DSF’s work in Yemen has been especially rewarding. Yemen as a whole presents a sobering profile. Her 21 million people are destined to exceed 71 million by 2050 at current trends. 74% of the nation is rural, male life expectancy a mere 59, females 63, with a daily income average of US$2.27.

It is not surprising, then, that there is widespread trafficking in wildlife and rapid loss of habitat. At least twenty species are known to be Threatened and Endangered, and the Arabian leopard in Yemen all but lost.

But Yemen also harbors an international success story, a treasure, that is spectacular, namely, her “Galapagos of the Indian Ocean,” the island archipelago of Socotra where, for Sanctuary: Global Oases of Innocence, we documented rich cultural traditions and remarkable indigenous biodiversity.

Scientists are making new discoveries almost daily on Socotra, a remote mountainous island South of Oman, East of Somalia. In the last 120 years, expeditions to the island have unveiled a veritable ecological renaissance of Socotran zoology. The island is a living font of biodiversification, most notably, among its bottle-trees: Dorstenia gigas gypsophila, Dendrosicyos socotrana, Adenium socotranum and obesum and, the most famous of all, Dracaena cinnabari or Dragon’s Blood.

The island’s bird life is extensive, with 178 known species recorded here and at least seven endemics. This abundance of taxa coincides with one of the oldest known island sites of continuous human habitation in the world. Today, the population hovers somewhere around 44,000 people. Their linguistic deep lineage pre-dates the Arabic language by millennia, though Arabic is spoken in the Socotran capital of Hadibo.

With kind assistance from the local United Nations -supported Socotra Conservation and Development Programme, we were able to trek into several protected areas and document the Socotran mountain people and their traditional customs of sustaining rare resources and vegetation within numerous ecosystem types.

Once thought of as a kind of Garden of Eden, Socotra retains its unique character. Here are wild Socotran asses, camels, endemic dragonflies, sparrows, breeding Egyptian vultures, but most of all, the woody-based herbal eco-systems supporting wild floral kingdoms biologically unique. The Socotran mountain people have passed down a legacy — so rare in today’s world — of total devotion to sustainability. For thousands of years they have lived in this mindset.

For more information:

> Socotra Archipelago Conservation and Development Programme

The filming of “Hotspots” throughout New Zealand encompassed over one hundred interviews with key scientists and others working to save endangered species and habitat, on Stewart Island/Rakiura, Ulva Island and Codfish Island (Whenua Ho), in Fiordland National Park, with the Department of Conservation in Te Anau and Burwood Bush, at Pukaha Mount Bruce National Wildlife Sanctuary, at the Grand and Otago Skink site at Macraes Flat in Central Otago, at Karori Wildlife Sanctuary in the heart of Wellington, at the Westshore Wildlife Reserve in Napier, at the Maungatautari Ecological Island Trust reserve, in the city parks of Auckland, and at Tiritiri Matangi Open Scientific Reserve, as well as dozens of other reserves and extraordinary locations throughout the country.

Some of the remarkable species captured on film include: a Short-tailed Bat pup, Kakapo, Kokako, Blue duck, several Kiwi, various Tuatara, Skinks, Kaka, Kea, Kakariki, Fantails,
Keruru, Silver eyes, Stewart Island Black Robins, Little Blue Penguins, Yellow-Eyed Penguins, New Zealand Fur seals, Bottle Nosed Dolphins, Paradise Ducks, Hihi, Tomtit, Saddleback, Weka, Pukako, Brown Creeper, Grey Warbler, and many others.

DSF was grateful to have the strong collaboration of the Department of Conservation throughout this endeavor, and was pleased to be able to screen the very first showing of the film for the Southland Conservator and key staff of the Department of Conservation in Invercargill, and then for DOC staff on Stewart Island/Rakiura prior to a large public screening at the Waikato University Performing Arts Center, co-sponsored by the Botany Department of the University and the Maungatautari Ecological Island Trust.

(see Maungatautari ratesplace on global map, in the Waikato Times.)

One spin-off from the “Hotspots” filming throughout New Zealand to date is a special documentary short for the Department of Conservation and the Alexandra Museum Exhibition on the Grand and Otago Endangered Skinks.

For more information:

> Skinks return to Alexandra after 30 years

> Department of Conservation Museum and Art Gallery

Within the biological hotspot known as the “Western Ghats and Sri Lanka,” exists one particular region of enormous biological endemism, much of it as yet unanalyzed in full, spanning parts of Western Tamil Nadu and Eastern Kerala. While nearly 15% of the overall hotspot enjoys some form of designated protected area (*1), there remains much to understand, and more to preserve in these globally unique montane rainforests and among the indigenous people who live there — particularly the Todas, one of the last largely vegetarian tribes anywhere in existence.

EBR or the Edhkwehlynawd Botanical Refuge (the “place from which a beautiful view is to be seen,” in the Toda, pre-Dravidian, language of Ahl) is a small parcel of private Trust land within this hotspot that harbors an educational and working scientific platform of great ecological and cultural importance. The EBR Trust was founded by Dr. Tarun Chhabra, an accomplished ecologist and a botanical specialist. Dr. Chhabra is one of the only people in the world, other than the Todas themselves, who speaks Ahl. With his associates, including the outstanding environmentalist Rami Singh, EBR has focused on helping the Toda to protect their traditional habitat, sustenance, agricultural gathering, and continue annual migrations with their sacred and endemic breed of buffalo. The fewer than 1,500 remaining Todas leave perhaps the lowest ecological footprint of any humans on earth (with the exception of Jain monks). Their knowledge of this hotspot goes back thousands of years, and their near universal vegetarianism and worship of buffalo and of nature, reveal a unique window on the human spirit and offer the hope of human sustainable communities in harmony with nature.

