Ten hectares of forest were cleared for cultivation on a steep slope in the Alas Valley in Sumatra, and as a result 13 people were drowned. The authors describe what happened and show why a flood was almost inevitable.

Many governments of developing countries consider that croplands and pastures are more valuable than forest, so they harvest the most valuable timber, turn the smaller trees into charcoal, and burn the rest. Often the whole forest is razed to the ground and burned. Not only does the timber thus become a non-renewable resource, but many other valuable species are lost, for only a handful of scientists know what these valuable non-timber species are, and only rarely has the information been made available to governments.

Nigel Bonner has documented sightings of humpbacks Megaptera novaeangliae off the west coast of the Antarctic Peninsula which seem to indicate some recovery of stocks (Oryx 16, 3: 231–232). It may therefore be worth placing on record the following sightings of this species made from Argentine Islands for 1970/72, when I was stationed at the British Antarctic Survey base.

In the last thirty years at least three million crocodiles have been killed in Africa for their skins – and the figure may be much higher. As a result the Nile crocodile has declined seriously almost everywhere, and hunters are now turning to other species, none of which are anywhere abundant, to supply the trade. Only Zimbabwe has established viable crocodile farms, but even these were able to cull only 2253 animals for hides in the three years 1978–80.

After searching many remote regions in the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, the author discovered that the island's last two endemic mammals, formerly believed to be rare, are in fact common in some areas. But human pressures on the hutia Plagiodonria aedium and the solenodon S. paradoxus are such that, unless the Governments of Haiti and the Dominican Republic take effective steps both could soon become extinct.

The brown bears in and around Italy's Abruzzo National Park live quite comfortably with the fairly dense human population surrounding the park. The people like the bears, even though they eat sheep, and are not afraid of them. But these same people also favour economic development, notably tourism, and tourists have now increased to the point where the disturbance they create is a serious threat to the bears. In particular tourist pressure in high summer has driven the bears to scatter into areas where they have little protection.

The wildlife of the widely scattered islands that comprise the East Indonesian province of Maluku, formerly the Moluccas, is unique and immensely important scientifically. More than a quarter of the birds are endemic species, as well as nearly a fifth of the mammals, several reptiles and land snails and at least 25 butterflies. Seventy per cent of the islands is still untouched. But large-scale commercial logging is making increasing inroads on the forest of the north and central islands, and commercial overfishing and siltation due to the logging are affecting the sea. The Indonesian Directorate of Nature Conservation, assisted by FAO, is drawing up a conservation programme, in which the author is involved, which includes recommendations for a 180,000-ha national park on Seram Island and a 250,000-ha marine reserve in the Aru Islands.

In the eight years of Idi Amin's rule, law enforcement in the national parks and reserves completely collapsed, and poaching and human encroachment increased. Last year, Robert Malpas, working for the New York Zoological Society and World Wildlife Fund/IUCN, and with some help from ffPS, spent nine months on a survey of Uganda's national parks and reserves to determine just how bad the situation really was. He found the elephant situation so desperate in both the Rwenzori and Kabalega Falls National Parks, except in one area, that there is no certainty of their survival in either even if the poaching can be controlled.

When the author visited Nigeria in 1981 to look at forests on the lower Niger, there had been no reports for 15 years of the red-bellied guenon Cercopithecus erythrogaster, and only a single specimen of the olive colobus Procolobus verus was known from the country. He found surviving populations of both monkeys, but each is threatened by widespread, intensive hunting, and by habitat destruction. If effective measures are not taken to protect the guenon and its rainforest habitat, this species could become extinct, since it occurs only in southwestern Nigeria.

New Zealand policy is to eliminate feral introduced animals, such as deer and goats, which have done immense damage to the native animals and vegetation. But an attempt to kill off the feral goats on one island in order to protect the native vegetation raised the cry that these were ‘Old English’ goats and should be conserved.

The pied bare-face tamarin is found only in the vicinity of Manaus, the second largest city in Brazilian Amazonia, where rapid growth in recent years has resulted in much forest destruction. The authors’ studies show that this tamarin is now endangered and they suggest an action plan to ensure its survival.

The Serengeti National Park in Tanzania is famous for its huge herds of migrating wildebeest, zebras and other ungulates. But these herds spend much of the year in neighbouring reserves where their survival depends on preserving the right conditions. The authors made a study of two of these reserves with disturbing results. The Maswa Game Reserve they found was seriously threatened by invading (illegal) settlement with a fast-growing population cultivating land and felling trees; in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area they report that the Maasai have taken to poaching, both for subsistence meat and for trophies to sell – skins, ivory and rhino horn. In both places the guards are so poorly equipped they can do little to stop poaching.

Because of their coastal habits and lethargic nature, humpback whales Megaptera novaeangliae have been among the species hardest hit by the whaling industry. Between 1904 and 1973 (when humpback catching finally ceased), 68,294 humpbacks were reported killed in Antarctic waters, more than 40 per cent of these in the first ten years. Humpbacks, which are relatively easy to identify at sea, have been reported from the Antarctic in recent years only rarely. However, it now seems that some recovery may be taking place.

Because they must migrate up to the headwaters of rivers to spawn, salmon were badly affected when man developed the rivers for navigation and industry, then polluted them and, for hydroelectric schemes, sometimes blocked them. The final disaster was the Greenland fishery that started in the early 1960s. This has now been controlled, but the Atlantic salmon is unlikely to recover its former numbers. Moreover, some of the unique stocks that each river system originally had have been exterminated and others adulterated, so that the Atlantic salmon's original genetic diversity has been irretrievably destroyed. The author, who works on fishes at the British Museum, Natural History, is Chairman of IUCN's SSC Fish Group.

The South African giant golden mole has been seen by few people; scientifically it is almost unknown. After two visits to South Africa to look for it, in 1978 and 1980, the author, who is Chairman of the IUCN/SSC Insectivore Group, fears that it may already be extinct in the Transkei through loss of its forest habitat, and that the same fate is to be feared in the Ciskei.

In June last year a Customs officer at London Airport, suspicious of a cargo of 100 live royal pythons arriving from Ghana, checked the export permit with officials in Accra. They confirmed that the animals had been illegally exported from Ghana. The snakes were seized, and a difficult situation — what to do with 100 illegally imported live snakes? — was resolved by ffPS and the RSPCA jointly agreeing to pay the cost of returning the survivors to Ghana, where, under the guidance of ffPS Consultant, Dr Emmanuel Asibey, head of the Game and Wildlife Department, they were released in a national park. This incident highlights the important part the Customs Service plays in enforcing the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, and also some of the problems. Ted Mouat, who is a senior Customs official, describes how they are learning and coping, and how voluntary societies such as ffPS can help.

After nearly ten years of civil war Zimbabwe now has more elephants than at any time since at least the 1940s: the bush was simply too dangerous for the poachers. Much wildlife management too had to be suspended during the war. Now in the Wankie National Park there is considerable elephant damage as a result of the population pressure, and some culling has been done.

With 44,000 sq km of coral reef surrounding its many islands and an everincreasing population that depends heavily on fish for protein food, the damage being done to the Philippine reefs is of serious concern. Silting of the water (the result of erosion following forest clearing), modern fishing methods and the collecting mania all contribute to this. A long list of suitable areas for marine reserves has been compiled, and thanks to education programmes some communities are taking conservation measures for themselves.

After a somewhat perilous landing on Gough Island, south of Tristan da Cunha in the South Atlantic, the author was able to confirm the remarkable comeback of the fur seals there, once heavily exploited but now numbering over a hundred thousand.