[Kabar-Irian] News: August 14-15 2006 Part 2

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August 14-15 2006
KABAR IRIAN NEWS
(part 2)

TOPICS

* Whale stranded in Manokwari
*

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http://www.antara.co.id/en/seenws/?id=17877


Manokwari, West Irian Jaya (ANTARA News) - A 12-meter long whale stranded in

Wersi Bay, Manokwari, West Irian Jaya Province, last Saturday (Aug. 5), but

was managed to be saved by Indonesian naval officers by pushing the whale

back to the deep sea.

The appearance of the stranded whale attracted the attention of local

villagers, but few hours later they ran back to their village and stayed away

from the bay for fear of a possible tsunami.

The stranded whale reminded the villagers of an experience in 2002 where a

whale had been stranded in Wersi Bay, and few hours later a tsunami had hit

nearby villages destroying tens of houses.

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http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/534


Magazine feature
Meeting the ancestors
Issue 6 of Cosmos, December 2005
by Tim Flannery
Meeting the ancestors
Thw writer measuring a new species of tree kangaroo discovered in the jungles

of Irian Jaya.
Image: Tim Flannery

In the wet, inhospitable jungles of Irian Jaya, a hunting expedition revealed

more than just something to eat: a new species of ground-dwelling tree-

kangaroo emerged from the mist.

One day in late 1993, I received a telephone call from an employee of a

mining company called PT Freeport Indonesia. The distant voice at the end of

the crackly line informed me that the call was coming from Tembagapura,

Freeport's town, in the heart of Irian Jaya. The man explained that he

thought he had discovered a very rare kind of possum known as the great-

tailed triok (Dactylopsila megalura). The man had read my book on New Guinea

mammals; he was wondering if I would be free to come to Tembagapura to

confirm his identification, and to talk to the local community about

wildlife.

The Tembagapura area was somewhere I had always wished to visit, but had

hardly dared hope to do so, for Tembagapura is not the kind of place one

visits without an invitation. Tembagapura was also the source of a tree-

kangaroo jawbone I had picked from among the pile of human remains on an

earlier Irian Jaya expedition. It still eluded identification. A piece of

tree-kangaroo fur I purchased at nearby Kwiyawagi, which had originally been

fashioned into a war bonnet, remained similarly mysterious. It was unique

among all the tree-kangaroo fur I had seen: being black with a flash of white

on the chest.

To top it all off, since leaving Kwiyawagi I had received photographs of a

tree-kangaroo joey which had been taken near Tembagapura. They showed a very

young animal that was boldly patterned in black and white. It seemed now that

a species of tree kangaroo was waiting to be discovered in New Guinea's

mountains. Perhaps this visit to Tembagapura would provide the opportunity to

gather more evidence.

Built in the 1970s to house the staff of the PT Freeport Indonesia Mining

Company, Tembagapura is prettier than your average mining town, largely due

to its incomparable location, but also because of its compactness and good

planning.

To my dismay, the Amungme people, traditional landowners of the area were, at

the time of my visit, largely kept outside the town by a vigorous security

force. But through John Cutts, the community-liaison officer at Tembagapura,

I was introduced to some local men, foremost among whom was Vedelis

Zonggonau, a well-educated Moni man in his 30s.

I took out the field-copy of Mammals of New Guinea and opened it at Doria's

tree kangaroo. "Ndomea," Zonggonau said, giving its Moni name. " Naki," the

Amungme hunters said.

Next I showed them the photograph I had been sent, of the black and white

joey. "Dingiso," Zonggonau said. "Nemenaki," the Amungme chorused.

After some discussion, we formed a plan to explore the high forest above the

town, in search of these species. We decided to work in the forest along the

road at between 2,500 and 3,000 metres elevation. There was good beech forest

growing at this elevation and it looked like prime habitat for tree

kangaroos.

The small patch of heath we camped in was very mossy, with orchids and

rhododendrons making up most of the ground cover. One particularly

spectacular orchid had a white flower, which it produced in abundance. Its

spent petals, scattered on the mossy ground, looked like a fall of new snow.

We sent our hunters out each day with dogs in order to locate tree kangaroos,

and soon had our first specimen. I was disappointed to discover that it was

not the black and white animal I hoped to secure, but belonged to a

subspecies of Doria's tree kangaroo. I was nonetheless intrigued to discover

this species living so far west of its known range.

Over the next week, we located several other Doria's Tree-kangaroos, but the

black and white animal remained elusive. Frustrated, I decided to try again

at higher elevation: 3,700 metres. There, scrubby plants grew in dense

clusters among the rocks. I was deeply sceptical about the possibility of

finding tree kangaroos in this area, for there were not even any trees of a

reasonable size for them to climb in. Our hunters, however, insisted that

they could be had there, so I deferred to their plan to base ourselves at

this bleak spot.

My worst suspicions seemed confirmed when, after three days' hunting, we had

failed to locate any sign of tree kangaroos at all.

Then, early one morning, a dog emerged from the mist and approached our camp.

It was followed by another, then two men and two women. I introduced myself

to the taller of the men. He said that his name was Yonas Tinal, and that he

was a Lani man from Ilaga. He owned the two dogs and the women were his

wives. The other man he introduced as his friend. He had come to this high

forest, he told me, to hunt tree kangaroos.

