A wish to regain our lost biodiversity in our midst without chainsaws

A wish to regain our lost biodiversity in our midst without chainsaws

Continuing with the very important topic how Sabah had lost its massive rainforest covers since 1963 after some political groups were “awarded” timber concessions to finance their political activities.  That was unfortunately the start of great sorrows as the rainforest with mighty trees standing so tall “majestically” then and now only a few of them are left in Danum Valley.

How did that happen?  The logging of the timber was started with saws held by two men although in 1926 Stihl developed the first electro-chainsaw had yet to arrive in Borneo. Then in 1950 the first one-man chain saw invented.   Much improved models like Solo 635, year of construction 1965 and Stihl 042, year of construction 1976 the very much improved and efficient model that could be handled by one man.

So after 1976, the onslaught of the rainforests in Sabah was expedited as it was unstoppable until the rainforest land is almost bald with the exception of the much limited/reduced forest reserve prohibited for logging.

I have written a book titled “Sabah Wealth – Image of Woods Power” where the cover shows a graph of volume in million cu metres of the logs extracted for the period 1967-2002 in Sabah.  The graph divided into 4 periods of 9 years each coincided with the four State Governments is uncanny like the shape of Mount Kinabalu even with the shape of donkey ear at the near right end.  (see the from cover of the book). The highest volume of timber extracted was in the period 1984 to 1993.

Can we attribute to the one man held chainsaw and its usage that have expedited the logging of the once majestic timber trees?  If such chainsaws were not invented, the two men hand held manual saws would restrict the rate of logging.  So can we blame the inventors or manufacturers of chainsaws for the demise of the rainforest in Sabah and elsewhere? Like the curse of cigarette against health, and there are some people who pursued their cases in Court, can we do the same with the case of the destructive chainsaws?

Then some quarters started to rally with cry ”biodiversity and the loss thereof”.  Even an NGO known as “Borneo Biodiversity Ecosystem Conservation” or BBEC was functioning in Sabah campaigning for biodiversity to be maintained despite so much loss of that.  The fact is that Sabah and elsewhere had totally lost so much biodiversity so much so the environment of the once forested land is exacerbated by the alien mono crop oil palms plantations in the millions of acres in Sabah.  Thank God, we may have the much reduced Heart of Borneo where the world’s tallest tropical trees still stand in Danum Valley.

So much for the loss of biodiversity in the once majestic rainforests which also is also our water tanks.

We now come nearer home in our residential arena.  We may feel good that all our open spaces and public ground along our roads are cleared of bushes or grass monthly or regularly by contracted cutters using the string trimmer which was invented in the early 1970s by George Ballas of Houston, Texas, who conceived the idea while watching the revolving action of the cleaning brushes in an automatic car wash. His first trimmer was made by attaching pieces of heavy-duty fishing line to a popcorn can bolted to an edger. Ballas developed this into what he called the "Weed Eater", since it chewed up the grass and weeds around trees.

String trimmers can be dangerous tools due to the fact that they can cause debris, including rocks and stones, to go flying in several directions.

Such trimmers can be seen to be very efficient in clearing big areas in short time.

The other side of this is that we do not know or realise how much biodiversity we may lose in adapting such method. 

Since time immemorial, the source or original varieties of our food and fruit trees has been brought to us by animals and the birds in the ways they bring with them seeds of vegetables and fruits they first consumed and passed out in their droppings.

Now many birds cannot find food in the forests due to deforestation and come to residential areas in search of food for survival despite birds flu.

By using trimmers regularly, there is no chance for any herbal and fruit trees even for chilli padi plants to emerge from the open space or sort of “wild” ground around our neighbourhood as such plants valuable for a variety of uses may take time to grow up to be recognised and then to be nurtured for food.  In my childhood days in Labuan, we used to roam around in the jungles or sort of “wilderness” or no-man land in search of wild berries etc that are edible for anti-oxidant properties.  We use to find cashew nuts, guava, papaya, curry leaves, etc  trees around in the wild.

We really do not know how much under growths or bushes we do lose in term of biodiversity brought about by animals and birds in the enrichment of our natural neighbourhood.  Even our front and back gardens albeit small in size do find new plants or vegetation emerging regularly unless such gardens are now covered by concrete.

We also do not know how much valuable healing/curing herbs from certain medicinal trees in our once pristine rainforest due to the modern chainsaws and now losing plenty of plants including herbal ones from the droppings of birds in our neighbourhood as only recently that grass string trimmers are now used in urban and suburban zones.

If there is anyone operating a plants nursery, they would notice how enrichment from new plants emerging in the nursery.

Also with the grass trimmers and the cut grass or bushes are collected and cleared leaving little dried materials for recycle within the open compound of residential vicinity and have we wondered how the green grass is still growing well in most areas without rotten composts of the cut grass as enrichment to sustain its re-growth monthly?

Maybe, it is wiser appropriately that we now review the gaps of trimming to quarterly rather than monthly and that the grass cutters scan through the new vegetation prior to trimming meticulously rather than just rush through their effort In clearing the vegetation. Such new approach may reap some value in term of biodiversity as they go around millions of acres. Researchers do painstakingly make strenuous effort to identify new species of flora and fauna in the wild and why not do this as well in the vicinity of our neighbourhoods? Even many precious flowers like orchids are found in the wild/ open if given the chance to grow to maturity.

Care to give more priority to biodiversity in our midst to add much value thereof to benefit society and possibly to mitigate flooding rather than the very expensive and non-functional mitigation projects we talk about but really incapable to do that floods prevention in the low flood plains of our housing estates with very heavy downpours?

Joshua Y. C. Kong.  31 August, 2017