Herping at Pangkor Island

My first Herping adventure ever thanks to Jordan Lo Jo Zheng.
If you don't know what herping is, well it's pretty simple.
Herpetology is not studies on herpes and stuff like that, instead is a branch of zoology that deals with reptiles and amphibians. Exploring places to find reptiles and amphibians, it's similar to bird watching but what we do is totally different.
According the best herper in our group of 4, he capture snakes to study it.. along with other exotic reptiles. Not to worry, he don't do black market and all, he release it most of the time.
So I'll say, we're actually hunting more than herping.. well I AM herping but not the rest of the guys. *wink*Our destination, Forty minutes by ferry from Lumut to Pangkor Island. Too bad it's not a remote island where only few people will come to visit. Since it's particularly a holiday vacation spot and half the island is covered with resort, it'll be harder to find snakes and other animals since the island is already sub urban.

The herp mates. From left Austin, Ah Kang the top herper and Jordan Lo.
According to Jordan from his last herping trip, he discovered many kinds of lizard, snakes, centipedes and millipedes, well mostly snakes and lizard at Hutan Lipur Ulu Bendul situated in Seremban.
So I thought, wow maybe I get a chance to wrestle with wild boars, roar with a tiger, climb trees with monkeys, ride elephants and swim with the sharks or dolphins. But you can't do that in Pangkor Island. Disappointing I know, but seriously I would wrestle with a wild boar.
Roast boar anyone?

Puffer fish, one of the venomous fish in the sea. Spotted during our ferry ride from Lumut, and spotted again floating at one of the restaurant we dine in. It's actually just the outer layer of the fish. Somehow they caught the fish and took out their bones and meat stuff, I don't know how so don't ask me.. and sun dried it at it's ugliest post.. and it look like a balloon with spikes that's about to blow.
Somehow it reminded me of Pokemon, and there's 5 of them too.
They even make one of it into a hat.. serious.

Our camp site is located south of the island, the most remote area in Pangkor island. How we get there? We traveled by motorcycle, rent out a scooter at RM40 for 2 days. Which is quite cool cause we roam the whole island the next morning with less than hour, not to mention with just half tank of fuel.

Unfortunately, we cannot just ride our motor into the jungle. So we stop at the houses nearby and travel deep inside the jungle by foot, it's already 7pm and the sky has darken and there's lightning everywhere. All we need, it's torch light, a simple guide and hoping to hear the sound of the beach.

It took us half hour or less to reach our site. And there's 2 cats waiting for us along with a few Malay teenagers. Guess what? They were stranded in the island, some boat brought them to the south of Pangkor instead of the nearby resort and left them on their own. They tried calling the boat but there's no answer, you should see their faces when they saw us arrived. Thanking Allah and all, worse of all.. they don't have a torch light.
Anyway the picture above, it's a dead kitten, a 1 minute old kitten with the eh... disgusting bag that is still attached to it's belly. Here's what happen, the black cat was digging out food from Jordan's bag.
Jordan was like "eh don't lar!! " and pick the cat up and the next thing you know, it gave birth to one kitten... and it's disgusting. Jordan's the father now.

So we chilled a little, grab our stuff and head of herping at 8.30pm.
And here's what we found...

A foot length millipedes, 2 of them actually plus the Malays guys gave us another fully grown one.
Jordan took it back to face his fears of creatures that has more than 20 legs.

Snail, this one is pretty small and we spot it on a tree trunk while travelling to our camp. Actually, the whole jungle is filled with common garden snails which is damn annoying cause wherever we walk we have to step on them. And they are quite big in size too, like your palm I'm sure.

After long hours of herping with no luck spotting a single snake, me and Jordan went to the shore to find hermit crabs for fun. Caught a few large ones too, and they're pretty smart, fact that they can escape from the container by opening the lid.. I don't know how either.

Sea cucumber, plenty of it and it looks like a dick, feels like it too.. just that it's really big.
And it acts like a dick to since it squirt water for no reason. Sea cucumber, ladies and gentlemen. For the horny ladies, you can keep one as a dildo.. the best part is they are alive!!
Omg, screwing yourself with a live sea cucumber is damn sick!! SHIT~

So after long hours of herping, we rest a little and went back herping again under my suggestion that we'll definitely find a snake.