Toda water buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) are a vanishing breed, one of eighteen River buffalo breeds in South Asia.

According to recent data (*2) the Toda buffalo separated genetically from all others between 1800 and 2700 years ago. Without the Todas’ love for this gentle creature and for the shola mixed forest-grassland ecosystems upon which they depend, this animal and Toda culture itself would go extinct.

The EBR/Dancing Star Foundation Biodiversity Initiative is committed to documenting the Toda’s biologically remarkable habitat, and supporting local ecological restoration, study and replanting of native species and recording the tribal relationship with nature that harbors an ideal and blueprint for the future of human life on earth. A new joint EBR/DSF research expedition to fill in some biodiversity gaps within the greater Nilgiris Biosphere Preserve is being planned for the near future.

Footnotes:
1) Ajith Kumar, Rohan Pethiyagoda and Divya Mudappa, in Mittermeier, et.al, Hotspots Revisited, Cemex, 2004.

2) S. Kumar, et.al, “Genetic variation and relationships among eight Indian riverine buffalo breeds,” Molecular Ecology, Vol. 15, March 2006, p.593.

For more information:

> Edhkwehlynawd Botanical Refuge (EBR)

> MacArthur Foundation, India

> Family Planning Association, India

> Temples of Pushkar

While the rest of Borneo is losing its forests faster than any other region of tropical rainforest on the planet, Brunei, which comprises less than 1% of Borneo, has accomplished what few other governments have imagined by setting aside more than 56% of the country’s 577,000 hectares as protected area, the inspired vision of the Sultan of Brunei. From the perspective of native biodiversity, that protective umbrella is critical. Research at the Kuala Belalong Rainforest Field Studies Centre in Ulu Temburong National Park has shown that a single tree may harbor 400 different species of beetle. Mammalian diversity is also enormous.

Since 1984, at least 90 mammalian species have been identified here, including the spectacular Proboscis Monkey (Nasalis larvatus) in the adjacent Southwestern Belait District and along the Limbang mangroves. Present in greater abundance than anywhere else in Borneo are leaf monkeys (Presbytis hosei) and the tailless Bornean Gibbon (Hylobates muelleri), as well as the Silvered Langur (Presbytis cristata). Bird, reptile and amphibian diversity is also huge and largely untouched.

It was this intact biological assemblage that was chosen for the DSF Sanctuary book project. Ulu Temburong remains the least disturbed of all rainforest in any of the three “Heart of Borneo” Declaration countries (Brunei, Malaysia and Indonesia).

It is this forest that provides the clearest indication that a wealthy oil-producing nation can help counteract its global greenhouse gasses impact through mitigation by keeping sacrosanct a large proportion of its aboriginal canopy.

In Brazil, the DSF “Hotspots” film team explored the Mata Atlantica Rain Forest along the Eastern Coast of the country, including the Parque Nacional da Serra Dos Orgas, Iguacu Falls and select locations for rare primates in Sergipe and Minas Gerais states.

The Atlantic Rainforest of Brazil hosts some 20,000 plant species of which 8,000 are endemic making the region the highest in the world for plant endemism. This area is equally important for its concentration of primates, with 25 species of which 80% are endemic including the Southern and Northern Muriqui.

In Sergipe, after much searching through severely degraded habitat, one highly endangered Coimbra Titi monkey was seen for seven seconds, in a 750 acre forest surrounded by sugar cane plantations and huge burnt out areas.

Marcelo Cardoso de Sousa is a key researcher with the Zoological Laboratory at the University of Tiradentese. He is trying to get a handle on the fragmented distribution of this species,and what conservation options exist for it.

Maria Cecilia Martins Kierulff, a lead scientist with Conservation International, is deeply involved throughout the country in working with her teams to assemble critical data offering options for such species.

In the State of Minas Gerais, at the Fozenda Montes Claros Estagao BIologica Caratinga, the DSF “Hotspots” film team was welcomed by the CI staffers and the primatologist Jean-Philippe Boubli who is trying to better understand and help save the largest monkey in the Americas, the Northern Muriqui, a flagship species for Brazil. The species is down to fewer than 1,000 individuals.

Strictly vegetarian, 50% of the Northern Muriqui diet is leaf material, Dr. Boubli points out. In the dry season, a single fire could easily sweep across their entire habitat. During the more than twenty years of continuous research presence, that has fortunately not happened. Fragmented habitat surrounding Estagao Biologica Caratinga offers possibilities for corridors that could avoid genetic and demographic bottlenecks. That is partly the goal of the conservation work here. It is DSF’s goal in “Hotspots” to shine a “spotlight” on these remarkable creatures and the extraordinary team of researchers working to save them.

For more information:

> International Conservation in Brazil
Here is an English Translation

> How You Can Help