. Then they are packed into 50,000-pound containers for shipping to China and Japan, Newton said.

He retrieved a plastic bag from his truck to show to curious visitors. Inside were three yellowish wafers about 5 inches across.

"They're all protein and taste like whatever you put on them," he said.

According to the state Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, the dried jellyfish are popular in Asia as salad toppers, or with cooked vegetables. A 4-ounce serving contains 30 calories, 8 grams of protein and 120 milligrams of sodium.

Researchers think the jellyfish might be useful in fighting certain types of arthritis because of the collagen they contain.

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Green funerals in Singapore

RIP: Going green for last journey
Tania Tan, Straits Times 7 Jan 08;

Eco-coffins made of waste wood burn up to twice as fast; 100 have been sold here

MEDICAL doctor Tan Chek Wee believes in 'going green' - he wants to make his last journey a green one.

'I've told my family that I want an eco-coffin,' said Dr Tan, 52, who works part-time at three non-profit clinics.

Made from material such as recycled paper or chipboard, ecocoffins are easy on the environment as they spare trees from the axe.

These eco-friendly caskets also burn up to twice as fast as ordinary wooden coffins, which means less carbon emission. Chipboard, for instance, burns about 10 to 25 per cent faster.

Over 16,000 regular wood coffins were used here last year, with each requiring about 80kg of virgin timber to construct.

'Since I want to be cremated, I prefer not to kill a tree in the process,' said Dr Tan.

For religions that allow it, cremations are strongly encouraged here due to land scarcity, said the National Environment Agency. Religions including Islam and Judaism require followers to bury their dead.

Eco-coffins and so-called 'green funerals' have caught on among the environmentally conscious in the United States and Britain, with some opting for woodland burial sites, and using freshly planted trees instead of headstones to mark graves.

Though going green in this manner may not have quite caught on here yet, Singapore-based TentTech has already sold about 100 of its green coffins.

Produced from waste wood or timber from tree branches instead of trunks, its caskets are a more sustainable alternative to traditional coffins, said Dr Ng Khee Yang, the R&D consultant of the year-old company.

'There just isn't enough forest to supply us with wood in the long run,' he said.

But demand for eco-coffins has yet to take off here, conceded Dr Ng.

Undertakers agree.

'Imported green coffins are just too expensive,' said Mr William Quek, the managing director of Union Casket.

'We also don't want costs to become an extra burden for families who are already going through difficult times,' he added.

A Singapore Casket spokesman also cited lack of demand for not offering eco-friendly caskets to customers.

Green paper coffins sold elsewhere - made of densely compressed paper pulp - cost anywhere between US$600 (S$800) and US$3,000.

In Britain, some designs are even leaf-shaped instead of angular boxes.

While TentTech's price range is between $300 and $1,000, it noted that there is limited demand, as there appears to be a perception that its prices are on the 'high side'.

Wooden coffins here cost between $300 and $6,000 each. They are often carved locally from wood imported from Malaysia and Indonesia.

With shiny veneered surfaces, some come with satin cushioned upholstery, gilded religious carvings and gold- or silver-plated handles.

The more intricate the detailing and design of the coffin, the higher its price.

But such caskets are not for Dr Tan: all he wants is an environmentally friendly one for his final moment.

'I've always been a practical man,' he said. 'If my ashes can be used as fertiliser, that's even better.'

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Malyasia to ration cooking oil

Business Times 7 Jan 08;

(KUALA LUMPUR) Malaysian cooking oil will be rationed starting today to counter a supply shortage caused by smuggling and panic buying amid fears of a price hike, a government official said.

Consumers will be allowed to buy only up to five kilograms of cooking oil at any one time, said Hoo Seong Chang, parliamentary secretary of the domestic trade and consumer affairs ministry.

Supermarkets and retail stores nationwide have been told to enforce the rationing, he told The Associated Press yesterday.

'It's a temporary measure to alleviate the shortage. It will help to prevent panic buying,' he said.

'We can't control 100 per cent but at least people cannot buy more than five kilograms at any one time.'

The government is also asking cooking oil manufacturers to raise production, and is urging consumers to cooperate to ensure that the shortage is resolved quickly, Mr Hoo said.

Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak said panic buying and hoarding had created an 'artificial shortage' of cooking oil, prompting the rationing, but that there was plenty of oil for everyone, The Sunday Star newspaper reported.

'There is enough supply but the situation is due to an extraordinary demand,' Mr Najib was quoted as saying.

A Najib aide who declined to be named citing ministry policy confirmed his comments but could not give further details.

The customs department has been told to step up checks along the border with Thailand following reports that cooking oil was being smuggled into that country, newspapers reported yesterday.

The Sunday Star said news of the rationing had sparked a renewed rush to buy cooking oil nationwide. -- AP

Rationing of cooking oil in Malaysia begins today
Straits Times 7 Jan 08;

KUALA LUMPUR - MALAYSIA begins rationing cooking oil today with each buyer allowed to purchase only 5kg as the government imposes restrictions to curb a shortage blamed on smuggling and panic-buying triggered by price-hike rumours.

But some retailers had begun to ration cooking oil purchases over the weekend, said the official Bernama news agency.

The parliamentary opposition slammed the rationing measure, which it said was harming restaurants, consumers and vendors and was proof of the government's failure to provide the basic needs of the people.

'The nationwide cooking oil shortage which plagued the country is not something new, as previously we faced similar shortages in diesel, sugar and flour supply,' the opposition Democratic Action Party said.

'The government should be ashamed...it is a great irony that we are short of cooking oil even though we are the largest palm oil producer and exporter in the world.'

Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister Shafie Apdal, who announced the restrictions last Friday, blamed the crisis on smugglers who cash in on subsidised Malaysian oil by moving it to neighbouring countries.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

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Singapore start-up develops unique LED lighting solution

Amit Roy Choudhury Business Times 7 Jan 08;

System promises high power lighting at lower cost

A SINGAPOREAN start-up, BrightLite Systems, has come up with an innovative liquid crystal display (LED) lighting system that promises to help users save more than 30 per cent in electricity bills.

The technology was developed by the company in collaboration with the Singapore Institute of Manufacturing Technology (SIMTech), an Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*Star) research institute.

Speaking to BizIT, the company's CEO Bernard Lim said BrightLite's Ultra-BrightLite LED engine, which is at the core of its products, was an Economic Development Board-approved project under the EDB's Industrial Commercial Scheme.

LED is a semiconductor lighting system with a life span typically 50 times longer than that of traditional fluorescent lighting.

However, the widespread application of LED in lighting is constrained by two major challenges - effective heat dissemination and non-direct power source contact. For each LED type, a power supply must be specifically designed.

The worldwide LED lighting market is estimated by some market analysts of to be worth around US$6.7 billion, with a 15 per cent yearly growth rate.

Mr Lim noted that his company's collaboration with SIMTech in thermal analysis and simulation of a patent-pending LED housing design solved the problem of heat through 'effective and rapid three-dimensional heat dissipation'.

SIMTech's executive director, Lim Ser Yong, added: 'SIMTech's expertise in thermal management has helped BrightLite Systems develop an innovative high power LED lighting solution for the company to make its foray into the global market.'

The Ultra-BrightLite solution integrates the key elements - high power LED ranging from 5 to 30 watts, smart electronics, hard optical lens and aluminium metallic housing - into one integrated package.

Mr Bernard Lim however said the product is not something one can go into a store and buy. Rather, it's targeted at architecture and building firms and lighting and fixture manufacturers, among other customers. These companies will assemble the end products to either install in buildings or sell to consumers. BrightLite has no plans to retail the lighting solutions on its own.

'Ultra-BrightLite offers low cost, high reliability, fast time-to-market LED design solutions and products to companies that make lights that consumers buy,' Mr Lim said.

Asked how a small Singaporean company can hope to compete in a market which has such giants like Philips making similar products, Mr Lim, who used to work in Creative Technology, said product differentiation was the key.

'When one looks at the overall LED supply chain from the LED die, packaging and the finished products, big companies like Philips and Cree own the die patent and not many other companies can hope to enter this market,' he noted.

However, in terms of packaging - that is integrating the LED die in a casing to make an effective lighting system - there has been no marked improvement in design since way back in the 1960s, when the first LED lights started appearing.

He added that till 2005, most LED lights were low power, low wattage types. It was only after 2005 that high power, high wattage LEDs started to be designed.

