On campus (2) — bookish interlude
Back at the library, it turned out that my trusty student friend had checked the entire Loris contents list for articles on marine mammals, saving me a lot of time.
He had also kept back the dugong article which I now saw was written br Dr. S in 1999. The situation for the dugong had not improved in the 40-odd years since conservationists had called for the Dutch and Portugal Bays and Puttalam lagoon to be declared a marine reserve to protect the last remaining animals. Then as now fewer than 100 animals are thought to remain in the area although nobody knows for sure how many there are.
What is certain is that dugongs are still caught if they are encountered by fishermen. Although protected since 1970, nobody is under any illusion that the law is being enforced. Apparently, not long before the article was written, a dugong was butchered under the very eyes of the police in the Chilaw area.
Female dugongs reach sexual maturity late, although there is uncertainty when, with estimates for the Sri Lankan population ranging from 8-18 years. They have a 13 months gestation period and lactate their calves for two years. They produce only one calf every 3-7 years. There is a high mortality rate among calves during the first 4 months of life, which partly accounts for the variation in the lengths of the intercalving intervals.
Given all this, the future for the Sri Lankan dugong is bleak. The fact that any remain at all is thanks to the animal’s slyness. They actively avoid humans, feeding at night and are capable of undertaking long journeys, spanning hundreds of kilometres, to explore new feeding grounds. So it is quite possible that I did encounter evidence of dugongs feeding off Trincomalee. The question is whether enough safe habitats remain in the shallow waters the dugongs require to support a breeding population.
After I had finished reading the article, it was nearly four o’clock. It was too late to look at the issues of Loris which the librarian had found for me.
“Don’t worry”, she said: “We are officially closed tomorrow, but somebody will be in the office. You can come back in the morning.”
I thanked her and the helpful student and left with a smile on my face.
Before we went home for dinner, I insisted that we check out the Vijitha Yapa bookshop in town. I had already been to the stores in Colombo and Negombo but nobody had a copy of Dr. I’s book. John agreed to drag along when I told him that they also have a fine collection of computing books.
So, barely 20 minutes after leaving the quietly studious atmosphere of Rob’s office, we were back in the bustle around Kandy lake. Squeezing out of the packed local bus, we nearly fell over a couple of Western tourists who gaped at us as if we were Martians. I recalled that I had never seen a Westerner travelling on a local bus anywhere in Sri Lanka. To both of us it had become second nature.
We took no notice of the touts lining the street and set off directly for the bookshop. There, to my delight and John’s despair, I found and bought a copy of Anouk I’s Whales and Dolphins of Sri Lanka for nearly a thousand rupees. John lightened up when he found what he called “the ultimate book on databases”, a slim volume published in India for a mere 350 rs.
From the book I learned that some of my assumptions about the distribution of small cetaceans around Sri Lanka had been wrong. Only a single finless porpoise (Neophocoena phocaenoides) has ever been encountered in these waters. That was back in 1970 by a bunch of scientists from the Smithonian Institution on a research cruise. As was common practise in those days, they promptly caught it. It remains pickled in alcohol at the Museum of Comparative Zoology in Massachusetts to this day.
I pondered Dr. I’s photographs of blue whales and sperm whales which she had encountered on her research cruises. On this trip, this would be as close as I would get to the whales of Trincomalee.
Tags: The Whales of Trincomalee, Tag Index
Denni