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Monkeys of the Kinabatangan

JUNGLES to the animal world are like cities to humans. Forests support huge populations of herbivores that eat the vegetation and carnivores that eat the herbivores. When exploring a jungle one would expect to see a huge number of animals.

After setting up in the cramped hut at the jungle eco-lodge, I returned outside onto the raised balcony. I could see one of the couples in my group at the next hut looking through the trees looking at something. I looked up as some rustling happened in the trees above. There were some small silver leaf monkeys foraging for something to eat.

Now settled, we returned to the dining area. There were two small boats out on the lake starting to clean up the weed off the surface. I wondered how often they had to do that. Our guide Siamet arrived and led us back to the river returning along the same path we had earlier taken.

Upon returning to the boat, we set off continuing downstream along the Kinabatangan River. The boat travelled slowly into the thickening jungle as we looked around for wildlife.

Initially we didn’t see much, just the occasional solitary silver leaf monkey foraging in the long green grass by the river bank. We passed a sole fisherman in a small long boat. One of his hands was extended towards us, no doubt gesturing for money. The jungle thickened with magnificent trees on either side as a hornbill flew high overhead.

After about twenty minutes cruising up the river we saw one tree in the far bank with several small silver leaf monkeys in it. As we approached the tree we saw a lot more of the monkeys up the tree and on the ground. Some were eating the leaves from the tree, others were just wandering around, and others were leaping between the branches. Occasionally a scuffle between several of the monkeys would break out perhaps when one was invading on another’s space. Our guide Siamet gave a rather long commentary about these monkeys. These were the same species as the ones we had seen at the lodge. We were all busy looking at them though. With their perfectly groomed grey fur and long tails the same length as their bodies.

We all had our cameras out. Mine was obviously a lot bigger than anyone else’s, and as I had a lot of memory and battery freshly recharged I could take a lot of shots. One of the ladies in my group jokingly made the comment that I was like a paparazzo taking multiple shots in sports mode. But then I needed to get the perfect shot, and the only way to do that was to take lots of photos.

We left the tree and continued following the river downstream. A white egret stood on a protruding branch on the other side of the river. Upon our approach it took off flying gracefully along the river. Another hornbill flew high overhead.

By now the bottom of the boat was starting to fill with water. Fortunately we had elevated plank seats to sit on and there were lower boards across the bottom to step on. We had a couple of buckets between us to bail the water out as needed. When the boat was speeding along all the water in the bottom accumulated at the back where the driver was. When the boat slowed down though, the muddy water would slosh along the length towards the front. We obviously had to wear our bags on our backs to prevent them getting wet on the floor.

A hawk flew overhead as we passed a tall tree with a huge birds nest fern in it. Epiphytes were otherwise quite rare here apart from the entanglements of climbing vines that choked some of the smaller trees in their competitive quest for sunlight. The climbers created what seemed to be an impenetrable barrier between the river and the forest. This was only a short layer though as I recalled from the track that once away from the river, the forest undergrowth is rather sparse in the darkness under the two layers of canopy overhead.

Then we saw it. A large sandy brown monkey sat high in amongst the forest canopy. The brown merged into a grey colour along the limbs. A brilliantly white tail dropped far below its body. Then it turned its head around to have a look at the boat far below it, revealing its distinctive elongated nose – this was a male proboscis monkey, one of the strangest oddities of the primate family.

We passed several other strange proboscis monkeys high in the forest canopy sitting there very relaxed a good twenty metres above the ground. They were all sitting there in small groups chewing on the leaves Their bellies were enormous, reminding me of the beer guts typically found on a bogan. Obviously the vegetation wasn’t very nutritious requiring the consumption of a lot of food to sustain themselves.

There was a significant group of them up there. This included a couple of males with their huge bulbous noses that I imagined would get in the way when they are eating. There were at least ten females, distinguishable by sharp pointy noses. They were still large by monkey standards, but nowhere near as large as the male ones. There were also several juveniles.

Although they were very fat, they were incredibly agile when they lumbered their way from tree to tree with incredible precision. They walked along the branches of the trees nimbly.

No doubt this clan was nomadic, moving from one group of trees to the next as food became depleted. They would no doubt have their own set territory high in the trees far above any predators such as the rare elusive snow leopard. Perhaps if they were injured or ill from old age they would fall out of the trees to be prey by the ground dwelling scavengers.

Siamet continued his endless commentary explaining everything he knew about these strange treetop dwelling animals.

We continued upstream spotting the occasional proboscis monkey. Perhaps these were the celibate ones unable to display their dominance enough to attract females, or perhaps they were just wanting a bit of time out from the frenetic activity of their clan.

The sun was very low in the sky now, only highlighting the foliage of the tallest trees. It sank behind the row of storm clouds to the west, back in the direction of Mount Kinabalu – Borneo’s cloud magnet. Looking at the tallest trees, we could see large nests in them, probably about two metres in diameter. These were the nests of the elusive orang-utan, the man of the forest.

The boat finally turned around and quickly headed upstream back towards our camp. There was another row of storm clouds to our left catching the vibrant rays of the setting sun. We passed another small boat with a woman and a boy in it doing their evening fishing.

We finally docked at the small floating pontoon and walked back into the quickly darkening forest towards the eco lodge, quickly seeking refuge from the night just as the monkeys would all be settling into their homes to sleep for the night.

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