The Scientific Exploration Society

The Scientific Exploration Society
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BLOG: Fiona Place 12th Sep 2008 Sabah, Borneo>

Lost and Found

At 6:30am I set out with Farina, Sulaiman and Mus to locate the elephants for our group. We drove out to a palm oil plantation that was owned by the local villagers to try to radio-track the three collared animals. After no luck there, so we took one of the boats up the Mananggol River to the place where the elephants had crossed the river the day before. From there we tracked the elephants on foot. Not far into the jungle we came across three female elephants, however, after following them for a short while they took off and we were unable to collect any data. We tracked them back to the river, which they then crossed, leaving us disappointed on the other river bank.

Luckily, on our way back to the boat we came across three more females and we were able to take good photos of them for the analysis. We headed back to the B&B group to tell the group of our find, but unfortunately we were unable to find the elephants again in the afternoon. However, the afternoon was not uneventful as our group lost the trail markers leading us back to the boat, and though we had it marked on the GPS it transpired that it is very difficult to line up a direction in the jungle! To everyone’s relief we were able to locate the trail after about 15 minutes. Nobody really felt like spending a night in the jungle with the leeches!

By Inneke Nathan