Photo of the Week (02/27/2012): The Fallen King

A wildlife photo from the days I spent most of my time above land. King Gemunu walks his terrain in Yala. Sadly Gemunu has been fed by 'pilgrims' visiting Situlpahuwa and now begs for food from visitors to the park. A king transformed to a pauper and an accident waiting to happen. So much for gaining 'merit!'

Saman the CDF Tracker; Hope if opportunities used correctly

It was a Wilpattu trip after almost a year’s absence in the park and a quite uncharacteristically late entrance into the park after a 3.30am arrival to Aanawila the night before. With the late entry and an experienced and super jeep driver (Nishantha: 0724125078) we were assigned a less experienced tracker, Saman who clambered in clutching some paperwork.

It was a bit of a surprise to find out that he was a member of the Civil Defense Force, what is thought to be one of the poorest trained and least popular sections of the armed forces in Sri Lanka. Someone had put it fairly accurately to me some time ago, that (rightly or wrongly) the general impression is that the CDF is a bunch of village thugs with guns.

Saman however was completely different from what I expected, very nice and eager. The documents he was clutching as he got into the vehicle turned out to be a bird guide book. As I identified a blue-faced malkoha and a racquet-tailed drongo, he sheepishly admitted that he wasn’t the best at bird ID’s and if he had known I was into birds he would have gotten a better guide from the office. Yet it was refreshing to be with Saman, not only did he look up a bird in the bird every time we saw one but he’s enthusiasm was infectious. I usually just click a photo for ID’ng later and go along my merry way especially with the waders since they are usually quite obscure, small and relatively dull. This time however it was an interesting trip because Saman was quite into trying to ID every bird we came across.

A character like Saman does raise an interesting issue. Every park that I have visited, from Yala to Wasgamuwa to Gal Oya, is understaffed with the majority of staff being temporary. In a park like Gal  Oya, rarely visited and relatively obscure it is somewhat excusable. But in a park like Yala, where turnover has on some days exceeded Rs. 1 million a day and is a frequent stop on the tourist trail, there is simply no excuse.

Yet at the same time while the parks, which generate such vital income, cry out for manpower, the Civil Defense Force is 35,000 strong without any discernible purpose that the army or the police could not fulfill. They are paid salaries and have pension schemes (http://www.lankajournal.com/2012/01/pension-scheme-for-civil-defense-force/) funded by the taxpayer. There has been some talk about the CDF ‘helping’ the DWC with the elephant-man conflict but why not simply reallocate resources?

Saman cannot be the only one of his kind in the CDF. There must be more individuals in entities such as the CDF who have a latent interest in nature, wildlife and who would benefit from being brought into the fold of the DWC, being trained and acquiring skills and pride in protecting a natural heritage. These same people are otherwise pulling a salary, holding a gun and sitting around doing nothing much the whole day. That money could be much better spent on someone who is creating value for the country like Saman is. Our problem is not only limited resources but the poor way in which we use our resources, driven by political expediency and short term gain. We can get around limited resources by thinking smart and acting with principle. Of course the key here is letting go of our apathy and complacency but currently the majority seems intent on not doing that as long as possible. It’s the age old story of Sri Lanka, potential but no will to make good on that potential.

Environment & You - EFL Public Lecture series

EFL's 30th Anniversary lecture series which began on Thursday 24 November continues for the next 3 consecutive Thursdays. More details on the flier below and you can reserve your seat by calling the number on there. The Marine one should be interesting!

Ghost Nets

When a person sits down to a fish curry or a portion of fish and chips, they rarely think of where that fish comes from. We rarely realize that when we consume fish, we are eating the last truly wild caught meat on the planet, our ancient role as hunters reprised in the role of modern day fishermen.

Of course the new age fishermen are a far cry from what they were centuries or even decades ago. With engines, mechanization, longlines that stretch for kilometers with thousands of hooks and nets that could engulf the Empire State Building, the fisheries industry has become almost unrecognizable as has sadly our oceans, rapidly depleted and overfished what we see in our seas now appears to be but a sad remnant of the abundance that was there decades ago.

Our surface interval chats with Uncle Sumathi used to really bring this home, 56 years old, he had seen foreign trawlers come and rape the seas off Colombo, taking so much fish that the numbers have never recovered. Apparently the local fishermen had to gang up and beat up some of the fishermen who came in the trawlers to get rid of them and protect what was left. The discussion about the differences from then and now were frequent and depressing.

We rarely think about the ‘cost’ of the food on our plate except in monetary terms. The reality is that there is a far greater hidden cost to our environment, apart from the incidental catch which kills thousands of marine mammals and birds a year our hunger for fish continues to kill days, weeks, months and even years after the fishermen have moved on. This is done silently, without fan-fare by lost nets, those that escaped the fishermen, taken away by currents or carelessness.

A fish eye view of a derelict net, a net smothering Palagala (shallow reef in Colombo)

We see these nets often on our dives, especially on the inner reefs, carpeting the rock smothering everything in its path. Some are huge and while we try and take off what we can, it is a disheartening process as sea fans and soft corals often crunch away from the rock as we cut the nets. We often find fish entangled, dead or dying and other animals (await a story about a crab rescued from a net) waiting for a slow, inevitable death in the nets.

