No info on those behind jumbo deaths despite reward

TELUPID: Despite the reward of RM120,000, no one has come forth with any information on the culprits who caused the deaths of 25 Borneo pygmy elephants in the state this year.

Sabah Wildlife Department director Augustine Tuuga said the reward has been around for the past five years.

“Investigation into the deaths of the 14 elephants in the Gunung Rara Forest Reserve (in 2013) is still not closed.

“We also offered RM20,000 on the killing of the elephant with ‘sabre’ tusks (in 2017) but nobody came forward,” he said.

The bulk of the 25 deaths were discovered in the past four months.

The causes of the deaths ranged from gunshot injuries to wounds incurred from traps set up by hunters and other unknown causes.

Elephants that are injured by trapping devices will develop infections before they die.

WWF Malaysia said that snares are commonly used by poachers along animal trails in forest reserves bordering plantations with the intention of catching wild boars and deer. Though elephants are very rarely the target of poachers, they commonly fall victim to these devices as they use the same trails as other wildlife.

In the latest case, a female elephant was found dead at Ladang Bintang Emas Property Sdn Bhd in Tongod here on Saturday.

SWD public relations officer Siti Nur’ain Ampuan Acheh said the case was reported to the department by the Tongod district forest officer.

“SWD despatched a team of rangers and veterinary officer to investigate and conduct post-mortem on the animal on Monday.

“The carcass was mildly decomposing. It is believed to have died about a week earlier,” she said.

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Sabah CM orders all-out effort to stop ‘disturbing’ elephant deaths

KOTA KINABALU, Aug 30 — Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal has ordered fresh initiatives to put an end to the unprecedented number of elephant deaths in the state recently.

Pointing out that he was “shocked and stunned” by the deaths, Shafie said action should include “all-out effort” by the relevant agencies to engage locals in human-elephant conflict zones and educate them on tackling wildlife intrusion with conservation in mind.

“I am indeed disturbed by the sudden spike in Bornean elephant deaths in Sabah,” he said in a statement.

“I have ordered two state ministers — Tourism, Culture, Environment Minister Christina Liew Agriculture and Food Industry Minister Junz Wong — to hold special meetings with plantation owners in known elephant habitats so they can engage their workers to help with the fight against poaching and killing in their areas,” he said.

Shafie also called for cooperation from plantation workers and owners to remove snare traps found on their land.

“The plantation workers have shown that they are responsible when they have reported unusual activities like stray baby elephants or snared elephants. As people who are constantly on the ground, they would be the most effective in rooting out these criminal elements that seek to gain from illegal activities,” he said.

Shafie also called for the Sabah Wildlife Department to make their hotline number available to those living in human-elephant conflict zones to enable quicker action to stop possible conflicts.

He added he was aware of the need to form wildlife corridors to link fragmented forests and said he hoped non-governmental organisations could help fast-track this effort with the state government’s facilitation.

The state is currently under global conservationists’ radar following the reported death of 25 rare Borneo pygmy elephants this year alone.

Four elephants were found dead last weekend, including a mother and calf on plantation land, with two of them with gunshot wounds.

The causes of death for all 25 range from gunshot injuries to wounds, toxic substances and “unknown diseases”.

Shafie said that although he understood the plight of farmers and planters, who have to protect their crops on their land, they had “no right to kill these assets of ours.”

“Elephants in Sabah are totally protected by the law. It is a crime to hurt or kill them. Enforcement agencies cannot cover the ground that is needed to expose these criminal elements in our society,” he said, adding that he hopes Sabahans will serve as the eyes and ears for the protection of elephants.

“The human-wildlife conflict cannot be an excuse to kill, snare or poison these animals that are fully protected under the law as the state government wants to ensure that these animals are conserved so we and future generations can continue to enjoy Bornean elephants in the wild.”

The chief minister said Sabah’s wildlife, including the elephants, orangutans and proboscis monkeys, were part of the state’s rich heritage and an important tourism revenue earner with huge economic spin-offs for rural Sabah.

“Sadly, the wildlife, in particular the Bornean pygmy elephant, is dwindling at a rapid pace if the deaths this year alone are an indication of things to come,” he said, adding that the mere 1,500 to 2,500 elephants left in the wild could be extinct in a few decades.

“This effort to conserve cannot be left in the hands of the government and NGOs, the people –farmers, villagers, and plantation owners and their workers — have to cooperate in the fight against the problem with wildlife poaching.”

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Jumbo deaths raise welfare alarm

KOTA KINABALU: Drastic steps are expected to be taken at the Lok Kawi Wildlife Park where two endangered Borneo pygmy elephants died within two months.

Sabah Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Christina Liew will be at the wildlife park today on a fact-finding visit in which she is expected to make some tough decisions on the management and upkeep of the park, sources said.