However, packaging has proved to be a major hurdle.

'Since LED lights dissipate a high amount of heat due to high power lighting, not many designs can take high watt LED lighting. In an LED light, the temperature can reach six to seven times higher than in a normal CPU (central processing unit) of a computer.

'With our Ultra-BrightLite technology we can integrate the LED into a metallic housing which also houses a temperature monitor. If the temperature is too high, for example during summer time, it will control the current.'

Mr Lim noted that by leveraging on SIMTech's competency and experience in thermal management of advanced electronics and microsystems, his company has successfully developed a unique patent-pending LED housing design.

'SIMTech's expertise has enabled us to achieve a miniaturised and high performance LED solution with integrated electronics. This 'Made-by-Singapore' product will enable us to capture the exciting opportunities in solid state lighting.'

At present BrightLite is funded internally by Mr Lim and his associates. However, a few venture capitalists have expressed interest in the company.

Said Mr Lim: 'We are talking to a couple of VCs and for marketing we are in contact with some government departments such as the Housing and Development Board (HDB) as the government is looking at making buildings more energy efficient.'

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US$100 oil price not very high: Opec

Business Times 7 Jan 08;

Taking into account inflation, the current price is below 1980 record, cartel says

(PARIS) The price of US$100 for a barrel of crude oil is 'not necessarily very high' given the high demand of oil and higher production costs, the president of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) said yesterday.

On Wednesday, the price of a barrel of crude reached US$100.09 in New York, before retreating at the close to US$99.18.

Algeria's Energy Minister Chakib Khelil - who took over the rotating presidency of Opec on Jan 1 - told AFP that the current surge must be seen 'in relation to the real price', that is taking into account inflation.

The current oil price was therefore below its 1980 record of 'between US$102 and US$110 depending on estimates', he said.

Mr Khelil said that high oil demand was not only being pushed by 'China and India but also by the Middle East whose consumption has risen immensely'.

'When you take that into account, US$100 is not necessarily very high,' he said.

Mr Khelil said on Saturday: 'The surge in price will probably go on until the end of the first quarter of 2008, before stabilising during the second quarter.'

Speaking on the sidelines of a conference on the security of hydrocarbon pipelines in the Algerian capital, Mr Khelil said to members of the press that a second-quarter stabilisation was 'probable'.

Mr Khelil said on Saturday that the steady rise in prices was due to tension in Pakistan, escalating violence in Nigeria and a fall in oil inventories in the United States.

In Riyadh, Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said the record prices have been set by the market.

'The market fixes the price of oil,' Mr Naimi told reporters at an energy conference in Riyadh when he was asked to comment on the surge of oil to a record above US$100 last week.

Mr Naimi declined further comment on the price or what Opec would decide at its next meeting on Feb 1 in Vienna.

Saudi Arabia is the world's largest oil exporter and the most influential voice in Opec.

High energy costs have caused concern among some members of Opec regarding the potential impact on the global economy.

But ministers say there is little they can do to tame the price, which is driven by political tension and speculators and not supply and demand fundamentals.

An official of Saudi state oil giant Saudi Aramco is on track to hit its oil production capacity target of 12 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2009.

The start of Aramco's 500,000 bpd Khursaniyah oilfield was delayed a few months to the first quarter this year from December last year.

Other expansion projects remain on schedule, Aramco's senior vice-president of exploration and production Amin al-Nasser said.

'We are going up to 12 million bpd (oil production capacity) in 2009,' Mr Nasser said at a presentation to an energy conference in Riyadh.

Aramco's total output capacity does not include the Saudi share of capacity in the neutral zone which is between the kingdom and Kuwait.

Saudi Arabia is aiming for total output capacity, including the neutral zone, of 12.5 million barrels per day in 2009.

Saudi Arabia is spending billions on projects to meet growing world demand and maintain spare capacity of 1.5-2 million bpd of oil to deal with any unexpected outages in global supply.

A 250,000 bpd expansion at the Shaybah oilfield and the development of the 100,000 bpd Nuayyim field will add another 350,000 bpd of capacity by the end of 2008, Mr Nasser said.

The planned 1.2 million-bpd Khurais oilfield is expected to start production by mid-2009.

The 900,000-bpd Moneefa oilfield will start production in September 2011, three months later than Aramco's initial schedule.

