Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Temengor Forest Reserve

I found the smallest bat in Malaysia on the pavement in the middle of Grik town. It was a rare find. It was injured. It was probably killed by some other raptor. This jungle dweller could be escaping from the rampant logging at Temengor Forest Reserve. Note the size of the bat vs the 20 sen coin.





The Royal Belum State Park is fortunate to be gazetted as a protected area. But why is Temengor Forest Reserve which has such rich biodivisity was not given the same royal treatment? The Plain pouched Hornbills are migrating rare birds. They travel everyday from the south to the north everyday during the month of June-September. If Temengor is not protected, Royal Belum’s health as a biological hot spot will also be affected (Dr Loh, MNS). Map below showed the Royal Belum State Park in green while her stepsister - Temengor Forest Reserve has to bare all for the greedy loggers.





Orang asli are being "pushed" to the limit. With no place to hunt and no forest to gather food. They have but to open up land for agriculture. See the picture below how forest have to be chopped. Who should we blame - the orang asli or the loggers or the authority?




Look at the logs. Waiting to be transported out from Temengor Forest Reserve.




Lorries after lorries were seen extracting out the logs.


And if the orang asli were not affected...then this little frog hiding in a small dent on a barren logging trail could best sumed up the state of the environment now. Do you want to wait until the frog "fly"(if it can) out to Grik town...and suffer the same fate as the little rare bat?



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