During the migration season between August and April every year, more than 200,000 migratory birds representing some 50 species are estimated to stop over here.

There are also well-equipped and informative visitor centres where you can get detailed educational programmes and displays, which focus on the importance of safeguarding and preserving the mangrove ecosystems and the large numbers of resident and migrant bird species.

The Kuala Gula Bird Sanctuary has won the “Best Tourist Attraction (Natural Attraction)” category during the Malaysia Tourism Awards, a prestigious award presented to agencies and organisations which contribute to the development of tourism in Malaysia.

How to get there

By Road

Although the bird sanctuary is in the state of Perak, it is actually easier to get to it from Butterworth (Penang). Take the North-South Expressway south from Butterworth (Penang) for about 30 minutes, then turn off at Jawi for the town of Kuala Kurau. Another 30 minutes onwards and you should see the signs for the sanctuary.

The best time to visit is at 10.00 am and again at 2.30 pm when the primates emerge from the forest for their daily ration of bananas and milk. You can see the orang utans being fed from a platform in the centre. Nicknamed the ‘Wild Man of Borneo’, the orang utans are returned to the forest when they can fend for themselves.

Aside from the orang utan, over 200 species of birds and a variety of wild plants can be found within the 5.666 hectares of forest reserve.

How to get there

By Bus

From the local bus stand next to the Sandakan waterfront market, board the blue bus marked ‘Sepilok Batu 14′ (Sepilok – 14th Mile). The 30-minute bus ride will take you directly to the rehabilitation centre. Regular buses, marked ‘Batu 14′ or higher, will drop you at the turn-off to Jalan Sepilok. However, you’ll have to walk 1.5km to get to the Orang Utan Centre.The last bus leaves Sepilok to Sandakan at 4:30 pm.

Take a walk through the park, or a stroll on wooden the suspension bridge at the 950 metres canopy walk and view countless of exotic wildlife.

Night walks along the trail also offer a chance to catch a glimpse of wildlife such as the cunning mousedeer, wily civet cats, cute tarsiers and various insects and birds.

There are also many magnificent flowering shrubs a the Plant Discovery Garden, with about 250 species of native orchids. The orchid family, is known to be the largest flowering plants with about 25,000 wild species throughout the world.

Enthusiasts, naturalists, budding scientists and nature lovers from all walks of life will get to know more of the wonders of the rainforests through this unique Rainforest Discovery Centre.

The RDC helps to raise public awareness and appreciation of the importance of conserving forests, as well as the sustainable use of forest resources.

How to get there

Car or local transportation

When in Sandakan, you could opt to drive or use local transportation. If driving, go along Jalan Labuk from Sandakan Town. Turn left at the Mile 14 roundabout (with large orang-utan statue). Drive along until you see the large, pictorial RDC sign and turn right. Drive for about 500 m to the RDC car park.

The building is made of local building materials and can accommodate at least 200 visitors at any one time. The complex houses a Counter Bar and a Souvenir Shop with a good assortment of local handicrafts.

It also has a 30 feet observation tower that enables you to enjoy the sighting of tropical wetland and its rich wildlife across the river banks. The complex has a 500-feet boardwalk with Nipah Atap roofing and a river jetty providing a comfortable river cruise.

Facilities they have is built using Local Materials, Eco-Lodge consist of boardwalk, Bird Watch Tower, Dining Hall, Sundeck, Fish Spa and space for 300 visitors. Multi-media facilities for seminar for seminar etc are available. Incentive group event most ideal. River cruise boat 25-33ft, capacity 16-30 pax on most comfortable seating.

How to get there

By road.

Located about 100 km south of Kota Kinabalu, Sabah and accessible by highway and takes about 1 hour 30 minutes to get there.

Jungle trekking is also possible as there are four jungle trails here, the Pitcher Trail (takes about 2 hours), the Sungai Rayu Trail ( about 3 – 4 hours), the Sungai Senduk trail (about 1 hour) and Sungai Buluh trail (about 2 hours). Picnic spots, an information centre, accommodation facilities, a car park and a small canteen are available at the park HQ.

How to get there

By Bus or Taxi

Matang Wildlife Centre is about 30km from Kuching City and it takes about 40 minutes to reach the Centre. Since there is no regular bus that goes directly to the centre, hiring a taxi is recommended. Alternatively, you may contact any of the travel operators who offer packaged tours.

According to the 2007 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, life on Earth is disappearing fast and will continue to do so unless urgent action is taken.

