Malaysia has many interesting species of animals, so when I heard about the Night Spotting Project, I was eager to join and see them for myself. The focus of the project is on nocturnal mammals, such as slow loris and colugos.
Before coming to Langkawi, I had never heard of a colugo, and was very interested to observe them as there is not much information and literature about them. I was amazed to find out that there are not many groups studying this animal and not much is known about their behaviours.
Many people may find it boring to observe animals for 5 hours; however, I enjoy following the colugos on their night-time adventures, especially if is a mother and baby.
It amazes me how the colugos glide from tree to tree with a baby clinging to the belly, the first time I saw this I thought the baby was going to fall, but of course it didn’t.
As the months go on it is getting easier to identify the individuals in the colugo group. Although mistakes are made sometimes, it is possible to identify the colugos by the unique patterns on their fur. Some have white spots or dark lines on their fur which are unique to that individual.
The habitat in which we observe the colugos is in a resort that was built around the existing forest, so the habitat of the animals already living there were not disturbed too much.
The population in the resort is easier to observe than other wild populations as there is easy access to most parts of the forest and areas in which the colugos reside, without disturbing them with our presence. I am excited to learn more about these crazy mammals, and their nightly excursions. It will also be very interesting to see some of the babies grow up while we observe them over the
next few months.
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