Dead and beheaded, a fish killed by a ghost net

One of our wrecks, the Medhafaru was literally a tomb for fish being sheathed in nets before some inteprid divers from the Sri Lanka Sub Aqua Club cleared a lot of them from the ship. Research has provided some staggering estimates for kills from these nets, with a  single net in Puget Sound being estimated to have killed over 3,000 seabirds and fish combined. We don’t have any figures from Sri Lanka but it would be safe to assume fish kills are quite high.

Perilously close, fish feed close to a net on the Medhafaru

Divers can of course play a part in removing this menace but with the risk of entanglement it is advisable if only experienced divers working in teams tackle this kind of thing. We can all however try and understand where our seafood comes from and at least appreciate the cost to our natural systems from this harvest.

Cutting a net off the reef (only experienced divers should do this)

Clean Up Sri Lanka: Say NO to plastic bags

Have you noticed the litter around our beautiful homeland while you travel here? The plastic bags flapping on trees and floating in the wevas? Come join us at Clean Up Sri Lanka and help us spread the word on how to stop this:

NO to Litter

NO to Plastic Bags (Please use Reusable bags)

NO to Plastic water bottles

Clean up a mess if you see one!

Clean Up Sri Lanka

Promote Your Page Too

Our Kick off event is at Independence Square on Saturday 25th from 8.30am to 6.30pm. Come down and see how you can help keep our country beautiful.

The Full Tour (Wilpattu, May 2010: Part 2)

 Continued from here:

This being our first time in the park for all of us, we had opted for the complete tour and Chamara obliged very gladly. The Villus of course are a characteristic highlight of the park, Tala Villu, Kali Villu, Maila Villu, Walas Villu, the names rolled of Chamara’s tongue as we passed the golden grass and pure white sands of the small lakes.  Formed by water percolating through limestone rock to the surface, the villus are famed for their birdlife, though possibly due to the park being quite dry we didn’t see too many birds.


One of the many Villus,I cannot recall which one; Wilpattu birdlife

We didn’t see any of the legendary ‘villu elephants’ either, long touted as being the biggest elephants in Sri Lanka. In fact on our whole trip our sightings of animals were few and far between, a Monitor Lizard on its way up the evolutionary ladder, a Barking Deer standing transfixed in the road before dashing off into the undergrowth, two Sambhur watching us warily before spooking and Wild Boar trundling ahead of us. It was obvious that the animals still had a ways to go before getting used to vehicles and people.


Monitor Lizard at attention; Wary Sambhur; Wild Boar on the road

A gloom settled over our little group as we cut across the new ‘Mannar’ road that bisects the park. Chamara was subdued as well as the personnel at the Navy checkpoint were incredibly arrogant as we tried to cross over to the other side of the park. Being used to the good manners of the forces in most other places we were a bit perturbed by this treatment and Chamara seemed to withdraw into a shell as he told us in low tones about how the Navy had started acting like they owned the park. Crossing the new road we came across more brush cleared along the track as we moved towards Kudiramale. Then we hit it, the new coastal road that the Navy had cut along the westward edge of the park. The fresh red earth gleamed like newly drawn blood across an immense expanse that stretched on either side of us. I’m not even sure how to describe what I felt then, just nausea that after all this time, the crown jewel of our parks was finally open but being pillaged at the same time.


Cleared brush; The road cut by the Navy

Our mood was slightly lifted as we stopped at little bay from where we had to disembark and walk to Kudiramale Point, where Vijaya is supposed to have landed presumably in search of somewhere to party. The red soil of the area is linked with the name given to Lanka by Vijaya of Thambapanni. From the bay we walked into the shallow sea and hugged the shore to where we could ascend up the hill. The waters lapped warm and brown against our feet as fossilized coral showed just under the surface. The silence and the immobility of the small bay was a bit unnerving as we picked our way through the water and the twisted trees and we were somewhat relieved to leave the sea and start up the hill.


Walking in the bay; Strange driftwood

Of course by this time it was close to noon and soon our relief was overcome by exhaustion and a general unwillingness to go on. Of course Chamara egged us on up the cliff and we entered an eerie landscape of black heaps of stone that to me looked again like fossilized coral, though others didn’t agree. It was a fascinating experience though and I was as usual drawn to the sea. From the cliffs the waters looked at once quite shallow but a bit unnerving with Ghar fish swimming in throngs in the milky water and rocks appearing and disappearing in the murk.


The sea from the cliffs; Black rock formations

A flash of bright blue alerted us to a rather incongruously new board put up by the Navy explaining the historical significance of the area with laviscous details of Kuveni’s affair with Vijaya. Well I jest but the board was somewhat interesting and I glanced at it for a few seconds before I realized the jeep was nearby along with a much needed bottle of water. And thirst trumped interest in history.

History of the site

Part 1

Part 3