Siew Te Wong's Sun Bear Journal: April 2019

4/27/19

Outreach to IOI Plantation Luang Manis 25th April 2019

26/4/2019

On the 25th of April 2019, IOI Plantation Service Sustainable Palm Oil Department Sandakan Region organized “Sustainable Outreach Programme” at IOI Plantation Luang Manis, Beluran. BSBCC along with Sabah Wildlife Department and Rainforest Discovery Centre (under Sabah Forestry Department) have been invited to make the programme a success and off course, BSBCC will not forsake the chance to spread the awareness and educating the palm oil plantations community there. A very interactive programme among the organizers, participants and community, the programme itself started with talk from Mr. Aznandy, representative from Sabah Wildlife Department, emphasizing on the conservation of wildlife, the conservation law and also the enforcement effort. Concurrent to the talk was the wildlife masks coloring competition with explanation of each ‘involved’ animal done by the Humana School Luang Manis and also a Community Learning Centre (CLC) to provide awareness and information to the children in the plantation. In addition, the RDC team done a roleplaying game for the community; a game called Eco-Shopping, aimed to provide awareness on proper waste management. Throughout the programme, exhibition from BSBCC and the other participants were running and attracting not only the students, but also the workers and staffs working in the plantation, in which we can wrap it up as a fruitful interaction between the participants and also the community. Conclusively, we can hope more programme of this kind can be organized to continuously educate and attracting more people to achieve sustainable development and conservation for both us human and the wildlife.

4/25/19

New Journey for the Trio

25/4/2019

Text by Nithisha Nair (Intern student, University Putra Malaysia Bintulu Campus)
Photos by Chiew Lin May

And so, the journey begins for the three new musketeers- Joe, Romolina and Logan- into the bear house after patiently getting through their days in quarantine.

Romolina, being the oldest of the three was kept as a pet before being handed over to our centre. Whereas Joe was found alone in the forest when he was three months old. A person then sent Joe to Lok Kawi Wildlife Park. The youngest of the three, Logan, was found on a Lokan River near a village who separated from his mother as she crossed the river leaving him behind. He was taken care for a few months by the person who found him before being sent to our centre. These three musketeers, being as young as they are, are nothing short of curious, explorative and energetic.

Due to the lack of space in the bear house, this group of sun bears ended up extending their stay a little longer than expected. But with the release of Boboi, Kitud and Tan-Tan on the 14th this month, new room opened up to welcome our trio.

The week started off with enrichment preparations for the sun bears. Lengths of firehose were used to construct a ‘zig zag firehose’ as well as a wooden structure that the trio will be able to use to climb and play.

Zig Zag fire hose in the making by Umadevi, Adrian, and Adneen.

This recreational enrichment will go a long way in diverting the sun bear’s attention from the stress they might face through switching homes. Besides that, we also extended our measures and collected barks, dead wood and sacks of dry leaves to be put into their cages for a more forest-like feel. The bears will also be able to dig their claws and teeth into the barks in search for ants and termites. Termites nests were also brought from the forest for the trio to feast on.

Dead wood and broken tree barks being carried out from the forest.

Arrangement and decoration of the dens by Umadevi and Nithisha with the help of Adneen and Jeniur.

Two dens were transformed and decorated to the best of our abilities to give the bears as much of a natural environment as we could, dry leaves, tree barks, ginger leaves and termites nest were all placed in the dens alongside structural enrichments.

Then the long-awaited day finally comes and the cubs were ready to be brought to the bear house. Translocation cages were used to transport them from quarantine to the bear house. Prior to the transfer, they are lured into the translocation cages by quarantine keepers using diluted honey. Then they are weighed before being put on to the car to be brought down to the bear house.

Bringing the bears out of quarantine.

Putting the bears into their new temporary homes.

The transfer started off with Romolina, who was no trouble at all to lure into the translocation cage and was quite calm throughout the journey. After Romolina’s transfer, Logan was next. Eventhough Logan was no fuss to get into the translocation cage, he seemed pretty anxious on his way to the bear house. Honey water and bananas were provided upon arrival to eradicate any stress caused by transportation.

All the other bears seemed very alert and peculiar to the arrival of these cubs but did not cause a commotion of any sort, which was great as any vocalization would’ve rendered the cubs more stressed. After the two bears settled down, they enjoyed exploring in their dens and was nothing short of curious and adventurous, sniffing every corner and climbing every angle. They also foraged through the dry leaves for bananas and tore through tree barks in search of insects to feast on.

Romolina and Logan exploring their dens.

After ensuring the two cubs were okay, we proceeded with a health check for the last cub, Joe. The health check was done in quarantine with a hand injected anaesthesia by Dr. Boon whilst being distracted with honey. After Joe was unconscious, a full health check was carried out to ensure that the sunbear is well and healthy. Joe was then brought into the bear house and put into a separate den until he was fully conscious and able to join in on the fun.

Joe’s medical health check up.

Once Joe was concious, the three cubs didn’t waste any of their time before exploring all three dens together. They foraged through dry leaves and dead wood, climbed ladders hung on the den basket as well as on the gates of the den, and rolled around the dry leaves goofily with one another.

Romolina, Logan and Joe exploring their dens in the bear house together.