Aramco also aims to boost gas output capacity to 12 billion cubic feet per day (cfd) in 2011 from 9.5 billion cfd, he said. -- AFP

Oil prices to keep rising, says Opec president
Straits Times 7 Jan 08;

Speculators driving surge in crude oil market, Qatari oil minister points out
ALGIERS - OPEC president Chakib Khelil said on Saturday he expected oil prices to keep rising during the first quarter before stabilising in the following quarter.

'The rise is likely to continue until the end of the first quarter of 2008 and will stabilise in the second quarter,' Mr Khelil, who is also the Algerian energy and mines minister, told Algerian official news agency APS.

He linked the steady rise of oil prices to 'political tension in Pakistan, escalating violence in Nigeria and a decline of oil inventories in the United States', APS added.

Oil in New York hit US$100 a barrel last Wednesday, the first trading day of the new year.

In further comments relayed by Algerian state radio, Mr Khelil said the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries' (Opec's) next meeting would closely study forecasts for world economic growth, particularly those of the US, which had been seriously affected by the sub-prime mortgage crisis.

The world market had sufficient oil supplies for now, and no decision could be made to increase production before the next conference, he was cited as saying.

Opec is scheduled to meet next on Feb 1 in Vienna.

Separately, a Kuwaiti newspaper quoted the Qatari oil minister as saying Opec was not behind the recent rise in oil prices, as markets were well-supplied and the price was being driven purely by speculators.

'Investment funds and speculators are behind the recent hike,' Mr Abdullah al-Attiyah told al-Jarida newspaper in comments published last Friday.

'The market is not suffering from any lack in supplies, and there is no disturbance in producers' regions.'

Opec, a source of more than a third of the world's oil, decided to keep oil output steady at a Dec 5 meeting, rebuffing calls from consumer countries for more supply to rein in prices, then at levels of around US$90.

REUTERS

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Beach sand washes away, breakwaters aggravate

Breakwaters – remember those?
“Renourishment” keeps washing out to sea
John Johnston, Bocanews.com 6 Jan 08;

“How many times are you going to get hit on the head with a bat to know you have a headache?” asks Aaronson of the euphemistically labeled “beach renourishment.”

Futility of a different sort was what iconic rock legend Bob Dylan had in mind when he penned “Blowin’ in the Wind” in 1962. He had in mind that mankind’s greatest inhumanity to man is indifference.

In a more mundane context, he could just as easily have been talking about Palm Beach County government and the seeming indifference to the never changing reality that, indeed, beach sand is going to be “blowin’ in the wind” – and millions of dollars needed annually to replace it.

But it’s not really blowing in the wind, is it? It’s actually storm surge and high wind that’s the culprit, i.e., some $5 million worth of sand and 80 percent of this year’s leatherback turtle nest disappeared in the literal wake of Tropical Storm Andrea in May 2007.

Palm Beach County has replaced about 15 million cubic yards of its shoreline sand over the last decade. Governments at all levels spend about $16 million a year to annually replace the county's shoreline. About $1.1 million comes from property taxes, and about $2 million from the "bed tax" on all hotel stays.

County commissioners in fact just approved another $1.1 million of county taxpayer funds to match state money for the purchase, delivery and placement of over 125,000 tons of sand following an early October Nor’easter and Tropical Storm Noel. The sand will go, of course, to those financially bereft communities of South Palm Beach and Singer Island.

And what’s really scary is that Commissioners Burt Aaronson and Mary McCarty agree on something – that annually spending millions to replace sand is putting good money after bad,

Assessments?

“How many times are you going to get hit on the head with a bat to know you have a headache?” asks Aaronson of the euphemistically labeled “beach renourishment.”

And in fact, much of the beach erosion, and subsequent “renourishments”, serve private condo owners – not a general audience.

Which is why McCarty has in part called for – and a majority of her colleagues at least said ‘let’s look at it’ -- “doing an assessment of those who are directly affected” -- “a per square foot thing,” McCarty said, “and then a bond issue to deal with it.”

And in this case, concrete – not sand – would be purchased.

With support from Daniel Bates, director of Palm Beach County's Environmental Restoration and Enhancement Division, McCarty called for the construction of offshore “breakwaters” to deal with the annual erosion issue.