Sabah Wildlife Department director Augustine Tuuga confirmed a report in The Star Online that two elephants died there on May 7 and June 27.

An adolescent male elephant rescued 13 years ago from Lahad Datu’s Yapid plantation died on June 27 while a four-year-old calf died on May 7.

Wildlife officials had kept a lid on the deaths amid calls by activists for improvements at the wildlife park that acts as a rescue and rehabilitation centre for the animals.

Sources said that wildlife veterinarians were puzzled over the deaths of the two elephants.

So far, post-mortem reports have not given any clue about the cause of the deaths.

It is understood that the calf, which was born in captivity, had been sick.

The deaths in captivity, sources said, was worrying.

Earlier this month, Friends of Orang Utan director Upreshpal Singh raised concerns about the upkeep of animals at the Lok Kawi Zoo but the Sabah Wildlife Department dismissed allegations that the animals were kept under poor conditions.

Tuuga said this was the second time that such an accusation had surfaced, adding that the animals were “well looked after”.

Liew made a surprise visit two weeks ago following the complaints.

However, she said then that all was good at the park.

At least seven elephants in the wild have also died of unknown causes in April and May in various parts of Sabah’s east coast.

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Deaths of two elephants at Lok Kawi wildlife park unfortunate

KOTA KINABALU: Authorities today revealed that while one of the elephants that died at Lok Kawi Wildlife Park has been sick for years, the baby elephant meanwhile may have contracted a new disease that was not linked with Borneo pygmy elephants previously.

Sabah Wildlife Department yesterday confirmed the deaths of the elephants which occured during two separate occasions which occurred a few days ago and in May.

State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Christina Liew who was briefed and visited the Wildlife Park - located 45 minutes from the city centre - this morning, said Yapid, a 15-year-old male elephant, was found dead on Tuesday morning (June 26).

He was a ‘disabled’ elephant with stunted growth which was due to his swallowing problem which he had since he was rescued back in 2003, when he was just three months old.

This meant that everytime he ate, he would ‘vomit’ out some of his meal, thus resulting in his stunted growth and he also suffered from chronic gastric problem.

“Samples were taken for analysis to check for anything that might have further contributed to his death. But it was a miracle that he has survived that long,” said Liew, as she was informed veterinarians expected Yapid’s lifespan not to go beyond five years.


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6 pygmy elephants found dead in Sabah in recent weeks

KUALA LUMPUR: Six Borneo pygmy elephants have been found dead in oil palm plantations in Sabah in recent weeks, officials said Monday, the latest of the endangered creatures to perish as their rainforest habitat is devastated.

The carcasses of the elephants, aged between one and 37, were discovered at different locations in Sabah, local Wildlife Department director Augustine Tuuga told AFP.

“We are currently conducting tests on their internal organs,” he said, adding the carcasses did not have any signs of gunshot wounds.


Tuuga said the elephants could have accidentally consumed fertiliser in the palm oil plantations, which could have poisoned them.

The Star newspaper, citing conservationists, said the creatures might have drunk from poisoned watering holes.

There are about 2,000 pygmy elephants, the smallest type of elephants in Asia, in the wild. Late last year, three were killed by poachers.

In 2013, 14 pygmy elephants were found dead in Sabah and were thought to have been poisoned.

They are threatened by widespread logging of their natural habitat to make way for lucrative oil palm plantations, and are targeted by poachers as their ivory fetches a high price on the black market.

The pygmy elephants are baby-faced with oversized ears, plump bellies and tails so long they sometimes drag on the ground as they walk.


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Another Pygmy Elephant is Shot Dead

The wild pygmy elephant was found dead near a small river at an oil palm plantation in Tawau. The pachyderm’s remains were riddled with three bullets. It doesn’t take a Sherlock Holmes to figure out what happened: the bull elephant had been killed either by plantation workers or local farmers in revenge for wading into crops or by poachers.

“The tusks are still there and we found gunshot wounds,” Augustine Tuuga, director of Sabah’s Wildlife Department, explained. “I believe it was done by poachers.”

This pygmy elephant is the seventh pachyderm that is known to have been killed in the past year, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature. In the past four months alone four pygmy elephants have been gunned down in Sabah. In August plantation workers discovered a female pygmy elephant suffering from several gunshot wounds at an oil palm plantation by the Malua Forest Reserve in Kinabatangan. She died of her injuries.

In early September, meanwhile, the remains of an elephant were found, without its tusks, at a plantation near Dumpas in Kalabakan. Soon thereafter, another pachyderm was discovered floating in the Kinabatangan river. It, too, had had its tusk sawn off by poachers.