The cubs will have to go through integration as well as fence training before their debut in the forest enclosure. The cubs can frequently be seen exploring their surroundings and playing around with one another, their playful yet explorative behaviour is one we hope they keep throughout their rehabilitation journey. Here’s wishing good luck to these cubs in their journey before being released to the wild, good luck musketeers!

4/24/19

激動の２週間 The Tumultuous Two Weeks

24/4/2019

Text by Shuma Noda
Photos by Shuma Noda & Chiew Lin May

こんにちは。私は日本に住んでいる大学３年生の野田柊馬です。
Bsbccを知ったきっかけは、ぼくは、動物が大好きで特に、野生の哺乳類に興味があり、将来、自分も野生動物保全にかかわりたいと思っています。そんなときにとある先生からbsbccのボランティアを紹介してもらいここを知りました。そして２週間のプログラムに参加しました。
ここでの仕事はクマの餌の準備から餌やり、ケージの掃除、外の囲いのメンテナンス、エンリッチメント作りなどなどいろんなことがありました。その一つ一つは地味で汚いことかもしれません。しかしその一つ一つの作業がマレーグマの保全につながるすごく大事なことだと痛感しました。

Hello, I am Shuma Noda. I am an university student in Japan.
I love animals, especially I have a great interest with mammals in wild. I would like to work in a job related to conserving wildlife in the future.
I knew about BSBCC because of my teacher. He introduced me that BSBCC has a volunteer program, and I joined two weeks program.

There were many works to do for bears at BSBCC such as preparing meals, feeding, cleaning and maintaining their enclosures, making enrichment. Each work was simple, but I realised how important those works are for conserving sun bears.

僕はこのボランティアでいろんなことを学びました。エンリッチメントという方法でクマが退屈しないように、おもちゃのようなものを毎日違う種類のもので作り、それが野生に返すための訓練にもなるということやマレーグマがボルネオ島の生態系でどんな役割をしていて、そしてどんな大事な存在なのか、またマレーグマが人間によってどれほどおどろかされているか、それがどれだけ深刻なことかいろんなことを教わりました。

I learnt a lot from doing volunteer at BSBCC. For example, the role of sun bears in Borneo and how important they are for their surrounding environment. However the number of bears has been decreased by human beings and how serious it is. At BSBCC, giving bears different types of enrichment every day makes them not getting bored but also those are good tools for training them to release back into the wild.

印象に残っていることは、Mr.wonさんとのイントロダクションです。彼は野生動物の保全の４つの鉄則を教えてくれました。研究、教育、動物福祉、エコツーリズムです。Bsbccはこの４つがうまく絡み合った施設だと思います。Wonさんを筆頭に研究し、いろんな講演活動をしてみんなに教育し、先ほど述べたエンリッチメントなど工夫した方法で動物福祉の向上を目指していて、観光客にできるだけ野生に近い環境で見てもらう工夫がなされた展望台が用意されているからです。

The introduction with Mr. Wong was my highlight. He taught me four rules for wildlife conservation, study, education, animal welfare and ecotourism.
BSBCC is the great facility for wildlife conservation. Having Mr. Wong at the head of the list, the staff at BSBCC study a lot and give a lecture to educate people about bears. Also they aim to improve animal welfare for bears using many types of enrichment and well-designed enclosures. There are two observation platforms, so tourists who visit BSBCC can see the bears just like in wild.

僕はスタッフの皆さんに感謝しています。下手くそな英語もやさしく汲み取ってくれたり、わからないことは優しく教えてくれたり、仕事終わりにはフットサルやバトミントンに誘ってもらい、早くみんなと打ち解けることができました。
また、彼らはプロとして毎日マレーグマの保全を考え、すごい熱量を感じました。
もし、野生動物にかかわる仕事をしたい、興味があるという人は強くお勧めします！

I really appreciate all the staff members so much. They tried to understand my poor English, helped me and taught me kindly when I could not understand. Also they asked me to play football and badminton after work, so I could come out of my shell with everyone faster than I thought.
They are serious about bears and its conservation as a pro. If you are interested in conservation or thinking to have a job related to wildlife, I strongly recommend you to join the volunteer program at BSBCC.

Wildlife Conservation Education & Awareness Programme (April 2019)

21/4/2019

Children are well known for their curiosity for almost everything new and unique, and love for wildlife and nature should be shaped and nurtured at starting from a very young age. Knowing these facts, from 12th - 22nd April 2019, as a part of Wildlife Conservation Education and Awareness Programme Series 1, we, BSBCC’s Environmental Education unit organizing an outreach and invited our partners, Sabah Wildlife Department (SWD), HUTAN-Kinabatangan Orangutan Programme (HUTAN-KOCP), Sandakan Borneo Bird Club and Reef Guardian to continuously spreading the awareness on our wildlife to another schools in the district of Sandakan. There are six primary schools that are selected for this time. As usual, the whole programme filled with activities such as talks, interpretation, coloring activity and exhibition. The activities aimed to develop and inserting information among the children, in which become instilled in their mind, creating a wildlife-loving community in the future. Once again, we would love to express our gratitude to all the school teachers and students for the outstanding cooperation and also to our education partners for standing with us in our relentless efforts to educate our youngsters.

SJK (C) Syn Hua, Sandakan (12th April 2019)