And guess what? Austin actually found one hanging on the branches 12 feet from us. How we going to catch it? I'll tell you later.

Found a flying lizard alone my way to look for my wallet. Yes, I lost my wallet in a jungle, speaking of bad luck.. sigh. Flying lizard, it's 20-40 centimeters long, they could glide from tree to tree by spreading their large wing like flying membrane. There are other flying reptiles too like snakes and geckos. Frogs can fly too!
Next thing you know, elephant flies!

Caught 2 large crabs too..I think it's a common ghost crab but I couldn't be too sure either. Cause none of them looked like the one in my books. It may look edible but it'll take a while just to cook it that day, plus the fact we don't have any suitable equipment to clean the crab. So we release it in the end.

And then now I thought I should have brought it to the locals to sell or let them cook for us!!!!

Annoying Monkeys. It's damn annoying and not to mention fierce. I hate monkeys especially this one. It stole 2 of my buns and left me starve the whole morning, stupid monkeys. I guess this is a wild long tailed macaque (kera). It can swim too, pretty good ones, hunts crab and sometimes known as the crab eating macaque. Some train them to pluck coconuts and palms.

I never expect to see a hornbill in peninsular Malaysia. I confirm these pair is a oriental pied hornbill. According to my books, they are able to be found at various altitudes, and some are also found in mangrove forest. The one on the left is a male and right is female.
I considered lucky to actually see a wild life horn bill! I never thought I could see one.

Found a stick insect too, a young one at 2 inch length.

That's pretty much all that we saw during the whole trip, sorry no wild boar, tigers, crocodiles or elephants. We caught a few common spotted house geckos too. Herping trip was not as productive as the the one Jordan went last time, so according to Jordan.

Here's how we catch the snake. Since it's 12 feet above us and taunting us with it's laziness, no matter what, we have to catch it cause there's no other chance to spot another nearby.
Jordan volunteered to climb, well since he IS the best climber in our group. He grab one of Ah Kang's equipment, and like a ninja he hop up the tree. Despite all the ants and annoying branches.. and leeches too he managed to sweep the snake down.

You can see the snake at the far top right corner of the picture.

It's a Wagler's Pit Viper, whose bright colouring is very different from that of the juvenile of the species. It's venomous, dangerous and lazy. I thought it would be aggressive but it doesn't seem that way. Among the eight species of Malaysian pit vipers, those frequently encountered are the Malayan pit viper, Wagler's pit viper, and the mangrove pit viper.

A worthy trip after all, I was afraid we won't encounter any snake at all!

How we kept ourselves alive? Well, it took us 2 hours to make a large fire.. it's not that large either but it's enough to boil a pot of water. Luckily there's a water tap nearby, but it's filled with the slime of snail.. I don't know.. I was hungry I couldn't care less.

So we cooked, 6 packet of noodles split to four of us. Served dried, AND it taste good.. the fact that Jordan threw in 5 packet of Maggie powder in it.
Despite the sand and dust in the boiling water, we still ate it.. and of course there's consequences but it's just minor. KUAT MAR!!

That's how I spent Earth Hour!! More earthly than you can think!
I can say, I like this trip.. in fact I love the outdoors! So what it's dangerous, that's how I roll! Man vs Malaysian Jungle!! The whole Pangkor trip, it's more like a backpacking trip just that we're too tired too walk and look around the towns.
Motor helps a lot, I love technology sometimes.
Hoping form a group of explorers and herpers together,
What say you?!?

Pangkor is just a start for me, the next time I hope it'll be more challenging.
Next trip, Pulau Kapas, Trengganu!! Heard rumours of excessive wild life and corals, not to mention whole loads of sea fishes.
By the way, I brought my fishing rod hoping to find any swampy areas to fish. No luck for me, we don't have the time and I'm out of bait to fish sea fishes, thanks to the monkeys!

I'm on a quest, finding Ikan Tapah, or Bujuk! Google it.
And be surprise.

*off~