• 14% of Malaysia’s mammals are listed by The World Conservation Union (IUCN) as endangered
• 30 species of turtle ever discovered, only 7 are left.
• Less than 1,500 Borneo Pygmy elephants are found in the world.
• It is estimated that there are less than 20 Sumatran rhinoceros left in Borneo.
• The Bornean species of orangutan is highly endangered, and the Sumatran species is critically endangered, according to the IUCN Red List of mammals, and both are listed on Appendix I of CITES.

In Malaysia today the survival of wildlife often takes second place to human activity.

Does saving these endangered species and taking necessary actions for those who are on the brink of extinction means anything to you?

image credit: WWF Malaysia

Here at Malaysia Travel Guide, we seek to promote Malaysia Tourism in the right way.

Our first campaign revolves around the conservation of Malaysia wildlife. We seek to increase public awareness and knowledge of the value of biodiversity, its threats, and actions that will conserve wildlife and natural areas in Malaysia.

We believe that Wildlife conservation begins with education; The World Conservation Strategy states that until people understand why they should safeguard ecosystems and species they will not do so.

It is to address this lack of understanding that Malaysia Travel Guide introduced The Malaysia Wildlife Conservation Awareness Campaign.

JOIN US IN OUR CAMPAIGN

“We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.” – Mother Teresa.

Wildlife conservation begins with each of us – and each of us can make a difference. The best way to raise awareness is simply talking about it.

What can YOU do?

There are a number of options.
• Blog / Write a post that relates to the Malaysia wildlife conservation. It can be to do with your usual topic or totally just about a Malaysia wildlife conservation issue.
• Inform other people about this campaign and explaining it in terms they understand.
• Support the campaign: Add our banner to your site and spread the word.

How will this help?

When you talk about an issue on Malaysia Wildlife Conservation, your readers will take notice, and if they blog about it, this will create a huge chain reaction; effectively improving the awareness for Malaysia wildlife conservation.

Together we can reach out to millions about the need for wildlife conservation in Malaysia.

Email: TravelMalaysiaGuide@Gmail.Com with your Blog URL. Together we can make a difference!

This is a reply to one of the questions in the comments section – as in why i wanted to start this campaign:
When i was writing on Sabah and Sarawak, I came across the Sumatran Rhinos, and decided to do a little more read up on them and it really hit me hard that these Rhinos are facing extinction. The more I dug into it, the more i realize the severity of the problems we are facing, not only for the Sumatran Rhinos.

If what I’m doing here, can make just one more person realize what is happening to the Wildlife in Malaysia, I already felt that the numerous hours I put into this campaign is already worth it.

PARTICIPATING BLOGS

I might miss out some of the participating articles, do drop me a comments here, so that I be able to add you in.

** Eco-tourism: My thoughts ( on facebook discussion )

The Giving Hands: Wildlife conservation in Malaysia

Kenng Ng: Save Them. Don’t let them be history.

Pelf-ism: Happy New Year, girls and boys!

Little Cozy Corner: Saving my hairy relatives

Curry Egg: Save them right now

Fatty Poh’s Kopitiam: Turtle Soup NOT sold here!!!!

Leonalim.com: Malaysia Wildlife Conservation Awareness Campaign

MySabah.com: Sabah VIPs in Poverty

WiseUp: Save the Animal, Save the Nature

Rest N Rileks: Malaysia Wildlife Conservation Awareness Campaign

Realiti Kehidupan: Kemana Pergi Nya

Cheap Thoughts: The big bang

Frou Frou: Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

My Asylum: Saving Malaysian Wildlife from Extinction…

Xperience of Life: Malaysia Wildlife Conservation Awareness 08

In Passing – Malaysian: Malaysia Wildlife Conservation Awareness Campaign..

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The easiest way to put the campaign banners on your website is simply to copy and paste the following code into a blog post / sidebar.

EXTRA INFORMATION

• World Conservation Society article on Malaysia
• WWF Malaysia
• The World Conservation Union (IUCN)
• SOS Rhino
• Sumatran Orangutan Society
• Ocean Heritage

DISCUSSION

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The Sumatran rhino is the smallest living rhinoceros species weighing just 1,300-1,700 pounds. It has fringed ears, reddish-brown skin variably covered with long hair, and wrinkles around its eyes. It is probably the most endangered of the rhinoceros species and is the last surviving species in the same group as the extinct Woolly Rhinoceros. Numbers have declined over 50% due to poaching and habitat loss over the last 15 years. Fewer than 300 Sumatran Rhino survive in very small and highly fragmented populations in Southeast Asia with Indonesia and Malaysia being the only significant range states.