Seawall Problems

Building seawalls in front of various potentially affected buildings along the shore only adds to serious erosion problems, Bates explained. A seawall directly and propels water around itself, and actually causes greater erosion on either side of it that would have occurred if the seawall wasn’t there.

So, and while a condo building might be preserved by a seawall, an adjacent parking lot or other unprotected buildings might be swept out to sea – which is what happened in Jupiter inlet, Bates said, last May.

“Design work for breakwaters is “already completed,” Bates said, and “if funding was in place,” he added, work could be “finished next year.”

“Next year” is now this year – 2008 -- and not a proverbial peep about changing the “renourishment” system has been heard since.

Just more tax dollars washed out to sea.

Which is going to make it harder for those trying to convince voters to turn down the Jan. 29 property tax reform constitutional amendment.

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Debate on costs and benefits of Three Gorges Dam continues

Channel NewsAsia 6 Jan 07;

CHONGQING, China: The long-running controversy over the costs and benefits of the Three Gorges Dam – the world's largest hydroelectric power project spanning Asia's longest river, the Chang Jiang – looks set to continue for years to come.

The water level in one part of the Three Gorges has risen some 70 metres since the project began. And by the time the dam is completed in 2008, it will reach 175 metres.

Andy Sung, a tour guide, said: "Now that the water level has risen, the ancient coffins hanging halfway up the cliffs appear to be lower. They can be seen more easily. Previously, we had to use binoculars."

It is believed that rising waters have engulfed thousands of years of Chinese history along the Chang Jiang.

Scores of centuries-old villages have been submerged, and along with them, their ancient traditions.

While many relics have been moved to safety, archaeologists and historians mourn the loss of their authentic settings.

Furthermore, more than a million residents have been relocated to unfamiliar grounds.

But there have been benefits too.

Before the dam was completed, tourists who want to see the Lesser Three Gorges could only sail up in motorised sampans and go for about 30 kilometres.

Now, they can go further in bigger ships for up to 50 kilometres for better scenery.

The larger barges transport cement from the factories and coal from the mines that abound in this area.

While the production and transportation of these materials pose a potential environmental hazard, experts said that is not the only source of pollution on the river.

People living alongside the river have to be taught not to treat it as a natural sewage system.

Daniel Li, a river guide, said: "I have to say, in the last ten years, we have improved a lot in this kind of situation because right now, generally speaking, no floating garbage is found on the river. It's very muddy because of the silt, not because of the pollution."

The Three Gorges Project Development Corporation has spent $2.5 million on a vessel to collect as much as 7 million cubic feet of garbage that accumulates at the dam each year.

And drought is another worry. For a river that has flooded its banks through the centuries, some are warning that drought could happen downstream, after the dam, as more water gets held back.

With the more than 2,300 metre-long dam now a reality, the lives of thousands of Chinese living along the banks have been irrevocably changed.


- CNA/so

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Best of our wild blogs: 6 Jan 08

MPA's reply to the labrador issue
on the blooooooooooo blog

Where is the balance?
comment on discussions on Mandai development on the nature scorned blog

Incy weency spider on a nightjar's head
soon-to-be-snack? on the bird ecology blog

Java sparrow conservation
on the bird ecology blog

Aquatic life at Bukit Timah Nature Reserve
on the urban forest blog

Bukit Batok Town Park
aquatic and other wildlife on the johora singaporensis blog

My New Year Resolution
on the champions of the earth blog

Get your learn on
An example of independent study on climate change on the its getting hot in here blog

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A Passion for Birds: Lady of the birds

Adeline Chia, Straits Times 6 Jan 08;

Cancer hasn't stopped Ong Kiem Sian from compiling a book on bird photography which comes with a foreword from Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew

SHE has been dubbed the 'first lady of bird photography in South-east Asia', but Ong Kiem Sian cuts no imposing figure.

The veteran bird photographer is a petite 62-year-old with a shock of white hair. Her 1.53m frame barely tips the scales at 38kg.

She hardly looks strong enough to lug around almost 10kg worth of camera and video equipment, let alone wade in thigh-deep waters, trek for hours in the wild and spend mornings baking under the sun - all for the perfect shot.

But the optometrist by profession, who was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2006 and is still suffering from it, has published a book of bird photography. It features 262 species of birds from Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.

