Doors

Doors.

Fern

I love the holidays. Busy still but had time to indulge in phototaking.

This was taken after a meeting at Chinatown. A close friend is getting married next week.

Colugo

Sighted a Culogo at the BTNR visitor center 2 days ago. We just had a quick hike from Macritchie and was cooling down at the visitor center. It was early evening, around 7pm. The night sky will filled with birds flying in to roost. A culogo just glided past the seated students and landed silently on Syzygium tree. It made its way slowly up into the branches, rested for a moment before gliding another 10 meters to a bigger tree across the path.

I was only 1 meter away from where it first landed. The feeling was magic.

completion

Finally sent in my project. After a long time, one aspect which have been at the back of my mind is finally settled. Can now focus on other projects which need my attention.

Could feel the adrenaline wearing off and the fatigue creeping in. But yes, the mind feel relieved and light.

On finishing

Still feel wide eyed and awake but yet edgey cagey after a long session of preparing for the final draft. It feels like the last leg of Kinabalu. You can see the summit cresting yonder, yet every step you take does not seem to get you any nearer.
No cause to pop the champagne yet, not until the pixels on the screen materialise as burnt carbon on sheets on paper. Not until I can feel how heavy a 3 year journey is in my palms.

New genus of monkey discovered in Africa

Again another demonstration of how little we know and how complex Nature is.

Naming a new genus is not the end of the story. More information is needed. How does the monkey feed? What is its lifespan? How does it find its mates? Does it care for its young? What forms its diet?

What are its ecological roles?

How does it fit into the grand tapestry called Nature?

Read - New Genus of African Monkey Found

Ok back to my slides. 2 days more.

Final lap

Finally can see the end of the road. One long chapter in my life is finally coming to an end.

Would I have done things differently? Well, looking back, I would not have given up anything for the incredible people I have met, the oppotunities I had.

Sometimes it is worth putting your life on hold for a while. You really never know how things will turn out. So maybe one need not think too much, but listen to your inner voice and choose what you think is right at the moment. And sometimes, it is worth the delay.

Just hope I can clear this final hurdle on Monday.

Extinction and conservation

The new Red List (see report by BBC) is out. And polar bears and hippos are amongst the new members in Red List of Threatended Species. This means that they are at risk of being extinct. In fact, the organisms listed numbered 16, 119. This number is one third of the total number of animals surveyed.

99% of the cause of decline for aniamls such as the polar bear and the hippo is human activities such as habitat degredation and climate change.

The increase in the red list is both a indication of intensified studies by researchers and also a sober indicator of how little we know about the environment around us.

Why should we care? One may ask, when we had already lost 90% of species that ever existed, due to mass extinctions. In fact as Tim Halliday (BBC writer) aptly put it, maybe it's time we just try to document whatever we can before the species disappear completely. That was the feeling I got when I had this chance to join RMBR for an expedition to Natunas Island, catch what you can and document everything. At least the organism is not lost to science before it disappears completely from the face of this earth. Sometimes one just do what one can.

Yet all is not bleak as Jeffrey A McNeely, the chief scientist at IUCN-The World Conservation Union, rightly pointed out. No doubt there is a limitation to our resources. How do one decide whther to invest money in saving biodiversity vs budgetting for healthcare and treatment of diseases.

Where does conservation stand in the myriad of issues which surrounds the world? Yet I think there is no lack of resources. Sometimes you do not need alot of money to conserve a species or a habitat. Like how a few courageous and determined minds got together to try and conserve Chek Jawa in Singapore. These people really do have my respect. They act, do what they can, and hope for the best. Sometimes the reward could be so fulfilling, such as granting an extended lease to a rich marine habitat, conserving the organims living there and also enriching the lives of the countless visitors who had since visited this beautiful place.

Elections are coming, it is will be interesting to see if any candidate or party brings up conservation of Singapore's natural habitats as an election topic.

That will be the day.

A new clean interface

Changed to a white minimalistic skin (must be a mac thing). Did away with the moon but left the counter, still interesting to see how many actually drop by. Need to think through my entries also, maybe shall try to do a Carl Zimmer but he is really good. Perhaps after 17 May.