1. This year the Academy of Sciences Malaysia (ASM) jointly with Sabah Foundation (YS) organised a 11-day expedition to yet another pristine conservation area of Sabah Foundation at Imbak Canyon. With the supports of more tha 100 reseachers from various institutions such as USM, UM, UiTM, UPM, UNIMAS, UMS and UKM; PERHILITAN, Sabah Parks, Forestry Department Sabah, Sabah Wildlife Department etc etc.
2. The activity started off with a cocktail reception at Yayasan Sabah library on the evening of 25th November, followed by signing of MoU between ASM (reprented by YBhg Dato Zaidee Laidin & Dr. Shukri) and YS (represented by YBhg Tan Sri Khalil & Dr. Waidi), launching of Maliau book and a flag-off of the expedition by YB Datuk Marsidi, the Minister of Environment and Tourism Sabah.
3. We spent the night of 26th at Camp Tampoi and managed to watch the end events of Asian Games. On the morning of 27th the participants walked from the send-off point to Camp Kuli, the expedition base camp. The time taken by them varies from ca. 1 hr by Prof. Emer. Dato' Ikram to 4 hrs by Prof. Dato' Laily. Of course the young porters ran in with heavy luggage on their backs.
4. From the afternoon of 27th till the evening of 5th December the participants walked the trails, observed and captured all kinds of flora and fauna. The expedition is divided into (a) Physical landscape & Geology, (b) Water quality and aquatic life, (c) Flora, (d) Fauna, (e) Tourism and (f) Local communities., aspects hoping to cover every disciplines that are significant to conservation of Imbak Canyon.
5. Many new discoveries and plenty of new knowledge had been generated over the periods that will be discussed in February 2011, possibly at Kota Kinabalu. To recap a few reports; a total of 31 species of odonates, 27 species of freshwater fishes, many collections of mosses, ferns and higher plants were made; many collections of beetles, birds, small mammals etc were made. The geological aspects were mapped, water quality is Class 1. Don't let me preempt the findings!
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