Tree monitoring Nov 2008
During 17 - 20 November 2008, I have joined the 2nd trees monitoring of 6 tree planting sites (trees planted at the mid of August, so 3 months old) in the deciduous bamboo forest inside Salakpra wildlife sanctuary.
Picture: ECN (Elephant Conservation Network) staff try to measure young planted seedlings under broken bamboo trunk.
We started to work immediately when we arrived, but quite slowly because during this time of the year, there is still a lot of rain and wind. In addition, most of the tree planting sites are full of high grasses and weeds. Therefore the trees were difficult to find. So we spent much time slashing weeds and grasses down under the knee, before we could start measure the planted trees. From my observation, in 3 tree planting plots located outside bamboo shade, there was much weed and grass, significantly more than in the 3 plots located under the bamboo shed. Furthermore in the plots outside bamboo shed we found a lot of dead trees, especially in the 1st plot. In my opinion they died mostly from the drought, because they can’t fight with the high weeds and grasses that grow around the planted trees. There should have been more maintenance after planting. Most of the remaining trees that survived are very small and not healthy enough. There are only some of pioneer tree species that can survive and grow well in outdoor plot such as Afzelia xylocarpa, Cassia fistula, Pterocarpus macrocarpus, Careya arborea and Oroxylum indicum.
Planted tree in outdoor plots covering by weeds and grasses
The planting plots under bamboo shade have less weeds and grasses. At the same time, in the 3 other trees planting plots there are significantly less weeds and grasses than the planting plots outside bamboo shed. On the other hand, a lot of various species of young natural seedlings grow under the bamboo shed also, but not too high. On the bamboo shed plots, we also found many dead planted trees, but less than the dead rate in outside bamboo shed plots. In addition too, the remaining surviving trees that grow here, are higher and bigger and more healthy. There are both pioneer and climax tree species that have high survival rate and can grow very well under bamboo shed such as Afzelia xylocarpa, Cassia fistula, Pterocarpus macrocarpus, Oroxylum indicum, Spondias pinnata, Lugerstroemia cochinchinensis, Azadirachia indica and Dipterocarpus alatus.
Planted tree under bamboo shed plots.
Planted tree in outdoor plots covering by weeds and grasses
Biodiversity recovery monitoring
We found indications that many wild elephants came to our tree planting plots. E.g. elephant footprints on the seedlings, broken bamboo fallen disorderly everywhere in the under bamboo shed planting plots, and a lot of fresh elephant dung. Think we are lucky to save cost for fertilizer cause we got free organic fertilizer from elephants for our plots. Elephants also removed or laid down on the planted trees, especially in the outside bamboo shed planting plots.
Broken bamboo trunk fallen disorderly by elephants.
Conclusion
The results of this tree monitoring event are disappointing, because of the high weed and grasses everywhere. The dead rate of planted trees is high in comparison with the 1st tree monitoring. In addition too, the remaining surviving planted trees are quite small, have slow growth rate and are not healthy enough yet. To solve this problem, BTEH will organize trees maintenance events together with ECN and rangers. We hope to find more volunteers for weeding and apply fertilizer in order to improve quality and quantity of the planted trees inside Salakpra wildlife sanctuary, as fast as we can. Hopefully during the next trees monitoring event, we will have much better results.
Encouter with wild elephants
During the whole trip, we stayed inside Salakpra Wildlife Sanctuary station, sleeping in the bamboo shelter nearby the ranger watching station. This saved time and we hoped to see wild elephant because we heard from the rangers that wild elephants walk to the station many times in the night. Nearby the station there are a lot of salt licks, both made by the rangers and natural, attractive to wild elephants for eating and drinking. Moreover during this time it’s breeding season, so many elephants will walk to find each other for breeding and this time we will have more chance to see them. I used to stay overnight here more than 3 times, but never saw a wild elephant even once. This time we were very lucky. At the first night we saw a very big male elephant walk closely to our bamboo shelter to the salt lick. The elephant wasn’t afraid of us because he knew the forest ranger and could remember his voice. Moreover, at the 3rd night, we met 2 elephants, eating and drinking water in the salt lick pond but at this time it quite far from us and they growled to tell us to keep away from them. We tried to make photos but we couldn’t because it was very dark and we couldn’t get closer. After 20 mins the elephants walked back into the forest. Even after they were gone, we were still very impressed and hopefully next time we will see them again. I very much look forward to go back.
Kind regards,
Dutsadee Nilubol
Coordinator Trees for Elephants
Elephant step on young planted seedling, but the tree survived.
Fresh elephant dung on the planting site.
