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Confessions of a Pangolin Lover

by Shavez Cheema


Before we go any further, I wish to make something clear: my love for the Sunda Pangolin takes the form of wishing to conserve it; I want to protect it from misguided people who still think it is acceptable to kill it for food or to use its scales in traditional Chinese medicine.





How did my love start?

It was 2011 and it was getting late. I’d finished my sports training and left home to have dinner with a few of my teammates, we have had kueh tiaw, a Chinese noodle dish here in Borneo. It is midnight, the whole highway is mine. I am racing my car home at 100 km/hour, it's drizzling a bit. Under a bridge I notice a monitor lizard walking along the side of the road, I drive past and it seems to be limping. But wait - a Monitor lizard, at midnight? No, this isn’t right, I’ve never heard of that! I stop my car. I take out a flash light and run back to this ‘lizard’. I look left and right and it's starting to rain hard now. Is this worth it? Then, I notice it. What is this animal? It is scaly and scary looking, yet fascinating and amazing. After 15 minutes watching, I’ve had my first date with a pangolin! I saw her eat ants out of a termite mound before disappearing.

Little did I know that 9 years later, in 2020, I would be dedicating my life to protect this animal, one which has triggered my interest in conservation of all wildlife in Borneo. Little did I know that earlier than this, in 2015, internationally famous newspapers such as The New York Times would be publishing articles describing the pangolin as the most trafficked animal in the world (Goode, 2015). There are 8 species of pangolin in the world, 4 in Asia, 4 in Sub-Saharan Africa and all of them are threatened by poaching and habitat loss.

The Sunda Pangolin is a scaly anteater, a mammal found in all parts of Borneo, in other words in Brunei, Kalimantan, Sabah and Sarawak. It has been found in almost every terrestrial habitat you can imagine, from palm oil plantations, primary rainforests, disturbed forests, montane forests, peat swamps and, quite frequently and shockingly to some readers, in urban housing areas and towns. It is not strictly an aquatic species but it can even swim!

The maximum size recorded for a Sunda pangolin is 56cm and its weight is usually in the range of 4-12 kilograms, although 1StopBorneo Wildlife has recorded one individual of 15kg and another of 16kg during its rescues on Borneo. The Sunda pangolin is a strict ant and termite eater. They usually have a single baby that often hangs on the back of the mother’s tail, but there are still big gaps in our knowledge of this cryptic creature. Additional information is presented at: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/s/sunda-pangolin/.


The ecological importance of pangolins and their prey.

Apart from the obvious reason that the loss of any species is an irretrievable loss to our planet, why else should we be worried that pangolins are under serious threat? Importantly, in their ecosystem, they are the major predator of ants and termites and to understand the significance of this, we need to look in turn at the role ants and termites play in the maintenance of soil at a neutral pH. Ants and termites are soil engineers. They have significant effects on their local environment. Although individuals are small, their colonies may be surprisingly large. Firstly they may change their immediate surroundings by collecting soil for nest building and secondly they may alter the level of nutrients within the ground as they collect food for their colonies and indirectly impact local populations of many animal groups from decomposers such as collembolans to species much higher up to food chain (Cheema et al. unpublished data).


Ants also prey on insects and other invertebrates, whilst others feed on plants. Let us imagine if pangolins became extinct what impact might this have on ant populations? Theoretically, in the short term, the loss of pangolins could be a joyous occasion for the ants and their numbers might increase. But then the excessive numbers of ants might have a further impact on the ecosystem described above, resulting in an ecological imbalance (Cheema et al. unpublished data).


When are they active?

Sunda pangolins are nocturnal, meaning they are only active at night. Very few amateur or professional scientists are studying pangolins in Borneo, although a number of interesting observations have been recorded. Throughout Borneo, active pangolins have been recorded in all hours of the night, but it seems interesting that different types of observers, including some researchers, citizen scientists, wildlife guides and drivers in logging concessions, have particularly seen them active in the 5-hour period from 2300h to 0500h. For example, Jessica Haysom, a wildlife researcher with the University of Kent and South East Asia Rainforest Research Partnership, who undertook some camera trapping in Sabah, Borneo, has recorded pangolins 10 times during her 15 months of camera trapping. She reported the times of detection as being: 1934h, 2101h, 2302h, 02019h, 0227h, 0245h, 0246h, 0249h, 0430h, 0504h, in other words 8/10 sightings were in this 5-hour period.