ASHLEIGH SEOW TELLS THE SAD BUT TRUE STORY OF THE DUGONG - A MAGNIFICENT SEA CREATURE WHICH FACES EXTINCTION DUE TO HUMAN ACTION AND INACTION

An early sun was already warming the shallow waters of the bay, promising a hot day ahead. The dugong and her calf swam leisurely across an inlet, like pale-skinned tourists against the emerald water, after a breakfast grazing the seagrass buffet. Every day they moved feeding grounds, mowing their way though the sea grass plains like a grass-cutting crew, favouring the shallow warmer waters in the mornings then moving to cool deeper water in the hot afternoons.

They were fortunate to have found this large untouched bay. Their previous area was unable to sustain a viable population anymore as the rivers became increasingly murky and fouled with the metallic tang and bitter tastes of industrial chemicals, oils and household refuse as more of the coastline came under development. The once extensive sea grass had begun to die from poisoning or the lack of light for photosynthesis. The mother stopped to rest and touched her calf with her flipper as it nursed. She was 40 years old and this was her fourth child. Dugongs become reproductively mature at about the same time as humans, in their early teens, but pregnancies usually occur in the mid-teens. A dugong carries her baby for approximately 14 months before it is born in the warm shallow waters of a tropical bay before being brought to the surface for its first breath of air. The interval between births is about 3 to 7 years reflecting the long 18 months that the baby is nursed before it is able to feed solely on seagrass. It also requires guidance for some time after weaning before it goes its own way. The birth intervals can widen due to environmental stress, for example if there is lack of food and safety.

The common name “dugong” comes from the Malay “duyong” meaning lady of the sea. Although their scientific name “Sirenia” comes from the Greek “seiren” (seductive sea nymphs), they should more appropriately be considered “mothers of the sea” than mermaids. Their closest land relative is the elephant.

Wild dugongs can live to their mid-70s, but her first two calves had died before maturity. The first on a day like this when they had been relaxing on the surface and the calf playing. It was her inexperience in not recognising the whine of the propellers. When she realised and started to dive it was too late for the calf – the spinning blades slashed its back; the blood a crimson bloom staining the blue-green sea. The craft stopped and the passengers chattered excitedly while the mother stayed to support and nuzzle the dying calf. After an hour she had to leave as the blood plume had attracted a bull shark, a powerful coastal predator. Living in shallow coastal waters, the short-sighted dugongs are very vulnerable to boat strike, especially from fast boats or larger craft which can drag the almost neutrally buoyant dugong into the propellers even if it is not on the surface.

Her second child did not survive either. They were grazing on seagrass when she heard the propellers. They tried to flee but are slow swimmers, barely faster than a good human swimmer. They have nasal nostrils rather than blow holes, making breathing while swimming fast more challenging than for dolphins and whales.

The boat caught up and a harpoon was hurled into the calf’s back. She was older and stronger and fought the rope so the harpooner “played” the line as though she was a fish. Eventually, when closer to the boat, a second harpoon was thrown to ensure the dugong did not slip off and sink. She soon stopped struggling – a pink froth bubbled from her nose – a lung was punctured. The boatmen pulled her head out of the water and held it by the side of the boat and started putting things under her eyes. “Minyak air mata duyong” (mermaid tears) are believed to be a powerful love potion. When dugongs are caught these “tears” are released and collected while it is still alive. A rope was attached to the tail fluke and she was towed away, slowly drowning. In some places in southern Thailand and northern Malaysia, the mammary glands are cut off to make other types of love potions.

Dugong products are a valuable commodity. Besides the tears, the tusks, bones, teeth and tail are in demand for ornaments, “medicines” or Arab dagger handles; the flesh is considered better than beef and the fat used in ointments or, in some places, fuel for lamps. Every culture on the Indian Ocean rim from Tanzania to the Arabian Gulf, Iran, India, Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific from China and Japan down to Australia and Oceania are traditionally devourers of the dugong.

Later the pair moved off to a patch of seagrass to spend the night. Sleep is a series of naps of 8-10 minutes after which they surface, breathe and slowly sink to the bottom again. On one of these sleep cycles the mother was awoken by a strange muted rumbling.

While the calf still slept she began to see fish all moving in the same direction. She roused the calf and followed. The rumbling grew louder; she heard clanking. By now everything was in flight: sharks, groupers, sting rays, squid, fish of all shapes and sizes. The seagrass was illuminated by several small moons, a vast dark shape appeared; thousands of creatures caught inside a gigantic maw still open and feeding on fish. She swims desperately, the frightened calf beside her. They surface to breathe at increasingly short intervals as the lactic acid builds up in their tired muscles, each breath slowing them down. Their heart rate escalates. Soon the calf cannot keep up: the mother pauses, maternal instinct strong, but realises that her responsibility is to survive and hope that the calf somehow escapes. The trawler comes remorselessly, ripping up coral and sea grass like a bulldozer in a forest. Her tail is already in the maw when a blaze of pain engulfs her and then nothing.

The net is hauled on deck. The crew sorts the catch – commercial fish, rays, grouper, snapper are put in the hold but the bycatch of species considered worthless, often broken bodies barely alive, is tossed back to the sea.

The calf, an air-breathing mammal, was fortunately not crushed and was caught just before the net was hauled up; it is tossed overboard alive, now on its own without its mother’s guidance.

The only “fiction” in this story is in attributing these events to the life of one particular female dugong. Dugongs are regularly wounded or killed by boat strike; in Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines, dugong tears, and other dugong body parts are collected and sold by local people to traders.

But the hazards of propeller blades and traditional dugong hunting is limited compared to the decimation of dugong numbers caused by city dwellers when we pollute and destroy their food resources and encourage unsustainable commercial fishing by our insatiable hunger for seafood. Every year many dugongs drown in fish nets, die from explosions caused by blast fishing and those “lucky” ones that survive all these hazards face malnutrition in those areas where industry and development are destroying the marine environment.Whether it is Singapore’s land reclamation in the Johore Strait; pesticide and fertiliser run-off from agricultural industries; the demand for “minyak air mata duyong”; those who simply seek wealth or material gratification without a care for the environment, or those who fail to take action, we are all at fault.

The largest populations of dugong are now in Australia where most research takes place, next is the Arabian Gulf and the third is New Caledonia in the Western Pacific. These places are at the limits of the range. In the centre, the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific coastal belt is fragmented by habitat loss, dugong are increasingly rare.

It is especially sad what is happening to dugongs. Almost alone among mammals, the dugong does not hunt or injure us, nor does it eat our crops or our domestic livestock; compete for food with us or our animals; damage our homes or property; transmit deadly diseases to us and the like.

The dugong is truly inoffensive. But in Southeast Asia in grim pursuit of gross materialism, dumping the by-products of that desire into the seas, dugong have no choice but to swim into extinction unless we realize that by saving the dugong and the seas we save ourselves.