Sumatran Rhino Photo from MSN Alain Compost / WWF-Canon

Sabah is the last preserve of the Borneo Sumatran Rhino, a subspecies of the Sumatran Rhino. WWF officials said that surveys in 1992 and 1995 in Sabah had found fewer than 13 rhinos, scattered over a vast area. While some of the Sumatran rhinos are kept in zoos, they are difficult to breed in captivity. The 2000 birth of a healthy calf to a rhino called Emi at the Cincinnati Zoo in Ohio was the first successful captive delivery in 112 years.

The Sumatran rhino are solitary animals that only come together to breed, but a 2005 survey results seem to indicate that the 13 rhinos are in an area in Sabah that’s untouched by poaching which means the rhinos have a reasonable chance to meet each other and breed. There is also evidence that there are young animals in the group so it would appear that breeding have already taken place. This has sparked hopes that the population of Borneo Sumatran Rhino can again flourish, at least in Sabah.

On April 24, 2007 it was announced that in the jungles of Malaysian Borneo cameras had captured night time footage of a Sumatran rhino eating, peering through jungle foliage, and sniffing the film equipment. The rhino in the two-minute footage is a rare Bornean subspecies of which only 25 to 50 are believed to be left on the island scientists estimate, mostly found in the dense interior jungles of Sabah, a state located on the northern portion of the island of Borneo. Although found in a commercial forest where logging is commonplace the video will be used to convince local governments to turn the area into a rhino conservation zone. This is the first-ever footage that shows the elusive Borneo rhino’s natural behavior in the wild.

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The proboscis monkey gets its name from its large and fleshy nose, and is endemic on the island of Borneo in Southeast Asia. The proboscis monkeys live almost exclusively in mangrove forests of Borneo, but can also be found in lowland rainforests and cannot be found anywhere else in the world other than Borneo except in zoo captivity.

Adult Proboscis Monkey

Video: Proboscis Monkey

Both the male and female proboscis monkeys have the large noses; however the juveniles have small upturned noses. Female noses are not as large the males; the males are so large that they hang down over their mouths. Sometimes they have to push it out of the way before putting something in their mouth. Their noses swell and turn red when they become excited or angry. They also make loud honking sounds as a warning when they sense danger, which make their noses stand out straight. The nose acts as a resonator when the monkey vocalizes.

The other known physical attribute of the proboscis monkeys are their large pot bellies. Proboscis monkeys have a unique digestive system that allows them to use leaves as their main food supply. Their ability to eat mainly leaves also gives them a niche where the proboscis monkeys are the only medium sized mammal living in the canopy of the forest. The bloated bellies are divided into compartments and filled with cellulose digesting bacteria. The bacteria help digest the leaves and neutralize toxins in the certain leaves and not exactly for mating selections. They are abnormally large due to released gas inside their digestive tracts. Ninety five percent of the proboscis monkey diet is leaves of the mangrove and Pedada trees, with preference of immature leaves over older ones; however they will also eat fruits and seeds.

Juvenile Proboscis Monkey

Proboscis monkeys give birth to one baby at a time (twins are very rare!). Their gestation period is about 166 days and will usually give birth during nighttime. The newborn has a deep blue face and sparse, almost black fur. The color changes to its adult colors at about 3-4 months. Females will help look after each others infants and sometimes even help suckle other babies. The young will stay close to their mother for about one year, or until she has another infant. Male proboscis monkeys will reach sexual maturity in about 4-5 years and females in about 4 years. Life span of a proboscis monkey is about 20 years.

Proboscis Monkeys: Crossing

The best time to see proboscis monkeys are in the early morning and just before dusk as these are the feeding time for them and they are in the most active period. It is recommended that you be in position along the plank walks of the mangrove forest by then. The proboscis monkeys are elusive at best and extremely conscious of human presence in the area. Hence, visitors are often advised to remain still and quiet for a pleasant viewing time. Taking a good photograph of them is next to impossible though since they prefer to keep a safe distance from the nearest existence of any human beings.

The proboscis monkeys are truly unique animals which may not be found anywhere else on this planet except in Borneo. They are nature’s gift to Sabah and Sarawak, hence they must be protected at all costs.

Related Topics

• My Bako National Park Experience

Malaysia Wildlife Conservation
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