Happy World Wetlands Day!
Adventures with the Naked Hermit Crabs
The Not So Common Common Myna
BES Drongos
Singapore Raptor Report – December 2018
Singapore Bird Group
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Best of our wild blogs: 3 Feb 19
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Zero Waste Masterplan to focus on electronics, packaging, food waste: Masagos
Melanie Oliveiro Channel NewsAsia 3 Feb 19;
SINGAPORE: Singapore will relook the waste management cycle for three major streams of trash: Food waste, packing waste and e-waste, under its first Zero Waste Masterplan, Minister for Environment and Water Resources Masagos Zulkifli said.
The ministry has designated 2019 as Singapore's Year Towards Zero Waste, in a campaign that aims to raise awareness of waste issues and the need to conserve resources.
At 21 per cent, Singapore's household recycling rate is low when compared with other developed countries like Germany and South Korea.
While Singaporeans are practicing better recycling habits, many of them are still doing it wrong, said Mr Masagos in an interview with 938NOW which was broadcast on Friday (Feb 1).
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Malaysia: ‘Protecting Sarawak’s wildlife a niche tourism product’
Cecilia Sman Borneo Post 3 Feb 19;
MIRI: Sarawakians should cooperate with the authorities by not buying, rearing or trapping protected and totally protected wild animals, to prevent them from being extinct.
Assistant Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture Datuk Lee Kim Shin regards continuous and strong cooperation as being vital when it comes to protecting these animals from extinction and Sarawak’s tourism focus.
“Currently among our tourism targets include promoting nature tourism to tap its rich biodiversity, which is a niche tourism product especially to naturalists.
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Indonesia: Population of Komodo dragons in national park stable
Antara 2 Feb 19;
Komodo dragons in the Komodo National Park in West Manggara, East Nusa Tenggara. ANTARA FOTO/Indrianto Eko Suwarso/aww.
Kupang, E Nusa Tenggara (ANTARA News) - The population of Komodo dragons at the Komodo National Park located in West Manggara, East Nusa Tenggara Province, reaches 2,897 and is considered to be stable.
"Based on our record, the population of Komodo dragons remains stable, which is between two thousand and three thousand heads," Jackson, the Park`s Komodo dragon monitoring officer, stated here, Saturday.
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UAE's corals suffer 'catastrophic' damage in record summer heat
The future of eight reefs in the Arabian Gulf is in doubt after high temperatures and low winds leave corals dying
Daniel Bardsley The National 2 Feb 19;
Scientists fear the future of the UAE’s reefs is in doubt after research found rising temperatures killed almost three quarters of Abu Dhabi’s coral.
Record temperatures in the summer of 2017 left more than 90 per cent of Abu Dhabi’s coral cover bleached and struggling to survive, New York University Abu Dhabi found.
Dr John Burt, associate professor of biology, said there was a remarkable amount of damage.
“The results were catastrophic,” Dr Burt told The National. “I had never seen anything like it in my career.”
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Hong Kong customs seize record haul of pangolin scales bound for Vietnam
Reuters 1 Feb 19;
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Hong Kong customs busted a massive endangered species smuggling operation from Africa, seizing a record quantity of pangolin scales along with more than 1,000 ivory tusks, as authorities step up the fight against illegal wildlife trafficking.
The value of the seized goods - which equates to around 500 elephants and up to 13,000 pangolins - was over HK$62 million, ($7.90 million) officials said on Friday. Originating in Nigeria, the shipment was bound for Vietnam, they added.
In a separate incident, customs officials in the northern Vietnamese port of Hai Phong discovered another 1.4 tonnes of pangolin scales in a shipping container sent from Nigeria, the state-run Vietnam News Agency reported on Friday.
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'No malice or cruelty': Pest control company Anticimex rejects claims of mishandling snake at Tang Plaza
Channel NewsAsia 31 Jan 19;
SINGAPORE: There was no malice or cruelty towards the snake outside Tang Plaza during its capture, said pest control firm Anticimex on Thursday (Jan 31) after the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA) said it was investigating claims that the animal was mishandled.
AVA announced on Tuesday that it was investigating the case after a video on social media showed an Anticimex employee stepping on a 3m-long python while attempting to capture the struggling animal.
The authority previously said: "Cruelty to animals is an offence under the Animals and Birds Act. AVA has issued a set of guidelines on the proper handling of snakes to all pest control and wildlife management agencies in Singapore."
In response to this, Anticimex told Channel NewsAsia that the workers involved "used all necessary parts of their bodies to safely relocate a very large snake in a public place".
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Malaysia: MMEA saves 12 after oil tanker sinks off Tanjung Penyusop in Johor waters
Malay Mail Yahoo News 31 Jan 19;
KOTA TINGGI, Jan 31 — The Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) today rescued 12 crew members after their vessel sank near Tanjung Penyusop here last night.
All 12 male survivors, including a Malaysian technical passenger, had earlier been stranded at sea after their tanker met with problems at about two nautical miles east of Tanjung Penyusop.
Johor MMEA deputy director (operations) Maritime Captain Sanifah Yusof said the Sea Frontier motor tanker, registered in Saint Kitts and Nevis, was about 75 per cent submerged at about 9.15pm last night.
He said checks revealed that the vessel had hit rocks while attempting to dock, causing hull damage that allowed water into the ship.
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Indonesia: Why burn it? Government studies peatland conservation, management
Yuli Savitri The Jakarta Post 31 Jan 19;
The government has started research into developing peatlands as agricultural lands and conservation areas, following years of plantation companies and farmers using the slash-and-burn method in an attempt to cultivate peatlands.
The South Sumatra Peatland Restoration Team (TRGD) has focused on four areas in the province for developing as peat management and research centers.
TRGD chairman Najib Asmani said that the four areas were mapped on their individual characteristics for researchers to conduct a variety of peatland studies.
The four areas include Sembilang National Park, which UNESCO designated last year as a Biosphere Reserve.
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UK fish and chip shops are selling endangered sharks, DNA tests prove
People buying generic fish such as rock could in fact be eating a range of shark species
Patrick Barkham The Guardian 31 Jan 19;
Fish and chip shops and fishmongers are selling endangered sharks to an unwitting public, according to researchers who used DNA barcoding to identify species on sale.
Most chip shop fish sold under generic names such as huss, rock, flake and rock salmon turned out to be spiny dogfish, a shark species classified as endangered in Europe by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s red list.
Researchers at the University of Exeter also found fins of shark species unknowingly sold by a British wholesaler included scalloped hammerheads, which are endangered globally, as well as shortfin mako and smalleye hammerhead sharks.
Other species sold in fish and chip shops and fishmongers included starry smooth-hounds, nursehounds and blue sharks.
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Hotels, F&B businesses join Pact to cut back on plastic use
CYNTHIA CHOO Today Online 30 Jan 19;
SINGAPORE — Nine companies, including large hotel chains and popular food establishments, are teaming up to relook their plastic use under a new initiative by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).
Through the initiative called Pact — short for Plastic ACTion — the businesses will set targets and take measures to reduce their plastic production and use by 2030.
These include taking long- and short-term measures to remove from their operations certain plastic items that are deemed unnecessary, WWF said at the project’s launch on Wednesday (Jan 30).
For a start, this may include removing plastic bags and straws, but the WWF stressed that the initiative will go further than just these measures.
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