Despite my increasing misgivings, he seemed confident of success. His dog,

named Dingo, was, he told me, a four-million rupiah hunter: it was so good at

finding game that Yonas valued each of its canine teeth at a cool million

rupiah (about A$700 at that time) apiece. Dingo's companion, Photocopy, was a

less able animal and, as his name suggests, resembled a hunting dog more in

appearance than action.

After I'd explained to Yonas my desire to obtain a specimen of the black and

white tree kangaroo, he continued on his way even higher up the mountain,

promising to return with one in a few days.

I would have loved to follow Yonas to his camp, but our nets and traps were

already set out and our hunters were scouring the bush at this lower

location. It would take at least a day to reorganise ourselves, and Yonas

could not wait.

Our hunters continued to find nothing and I was losing hope. But at last one

morning I saw Dingo emerge from the forest. A smiling Yonas, holding up two

fingers, followed behind. As he opened his noken - his hunting bag - I

divined from this gesture that he had captured two tree kangaroos.

As the contents of the noken were revealed, I was all but overcome by near-

simultaneous sensations of exhilaration and despair. Yonas had captured two

tree kangaroos - but they had been eaten. All that he had brought were pieces

of skin and bones!

Nonetheless, the remains were sufficient to confirm that the black and white

tree-kangaroo was a very curious and hitherto unknown animal. The skins were

incomplete and miserably torn, but it was clear from them that the new

species was a largish creature (we learned later that females, which are

smaller than males, weigh 9-10kg). The back was indeed black, the belly

white, and the tail patterned variously in black and white, but usually with

a white tip.

The face was very unusual, for a band of white fur surrounded the base of the

muzzle, and a white star stood in the centre of the forehead. These features

were not evident in the photographs of the joey, and nothing like this

pattern is seen in any other marsupial.

The distinctiveness of this strange creature was also apparent from the

bones. The skull showed some similarities to that of Doria's tree kangaroo,

but was more gracefully shaped and differed in details of its teeth and

foramina (holes in the skull).

The limb bones were also dramatically different from those of any other tree

kangaroo I had examined. The major limb bones of tree kangaroos are

exceptionally thick and robust. They need to be, for many species leap as

much as 20 metres downward from the rainforest canopy. The limb bones of the

new species were, in contrast, gracile, and similar in proportion to ground-

dwelling kangaroos. Clearly, this animal could not make such great downward

leaps.

I would discover eventually that this new species was unique among tree

kangaroos in that it spent much of its time on the ground, among the stunted

shrubs and bushes of the alpine region.

Meanwhile, our largely unsuccessful hunters had gone off up into the higher

country with their dogs once more. Eventually another hunter called Obert

brought in our long-desired specimen.

As Obert carried the recently dead creature towards me, seated upright on his

shoulders, it looked more like a bear or koala than a kangaroo. It seemed

such an adorable, gentle creature. Later, when I encountered a living animal,

I would learn that its temperament is indeed mild. The local Lani hunters

have often told me that, when hunters find it, they offer it some choice

leaves, and it approaches them - then they simply slip a noose over its head

and lead it away.

This extraordinary animal is well known to hunters living high on the Maokop.

The Moni people, who inhabit the western edge of the range, know it as

"dingiso", a name that we eventually bestowed upon it as its English common

name. We did this because we were tired of the clumsy, double-barrelled

English names (such as Goodfellow's tree kangaroo) given to other species of

New Guinea mammal. We wanted to bestow a native name, such as the Aboriginal

koala or wombat, which would, in time, become familiar to Western ears.

We also gave the scientific name Dendrolagus mbaiso to the creature. Mbaiso

means 'the forbidden animal' in Moni, and we used this name as a tribute to

the traditional Moni conservation practices which have been crucial in

allowing it to survive to the present.

Dingiso remains common in Moni territory. Many clans revere it as an ancestor

and refuse to hunt it. When they meet it in the forest, they say, it throws

up its arms and whistles, which they take as an indication that it recognises

its shared ancestry with the Moni. Even their dogs, Moni say, recognise the

sacred nature of this creature, and when they see one will slink away on

their bellies. Biologists, who are a more prosaic bunch than the Moni, view

dingiso's behaviour differently, descrying in it a typical tree-kangaroo

threat display. They have no explanation, however, for the behaviour of Moni

dogs.

The Western Dani know the creature as wanun. In their territories, which lie

to the east of the Moni, it is not protected by traditional beliefs and is,

as a consequence, extremely rare. It has already been exterminated within a

few days' walk of most Dani settlements.

Now I had sufficient evidence to describe the species. With the discovery of

dingiso I felt that I had hit the high point in my career as a biologist.

During the decade or so I had been investigating the mammals of Melanesia, I

had discovered 16 other species that had been unknown to science, as well as

14 new subspecies. Among these were bats, possums, bandicoots, wallabies and

giant rats, as well as three other kinds of tree kangaroos.

None, however, was as unusual as dingiso, and none had such an interesting

evolutionary and cultural story to tell.
Tim Flannery is director of the South Australian Museum in Adelaide, and

author of The Weather Makers as well as Throwim Way Leg, from which this

article is extracted.

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