Civets, Insects and Babies Galore!

Things are beginning to settle down here after the excitement of Loris Pride Days.  This week it's back to business as usual and that means nightly treks up the mountain to observe our lorises and collect insect abundance data.  We're also lucky enough to have Peter Roberts for another week so we gained some special insights into the local civet population as well (mostly through poo samples!).  Of course, business as usual doesn't mean that life here is any less interesting or exciting.   :)

Spot the civet track.  Photo Peter Roberts.

Peter was able to collect five samples of civet scat (poo) during his time in Cipaganti.  Though this was far fewer than he had hoped to gather, we were still able to learn some interesting things about the diets of our civets.  Our scat samples included seeds from persimmon and coffee beans, body parts from grasshoppers and millipedes, and bones and feather bits from small birds.  There was also a fair amount of civet hair found within the scat that can be attributed to grooming.  Peter was also able to visually confirm at least one civet in our loris territories.  Visual confirmation is difficult because civets are also nocturnal animals but tend to jump quickly from tree to tree.  This means that observations of their behaviour can be quite difficult!  For this reason we have set camera traps to capture our crafty little civets on film.  Photos have already shown a civet with a white tip on his tail.  Individual coat variation or sign of a new subspecies in our area?  Hopefully we'll be setting out more camera traps soon to know for sure!  

Head tracker Pak Dendi setting up a camera trap.  Photo Peter Roberts.

Persimmon (top) and coffee beans found in civet scat.  Photos Peter Roberts.

Our volunteer Mark was working on his biweekly insect data collection this week.  Every two weeks he devotes three days to catching insects and puzzling together what orders the insect community of Cipaganti are made up of.  A very interesting micro-cosmos to look into, the only downside being that the mosquitoes (order Diptera, see it is not that complicated!) seem to be everywhere on your body and surrounding environment, except inside the traps. 

Mark setting our insect trap.  Photo Iing Animallica.

Even something as basic as insect collection can present difficulties because our insects use stealth and deception to keep out of the traps, and walking tea leaves or branches are not an uncommon sight!  So if you want to catch one of these trained commandos, you better be a patient and stealthy observer yourself.  A common insect in our area, and a favorite of Mark’s, is known as the Mantodea or mantis. Mantises are superb predatory beings – even amongst their own kind!  It is not uncommon to find a decapitated mantis body; the most likely scenario being that a female decapitated the male after mating.  It goes to show once again that serious male to female miscommunication is not just restricted to human beings.  ;)  

Mark displaying his favorite insect.  Photo Iing Animallica.

Curious baby Lucu!  Photo Peter Roberts.

This week was especially exciting for loris observations because we saw not one, not two, but SIX slow loris babies! Some, like Ena’s baby, came as close as seven feet to our faces! Peter was able to capture some really great shots of Ena’s baby as it boldly walked on a fallen bamboo trunk right in front of us. We saw these babies grooming high up in bamboo and jiengien (gum) trees, as well as foraging for some insects and nectar. We could tell these particular Javan slow lorises were babies by their fluffier white and black appearance and lack of radio collars. These primates are only given collars after about year, or whenever they mature into adult age, for safety purposes in their growing months. 

Our baby Lucu checking out the researchers.  Photo Peter Roberts.

A particularly interesting moment was when we saw Charlie and her baby, Lucu (which was the winning name of our previous baby loris naming contest and translates into “cute” in Indonesian), foraging for food together despite very windy conditions. These two could be seen grooming each other and cuddling together for heat and comfort high up in the trees.  Absolutely adorable? We think so!

Loris Pride Days!

Finally the event we’ve all been waiting for…Loris Pride Days are here!  An amazing week dedicated to the slow loris in our wonderful village of Cipaganti.  So many events to choose from with our football tournament (junior and senior teams), school visits, parade, kite flying, and closing ceremonies that it’s hard to know where to begin.  And don’t forget the introduction of a certain life-sized loris!

It's our very own Tereh ready to share the loris love!

The first of our big events was the football tournament and we used this opportunity to introduce our amazing new team member Tereh!  She caused quite a stir amongst the children and even some of the adults.  With a little coaxing we even managed to get Tereh to show off some of her dancing skills.  

Football committee showing off their loris pride.

Our visit to the local secondary school was a great success as well.  We visited there to introduce our new children’s book (written by Dr. Nekaris) that will be printed in Indonesian and English language versions.  During the reading, the beautiful illustrations done by Shelley Low and wonderful narrative written by Dr. Nekaris had the kids eating out of the palm of her hand!  After the book introduction it was activity time.  We had 150 students in one large room who were very well behaved and ready to make some loris-themed crafts.  Some of the students were assigned kite-making duties where they crafted kites in the local style using bamboo sticks and string for the framing and paper for the face of the kite.  For decoration they all drew loris faces that will be seen and admired high in the sky!  The other students were given beautiful Tereh and Bunga face masks to be worn during our parade. 

School children showing off their face masks.

Sunday we had the parade, adult football finals, closing ceremony and big party with traditional dance and music.  The morning started with a parade through the village where the children wore loris face masks and chanted "KUKANG!" for the whole village to hear.  During the parade, we managed to get most of the village to follow us up to the football field where we had traditional music and dance from local musicians and dance groups.  The most advanced dancers were able to perform beautiful traditional dances while swinging around a machete!  Not for the faint of heart.  :)  The final was decided by a nail-biting round of penalty kicks and the top 3 teams received trophies and loris uniforms.  After the trophy ceremony there was more dancing and traditional music (members of the LFP team even got on stage to participate!).  A wonderful time had by all and the best way to end our amazing week!

Group of local girls performing traditional dancing with traditional musicians on stage.

Party!

The Kukang Cup and Friends from Afar

This week we had two very exciting events happen in our small village.  The first was the kick-off of our Loris Football Tournament and the second was the arrival of some VIPs from England.  Never a dull moment!

On Sunday the tournament for the junior football teams from the village began.  Football is taken very seriously around here and though they are young players, they want to win!  I was amazed by how intensely some of these teams played against each other.  I’m sure many of them walked away with scratches, bumps and bruises!  Keep in mind that these are important rivalry games because all the teams come from Cipaganti.  So imagine playing your school’s biggest rival team in any sport.  Of course you want to win!  The adult tournament kicks off next week and I’m sure there will be even more blood, bruises, and scrapes.

Junior Team Ciburuy.

Junior Team Pamegatan.

Any guesses as to who the VIPs might be in our second exciting event for the week?  If you’re a fan of our Facebook page then you probably already know!  We’re lucky enough to be visited by Dr. Anna Nekaris, Dr. Vincent Nijman, Annie Fiorentino, and Peter Roberts.   Doctors Nekaris and Nijman visit the field station a few times each year to check on our study animals, discuss our goals, promote conservation locally and with law enforcement officials, and to have fun!  This year the big fun will be during our Loris Pride Days (June 13-16) where we will have a parade, football tournament, kite-flying tournament and official closing trophy ceremony.  We are all eager for it to begin!

Peter, Annie, and Dr. Nekaris arrive in Cipaganti.

Annie is a wonderful writer and journalist from the UK who is accompanying Dr. Nekaris to document her time in Cipaganti and help promote the loris love.  Some of our newsletter readers will already be familiar with Annie's work.  Peter is our new PhD candidate and will be doing population surveys of civets and taking a closer look at the trade for luxury coffee beans (e.g. coffee that’s been eaten and pooped out by a civet!).

Stay tuned next week for a look at our amazing Loris Pride Days!