Titled A Passion For Birds, the book spans 16 years of work and comes with a foreword from Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, for whom she has made spectacles for 30 years at F.J. Isaacs, an optometry clinic in Clifford Centre.

In it, Mr Lee says he first discovered Ong's passion for birds when she passed him a DVD she made of birds feeding their young. He then asked her to do a photo record of the birds in the Istana grounds, but she said that nearly all the birds there had been recorded.

On the bird pictures in Ong's book, he said: 'These photos are the products of painstaking efforts. I wish the book success.'

Ong says the book was a way to explain to her patients why she left her job suddenly after her illness.

She tells LifeStyle in her semi-detached home in Goodman Road in Katong: 'I have patients I saw since they were teenagers, and now their children come to me. This is a way to tell them about my condition.'

One thousand copies of her book, priced at $45, are on sale at F.J. Isaacs, nature bookstore Nature's Niche at the Botanic Gardens, Genesis Health Food Restaurant in Lorong Telok in Boat Quay and Revelation, a book shop in Beatty Road. Proceeds will go to charity.

Bird photography may be a niche interest in Singapore but Ong is a prominent figure in the field. Her book is one of the few coffee-table books of regional bird photography printed here, and her images have been used in Nature Watch, the Nature Society's magazine, and international bird reference books.

But in the veteran's house, only one print of her countless images hangs on the walls.

She is practical about this. 'I blow a print up, hang it up, but I have a better shot later. If I keep doing this, my house will have so many pictures.'

Strange influence

SHE came into birdwatching later in life. Born in 1946 in Solo, Central Java, to a well-off family of four children, Ong started work as a secretary with oil company Caltex in Indonesia.

In 1969, she left to study optometry in Holland.

Following her family who had already set up a peanut butter factory in Singapore, she moved here to work at F.J. Isaacs in 1972, where she worked for more than 30 years until she left her job due to her illness.

When she was 42, she married a school principal, now retired and aged 78. They have no children together, but he has two children from his previous marriage.

The call of the wild came when she attended a talk on bird photography by bird expert Morten Strange in 1990. The Danish-born Mr Strange, 55, is the co-owner of Nature's Niche and the author of four bird books.

He is also a partner of nature book publisher Draco Publishing, which put out her book.

Recalling her excitement then, Ong says: 'He said you had to climb a tree, wade in water, for a picture - it seemed so interesting.'

So she invested $450 in a lens - she already had a camera - and started photographing birds which landed in her garden. She has not looked back since.

She started exploring other places in Singapore, such as Bukit Timah Nature Reserve and Mandai Orchid Garden; Malaysia's Panti Forest Reserve and Fraser's Hill; and more recently Indonesia, in Sulawesi and Halmahera.

As her enthusiasm grew, she also started venturing into video, and bought a video camera to record nesting birds.

In her archives are rare footage of the Rusty-breasted Cuckoo usurping a Pied Fantail's nest, a behaviour which is rarely seen and even more rarely recorded. She also has close-view photos of the hard-to-spot female Violet Cuckoo and photos of the feeding habits of the bright orange Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher, gobbling up frogs, bugs and crabs.

On her passion for rare images, she says: 'It's like collecting stamps. You want to have something you don't have yet.'

Rarity comes at a price. When she goes 'birding' - short for birdwatching, as the enthusiasts call it - she wakes up at 5.30am to get to a forest by dawn, when the birds are most active, to make full use of the daylight hours.

If she has to travel further, she wakes up at 4am.

She once waded through part of MacRitchie Reservoir to get to the opposite bank for a glimpse of a Black-capped Kingfisher. She then had to set up a camouflage screen in front of her and stay still for hours to wait for the kingfisher to come.

Another time, she sat under Sime Road forest bridge, in ankle-deep water, to stalk a Blue-eared Kingfisher.

Why go to all these lengths for birds?

She says with a laugh: 'Friends ask me why I don't go to Jurong BirdPark and shoot the birds there. Birdwatching is a challenge. If something is easy, it's not worth doing.

'Birds are interactive. When you come near, they turn to look at you. When they're scared, they fly away. No offence to my friends who are interested in insects, but if you photograph a caterpillar, they just stand there and chew.

'I prefer challenges.'

