Caving in SE Asia

13 February 2013

Porcupine skull in Merapoh cave

I occasionally see porcupine in caves in Malaysia. The most recent sighting was of 2 porcupine in Gua Tahi Bintang in Merapoh, Pahang. These were the Asiatic Brush-tailed Porcupine (Atherurus macrourus).

On 3 Feb 2013 in Gua Ara Babi in Merapoh, we found the bones of an animal in a small passage. The guys looking at the bones -

Part of the skeleton was already cemented in place but the skull and teeth were loose.

It is a porcupine (Family Hystricidae) but we can't determine the species, although there is a possibility it is the brush tailed as they are in other caves in the area.

In the same passage were some droppings, but I don't know what left them!

More photos of the skull and teeth -

The Asian porcupines have 20 teeth. Their dental formula is 1.0.1.3 =
Incisors 1/1 Canines 0/0, Premolars 1/1 Molars 3/3 (one half of the mouth) .

The incisors

The teeth were already loose. This photo shows one of the incisors pulled out to reveal the whole length -

The lower molars (a back one missing) -

close up -

The upper molars -

The back molars missing on both sides

The teeth are quite orange in colour, but this is a trait of porcupines. Despite having powerful gnawing incisors, porcupines are herbivorous, eating fruit, roots, and bulbs, though they may gnaw on bones for calcium. They use caves for shelter.

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© Liz Price
No reproduction without permission

Caves around Gua Musang, Kelantan

The town of Gua Musang in Kelantan, Malaysia is surrounded by limestone hills. The most famous cave is also called Gua Musang and is in the hill right behind the railway station.

In 2005 I spent a few days caving with some friends from Ipoh and we took time to look for other caves in the area. There are many listed in my Cave register but none seem to have been documented otherwise.

We stayed in chalets in Taman Ethnobotani. The park has some small limestone outcrops used for rock climbing and abseiling. There is a short tunnel cave

We went to the small town of Pulai, south of Gua Musang and to Princess Mountain, Bukit Tok Cu.

At the time, a temple was being built up on the hill. Apparently in 1984 a man had a vision of stairs being built and in 1997 the building was started - concrete steps lead up to a small Taoist temple, Gung Ju San.

There is an upper level cave passage and you can look down into a big chamber.

We looked at other hills in the area but I didn't take many photos (I was still new to digital cameras in those days!). In Gua Sidang we found some charcoal cave drawings, Jawi writing and Chinese graffiti.

Next cave we visited I named Bombed Cave - apparently it was bombed by the British during the Emergency, as they thought Communists were hiding inside. [This was possibly 1950 when there was a lot of fighting in the area, e.g. the battle of Ulu Semur]
Some enormous slabs had fallen from the roof at some time.

The cave is a large chamber with a small stream running through. There were lots of sacks of guano.

We nicknamed this hill (Gua Serai) in Gua Musang as Mangy Dog hill!

In the Chin Teck plantation we went to Gua Batu Hijau

There are fruit and insect bats and lots of brown stains

Merapoh Croatian expedition in Descent

I wrote a short piece on the September 2012 Croatian caving expedition to Merapoh, in Pahang, Malaysia for the international caving magazine Descent.

It was published in Issue 230, Feb/Mar 2013. To order a copy go to Descent ordering.
Descent is a UK magazine.

7 February 2013

Merapoh 2013 Pt 2 - Gua Guri, Ara Babi, Air Mata Dayang etc

On 3 Feb we went to an unnamed hill in the Gua Hanuman and Gua Hantu Menari area. The first cave we found, Gua Guri was named after an earthernware bowl we found in one of the many entrances.

The cave is quite short. In the first entrance was a jaw bone, probably monkey

and an insect 'house'

We continued round the hill, next was Gua Kulit Musang, only about 20 m long, half walking and half crawling. The name comes from the grey markings on the walls.

From here we found several entrances with interlinking passages so we grouped them all under Gua Ara Babi.

In the entrance passage Juki spotted some tiger footprints in the mud, probably mother and cub.

In the left hand passage we found a dead wild boar, first time I've seen one (dead or alive) in a cave.

In another side passage are some thick roots on the floor and some roots going from floor to roof. Of course the boys couldn't resist climbing them!

There were roots even deeper in the cave, these ones are on the floor -

The main passage ends in a pretty grotto. Another passage had some ant "tunnels" on the floor and walls.

Some other inhabitants -

Further round the hill was a passage with some large bats, unfortunately 2 crashed into us, so were photographed. They are Hipposideros, probably diadema.

In another section was the remains of an animal, some of the bones were already calcited into the floor. Maybe a porcupine.

After lunch we went to see Gua Air Mata Dayang.

We did the dry section of cave, then at the far end Juki got into the water and had a look but there was no ongoing route. When we got back to the main entrance I decided to go for a swim to explore the lake part of the cave as no one has done this yet. Juki followed me, filming at the same time. We had to swim the whole way, I don't know the distance, maybe 50-70 m. There are lots of bats inside and the chamber ends with no dry way on, so maybe there is a route underwater. See video.

From here we drove round the hill to look for more caves. The first site wasn't actually a cave and we sunk up to our ankles in grey mud.