Mangroves Flora of Langkawi

The long awaited guide book on mangroves flora of Langkawi is now made available to the public.  

When Dr Wan Juliana handed me a copy of her first newly published book, I was ecstatic.

Starting from the definition of mangroves to the botanical name of plants species in Langkawi's mangroves. A total of 76 species in 58 genera and 35 families were recorded by Dr Wan Juliana and her team, which made Langkawi the highest mangroves diversity of plants in Malaysia. 

All plants were arranged according to the scientific names and the best of all, this book was written in English. Local or Malay names are also included for each species of plant.

Congratulations to Dr Wan Juliana and her team. And of course, many thanks for this wonderful New Year gift, Dr Wan. 

With the help of this book, I hope I will not bug Dr Wan so much now in asking for the mangroves flora identification. What I really love to see in future would be a complete mangroves flora and fauna of Langkawi.

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Two New Babes

What is this book all about? Well, the title description says it all.  To those who are interested in our natural history and what the future holds for us in related to our 100-million year old ecosystem, this may be the one for you! 

The publication was in year 2007 and I may be outdated in getting this book now. Well, I didn't know about this book until I went shopping in BookXcess bookstore in Amcorp Mall, PJ. So, what made me bought it? A chapter on Elephants, Dung Beetles and Ecosystems! And the next best part is the cost of this book is only RM17.90 at BookXcess bookstore. The stock is very limited. You can check out the contents of this book here.

I wish to take the opportunity to inform my readers here that BookXcess will be having a warehouse sale from November 12th-17th 2010 at South City Plaza (I have no idea where this place is) or go check out this website: www.bigbadwolfbooks.com . 

Here's another babe...

by James V. LaFrankie, JR.

The book above contains technical stuffs on Asia's rainforest trees and this book was launched in August 2010. Therefore it is not available at all at BookXcess. Cost? Don't ask. But it is worthwhile to have it in my shelf as a reference book. Many thanks to Chew MY for getting this book for me at launching and had the author to sign on the book.

Yippee!! Two new babes added on to my collection today.

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The Malaysian Rainforest Realm

Are all scorpions poisonous? Why do scorpions glow under a black light?

What enables a gecko to hang outside down from the ceiling or any other surface?

Which animal makes the distinctive 'Tok, Tok, Tok-Eh' call heard at night in cabins near forest edges?

Wish to know more?

You can find simple and easy to understand answers from this Malaysian produced book.

Book Title: The Malaysian Rainforest Realm, Fascinating Facts in Q&A

Authors: Dr Ghazally Ismail & Salina Ghazally

Published by: Marshall Cavendish Editions

Retail Price: RM70.00

This fun nature book is easy to read and digest. Very simple, general, non technical and with colorful pictures. 

The focus of this book is on our Malaysian rainforest and its flora and fauna.  The contents are divided into sections: Forest Environment, Lower Plants, Higher Plants, Invertebrate Fauna, Reptilia, Amphibia, Birds and Mamalia.

A great book for school teachers, nature guides, school kids, nature educators, etc. This is its first edition published this year. So far, I only discovered a tiny weeny error in one of its pages in labeling the names with the correct pictures.

I found this one and only book by chance in Popular Bookstore in Alor Setar, Kedah. If I can find this in such a place, I am very sure you can find this in any bookstores in Klang Valley. Or perhaps you may want to wait for its second edition after they had rectified the error.

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Gift from Pandora

"So who am I? I'm a neighbor, a friend, the enemy. I am anonymous. I am invisible. I am everywhere. I shuffle past you in a dense crowd, shoulder to jammed shoulder, unwashed because of the water shortages, stinking and sickly-looking from the bankrupt diet of cheap carbohydrates and synthetic proteins that are all we have left. Like you, I'm trapped in a rat warren of dusty gray concrete; tracked by the omnivorous, all-powerful net; sucking in sulfurous air; badly outnumbered; mostly numbed. I'm scarred, scared, hunted, and all too human."

Picture taken from http://james-camerons-avatar.wikia.com/wiki/The_Hometree

Did you think it was me? Na... That was an extract from James Cameron's Avatar - An Activist Survival Guide book written by Maria Wilhelm and Dirk Mathison.

Strangely today, my colleague and I were talking about the Avatar movie and I mentioned how I was almost in tears when the Hometree was brought down by the homosapiens.  Later, I found a package in my office's pigeon hole. Guess what?

A James Cameron's Avatar - An Activist Survival Guide book all the way from London, UK. Thank you for the coolest gift, Mr and Mrs Martin Bromfield. Mr & Mrs Bromfield were my guests for one of my nature excursions. I was indeed fortunate to have met them and got to know that Mr Bromfield has a role in part of the production in this Movie of Year (voted by the Environmentalists and Tree Huggers of Planet Earth) - AVATAR.

To the fans of Avatar, this is a cool book. It tells you from A-Z about AVATAR from the air of Pandora right up to its flora and fauna. Having to have read some parts of the topics, the authors were actually warning us about what we are now doing to Mother Earth. Yes, us the homosapiens.

To my friends, if you want to have a look at this book, you got to be extra nice to me ;) As  what Gollum used to say, "My precious..."

To Mr & Mrs Bromfield, thank you very much once again. I didn't expect that you would remember this and it is an honour. As an appreciation, I will buy an original AVATAR DVD for myself when it is available in the market. That will be a small tiny weeny fraction to pay for your next vacation to Langkawi, ya?

Picture taken from http://james-camerons-avatar.wikia.com/wiki/James_Cameron's_Avatar:_An_Activist_Survival_Guide

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She is Old Yet Classic

I found her sitting on the dusty area together with the "oldies". It wasn't easy to find her among the hundreds that were sitting silently and staring back at you. She is slim and old looking yet young at heart. When I allowed her to open up, I witnessed her underlining words were treated importantly and no secrets hidden. Everything about a simple thing that needed to be explained at that time was laid out. And yes, I found her. Though she is old as she was born in the year 1964 and yet she is classic. And she will be one that will widen my knowledge. She is...

...my new old book that I found in a bookstore that is selling used books. This book, "PLANTS AT WORK" was written by Dr F.C Steward. Best of all, though it was published in year 1964, I would say the condition inside was still good eventhough some pages are coming off and traces of termites' bite marks. This book was probably used as a text book then.

The shop is located on 3rd floor of Amcorp Mall, Petaling Jaya. Funny thing is that this shop is next to a brand new bookshop "BookXcess". I can't recall if this shop has a signboard or not. All I can recall is the look of the shop from the outside is messy, narrow walkway, disorganised, and overloaded with novel books. To find the one you want, would take lots of patience and time.

A little diversion, BookXcess also sells reasonable priced books. Much cheaper than Kinokuniya and MPH. However, choices may be limited. And also, there's a shop that sells lowered price past issues magazines from RM9.90. I got February 09 - April 09 issues of National Geographic, Discovery and Wildlife magazines with the priced of RM9.90! They are having promotion for 3 National Geographic mag for RM24.90 but limited choices for Nat Geo. This shop, ReIssued Magazines is located on the 2nd floor of Amcorp Mall.

"Plants at Work" is a serious technical book for plant lovers and a good source of information for a non-botanist-and-hope-to-be like me. Hope that I will understand the chemistry.

She just need some binding, a little touch up and she will be good as new.

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