 Reference Base  Country report - Malaysia: Distribution and population of... |
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Khan, M., 1987. Country report - Malaysia: Distribution and population of the Sumatran rhinoceros Dicerorhinus sumatrensis in Peninsular Malaysia. Rimba Indonesia 21 (1): 75-82, fig. 4, table 1
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| Location: |
Asia - South East Asia - Malaysia - Peninsular |
| Subject: |
Management - Programs |
| Species: |
Sumatran Rhino |
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The capture of two female Sumatran rhino in Peninsular Malaysia: In April 1984, a young female Sumatran rhino was captured by estate workers in an oil palm plantation, near Jeram, Selangor. This animal was one of the young born to the Sungai Dusun Group and the Department had been aware of the animal's movements for more than seven months. Apparently, the animal had just reached the age when it had to find a territory on its own. This, it could not do in the Sungai Duslin area, probably because of two reasons :
1. there was already a sizeable population of rhino occupying the somewhat small habitat available for them at Sungai Dusun and its surrounding forest, and
2. recent land clearing and development had further reduced the amount of forest available in the general area.
The animal had taken to wandering into the maze of oil palm plantations south of Sungai Dusun and at the time of its capture, it was in fact very much at home in such a habitat. This is in marked contrast to the behaviour of rhinos in the forest which need a closed canopy forest.
The second animal caught was also similarly young and was apparently trying to locate a territory. She too was probably from the general Sungai Dusun group of animals not unlike Jeram (the name of the first animal) had probably lived north of the Bernam river and had wandered into plantations adjacent to the rapidly developing Melintang forests.
We consider ourselves extremely fortunate in having brought both animals into captivity without any major mishap. In both cases, suitable transport cages were available and the point at which the estate workers had seccured the animals was accessible to both lorry and crane. This allowed us to have both animals crated within 24 hours of capture and transported to the Malacca Zoo within the subsequent 12h. However the whole operation was carried out under emergency conditions and anything could have gone wrong. Certainly we would not even dream of carrying out any capture operation if we did not have infinitely more control of our circumstances.
The current capture operation: There are at present two areas in the Peninsular Malaysia where the Sumatran rhinos are surviving in isolation and in some degree of risk. These areas are: Bukit Gebok in Pahang, and Tenggaroh in Johor. Both areas have possibly two animals each. The department constructed a corral-type trap in each area and is in the process of establishing a number of pit traps at both sites. The corraltype was abandoned as it was found unsuitable. On the 8th February 1986, an adult female was captured in our pit trap in Tenggaroh. We mounted an operation to take the animal (a female) out and by evening of the following day, the animal was successfully taken out of the pit and transferred to Malacca Zoo. On 6 July 1986, another female, believed to be from the Sungai dusun population, was captured near Sungai Samak, Ulu Bernam, Perak. She too was successfully retrieved from the pit the same night and transferred to the Malacca Zoo. The latest rhino capture was on the night of 8 September 1986, when an animal was caught in a pit trap near Sungai Dusun.
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