Cancer shock

BUT her illness has brought her birdwatching to a standstill.

In June 2006, she discovered painful lumps around her waist. She consulted a doctor, who diagnosed it as lung cancer. It had already spread to her waist and chest, and nodules in her brain.

This came as a shock to her and her friends as she has always been a vegetarian and a non-smoker.

She underwent radiotherapy to treat the nodules in her brain, and did not continue with chemotherapy for her body as she felt miserable. She says: 'I lost weight, I had no appetite. I'm very sensitive to smell and chemicals and react very badly.'

She sought alternative treatment at a health farm in Malacca, where she fasted, underwent enemas and went vegan, which means avoiding all meat and dairy products.

She still visits a doctor every two to three months. The cancer is not in remission as she says her lumps are still growing.

'More radiotherapy and I'll be gone. It's better not to know and let it be,' she says. 'But if you don't feed the cancer the food it eats, it might slow down and stop.'

Last year, a fellow bird enthusiast asked if Ong would write a book and 'leave her legacy behind'. So she assembled her best photos and got Mr Strange to shortlist them and write the captions. Her sister, an anaesthetist, and skin specialist brother-in law sponsored the $35,000 it cost to publish the book.

Says Professor Ng Soon Chye, 57, an avid bird videographer and Ong's friend for some 20 years: 'For a bird coffee-table book, this is a significant publication because it has some very nice and rare photographs.'

Adds the obstetrician and gynaecologist: 'Sian is dedicated to her craft and pursues it with a lot of passion.'

Mr Strange admires Ong's focus and discipline and has dubbed her the 'first lady of bird photography in South-east Asia'.

He says: 'When she's on the field, she has no lunch breaks and doesn't diddle-daddle. She is very patient.'

Ong is modest about her achievements. She says: 'I never think about achieving something or dream of writing a book or starting a collection.'

She adds with a toothy grin: 'I did it for fun. I am happy to share this with people around me.'

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PA's Family Life Champions get refresher programme to enhance skills

Channel NewsAsia 5 Jan 08;

On Saturday, the Family Life Champions were at the Outward Bound School on Pulau Ubin for a two-day team building programme. Southeast District Mayor Matthias Yao said the programme is a catalyst to emphasise that the family is the natural way of life.

SINGAPORE: Forty Family Life Champions of the People's Association are going through a three-month development programme aimed to equip them with skills to better perform their roles.

The programme has three modules - enhancing leadership, organisational abilities and management abilities.

The objective is to help the Family Life Champions effectively promote family life in their grassroots committees.

More than half of the programme involves hands-on learning, including harnessing the Internet to promote family life.

There are also eight workshop sessions, each targeted at an important aspect of promoting family life.

On Saturday, the Family Life Champions were at the Outward Bound School on Pulau Ubin for a two-day team building programme.

Southeast District Mayor Matthias Yao said the programme is a catalyst to emphasise that the family is the natural way of life. - CNA/ir

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Vietnam's Red River's water levels at lowest in 100 years

Straits Times 6 Jan 08;

HANOI - WATER levels in Vietnam's northern Red River have fallen to a 100-year low, stranding large ships and threatening agricultural production, state media reported yesterday, quoting Hanoi officials.

The authorities have ordered the dredging of the waterway, which originates in China and runs through the capital, after the river level dropped due to low rainfall and a halt to discharges from upriver hydro-electric dams.

About 20 ships of over 500 tonnes were stranded on the river near Hanoi last week, prompting Vietnam's Inland Waterway Administration to order the dredging of the river this month, the state-run Vietnam News daily reported.

The water level of the river, called Song Hong in Vietnamese, had dropped to 1.1 metres in Hanoi, down from almost 1.5 metres at this time last year, Hanoi irrigation department official Tran Ai Quoc was quoted as saying.

'It is likely agriculture production will also be threatened by the lack of water,' he reportedly said.

'Widespread drought is forecast for this year.'

Most of the northern area's reservoirs are only 30-55 per cent full, resulting in a serious shortage of water for farming.

The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development has required northern and northern central provinces to take anti-drought measures, including guiding farmers to shift to drought-resistant plants.

Rainfall in the northern and northern central regions is forecast to be lower than average for the first few months of this year.

AFP, Bernama

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