Mangroves New Life In the West Coast of Langkawi Part 2

April 26th 2009, 6pm - The mission continues. This time; 9 of us, armed with 100 over young seedlings and lots of laughter. These young seedlings were collected from mangroves channel of Tanjung Rhu and Kilim area of Langkawi while I was kayaking with my guests about few days back. Picking up seeds from the water is so easy on the kayak. Is more productive too. I felt thankful to my guests having to wait patiently for me loading the seeds up on the boat. Jan, my skipper, was scratching his head over my huge collection. A quarter of the collection was given to a nursery for germination and hopefully corporates will buy them for planting project purposes.

Returning to Kuala Muda, Langkawi, gave me the opportunity to have a look at my babies. To my shocking, there were only two! Where's the third one??? The Rhizophora has gone! :(

Only left with Brugeira Parviflora (the shorter one) and Ceriops Tagal.
Okay... so I lost one but I got hundreds more coming! So, we charged ... into the mud.

Karina was so excited that she went too far out and here she is crying... "Tolong, Tolong!" Sorry, Karina... we couldn't help much but to laugh.

During the planting, I noticed there were other young trees planted two years ago have collapsed or half-collapsed. Because this area is so exposed, no wonder these young trees have difficulty in sustaining against the swift current and strong western wind. We discovered that these young seedlings have to be planted closely together, preferably about 1 foot away. When they start growing, the close proximity would help support one another.
Our next tasks were TLC and maintenance. We looked for any young trees that we can salvaged.

Fadzillah, staff of Malaysian Nature Society, with Nena rebuilding the foundation.


Nena and me. Great job, Nena ... go start young..


The rest of the team: Aida (with butt up), Hanim (squat-toilet pose), Karen (looking on... hmm...sexy) and Susan(participant of Yoga retreat, got herself a part-time job as our photographer). Ijam?? and Ijam was hiding.

The planting was done at estimated tide level at that time: 0.5m


Mangrove Garden - part of 100 over seeds stuck in the mud. We shall see how many will stay on & propagate...

I was surprised the planting of 100 over seeds was completed in less than 1 hour. Thank you, Xie-xie ni men for all your efforts.

After discovering the collapsed young trees, I realise that this area needs periodically check, TLC and maintenance. We can't just stick them in and say "Bye-bye".

Will this be fruitful? Will that ground provide sufficient nutrients to sustain their survival?

Gee... I don't know. To get the answers, I decided that this will be an on-going project to test the area and see the results in hmm... at least 15-20 years time. Whew... that's long. Will I live to see that? I won't have my next biological generation to see that too... oops...