The killings have alarmed conservationists and local wildlife officials. Pygmy elephants are increasingly beleaguered in Sabah. They are at risk of being killed by irate plantation workers for wading into crops; they are at risk of being poached for their ivory; and they are also at risk of being run over while crossing roads dissecting forests. Having lost much of their ancestral forests to oil palm cultivation and logging, these placid giants are now facing hardships and dangers across their range in Sabah.

“These animals belong to us all and are beneficial to us economically,” Masidi Manjun, Sabah’s minister of Culture, Tourism and Environment, has stressed, calling on locals to protect the state’s wild elephants.

Here’s hoping locals will heed such calls and set about saving the state’s pygmy elephants from any further harm.

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Plantations in Sabah losing millions because of elephants

KOTA KINABALU: Oil palm plantations are losing millions from damaged crops, sometimes spanning 30 hectares in total, when elephant herds raid the area, says the Sabah Wildlife Department.
Its director Augustine Tuuga told FMT that smallholders were hit the hardest as they could sometimes lose up to six hectares of crops in just one night.

“Elephant raids are a major problem for plantations in areas where elephants are found.
“These herds damage oil palm trees and eat the shoots, causing the companies to incur big losses,” he said, adding that Sabah Softwood Bhd for example, reported a loss of RM3 million a few years back.

He said that the problem of elephant raids had become so dire that most of the department’s ground staff were in Kg Gambaron in Telupid to deal with the issue, bringing to a virtual standstill, investigations into the recent case of suspected poaching in Kinabatangan.
The department estimated that there were only 2,000 Borneo pygmy elephants left in Sabah and although the number was considered acceptable to many, Tuuga said he was cautious about their survival rates if poaching continued unabated.

He conceded that most of the elephant poachers were locals, who killed the endangered animals mainly for their tusks.

“We found that these tusks were sold overseas but many also sold them to the Timorese who have a custom of offering elephant tusks as dowries.”

On Thursday, the department released a statement that it was investigating suspected poaching activities after an elephant carcass was found floating in the Kinabatangan River near Sg Koyah on Monday.

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Malaysia: Two more pygmy elephants found dead without tusks

KOTA KINABALU: Another two Borneo pygmy elephants were found dead without their tusks in eastern Sabah.

One of the carcasses of the elephants was located in a plantation near the Dumpas area on Sept 10 while the other was found floating along the Kinabatangan river close to the Danau Girang Field Research Centre a few days ago.

Sources said it was difficult to pinpoint the area where the second bull was killed before the carcass was dumped into the river.

Sabah has been faced with the threat of wildlife poaching, especially of its endangered elephants which numbers around 2,000 in forests in eastern Sabah.

Six pygmy elephants, including the unique sabre tusk jumbo, have been reported killed over the last six months.

The Sabah Wildlife Department said they have no new leads or suspects in both the new cases.

Nevertheless, investigations are ongoing to identify the perpetrators.

The department's director, Augustine Tuuga, said the death of the elephant in Dumpas revealed no external injuries.

He said that they have taken blood samples to establish the cause of death while the second elephant might be a victim of poaching.

Wildlife officials were also probing the case of a green turtle found butchered on the shores of Pulau Bum Bum in Semporna which was highlighted in a Facebook posting on Wednesday.

At least nine dead turtles were seen in the photo uploaded on Facebook.

Tuuga said they were verifying the reports and carrying an investigation into the deaths.

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Plantations in Sabah losing millions because of elephants

KOTA KINABALU: Oil palm plantations are losing millions from damaged crops, sometimes spanning 30 hectares in total, when elephant herds raid the area, says the Sabah Wildlife Department.
Its director Augustine Tuuga told FMT that smallholders were hit the hardest as they could sometimes lose up to six hectares of crops in just one night.

“Elephant raids are a major problem for plantations in areas where elephants are found.

“These herds damage oil palm trees and eat the shoots, causing the companies to incur big losses,” he said, adding that Sabah Softwood Bhd for example, reported a loss of RM3 million a few years back.

He said that the problem of elephant raids had become so dire that most of the department’s ground staff were in Kg Gambaron in Telupid to deal with the issue, bringing to a virtual standstill, investigations into the recent case of suspected poaching in Kinabatangan.

The department estimated that there were only 2,000 Borneo pygmy elephants left in Sabah and although the number was considered acceptable to many, Tuuga said he was cautious about their survival rates if poaching continued unabated.

He conceded that most of the elephant poachers were locals, who killed the endangered animals mainly for their tusks.

“We found that these tusks were sold overseas but many also sold them to the Timorese who have a custom of offering elephant tusks as dowries.”

On Thursday, the department released a statement that it was investigating suspected poaching activities after an elephant carcass was found floating in the Kinabatangan River near Sg Koyah on Monday.

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