People generally spend the holidays visiting family, buying presents, taking a break from work and maybe going on a relaxing vacation. This is what passes through my mind as I’m speeding up a hill deep in the Bornean rainforest with a hungry Orangutan chasing our small group. I don’t have time to think about how many leeches or fire ants I’m picking up. It takes us about 10 minutes to get to the top of the hill and to jump in the car. Going downhill had taken more than half an hour but we could take our time since there was no one chasing us. How did I get here? Read on to find out.

After recording soundscapes in the Congo and Amazon rainforests, I felt like the logical thing to do was to go recording in an Asian rainforest. Borneo seemed very attractive for its high rate of endemism and biodiversity. My girlfriend also wanted to join me but she could only travel over the holidays so we decide to spend Christmas and New Year’s in the jungle.

Equipment

I decide to leave my trusty Sound Devices 633 at home since it’s quite heavy and there will be a lot of hiking. I opt instead for my newly-acquired Sound Devices Mixpre-6 II and Zoom F6, plus two Sony PCM A10s, one PCM D10 and one D100. Mics-wise I brought my Sennheiser DMS rig, two pairs of DPA omnis, two pairs of MikroUsi Pros and about 6 pairs of regular MikroUsis.

I want to record in Surround with both big recorders so I will use the DMS rig with the Mixpre and 4 MikroUsi Pro lavaliers with the F6, the latter tied around trees roughly the size of a human head. On top of this I will also record with the smaller recorders and the PIP MikroUsi mics, but only in Stereo. All the recordings I plan on doing will be drop and leave, generally for about 24 hours at a time.

Tabin Wildlife Reserve

After 18 hours of flying we land in Kota Kinabalu, the state capital of the Malaysian state of Sabah. It takes us a full day of driving our rented Hilux to reach Tabin Wildlife Reserve, a protected area of primary and secondary rainforest surrounded by oil palm plantations. There are other tourists here too since it’s quite a big place, but we lose them as soon as we leave for the rainforest accompanied by our guide Mawi. There are several areas we can explore, including a mud volcano and a beautiful stretch of primary rainforest that isn’t generally open to tourists.

Tabin is great for my purposes since it’s quite vast and offers access to different habitats like primary and secondary rainforest, oil palm plantation, forest clearings and even a lake. Our guide Mawi is happy to accompany us in the deepest parts of the reserve and is always up for an adventure. When I mention to him that I’d like to wade through a stinky swamp to get to the center of a lake he is immediately on board. Listen to a beautiful recording I was able to make there:

On one of our daily hikes in the primary forest we spot a wild Banteng, one of the rarest mammals in Borneo. It’s a species of wild cattle that lives mainly in undisturbed forest of which there is less and less every day. It certainly doesn’t help that it is being hunted for meat. We also see and hear Helmeted Hornbills, critically endangered birds that are hunted for their casque all over their range in Asia. Luckily they seem to be protected here.

We see more than 9 individual Orangutans, both wild and reintroduced rescues. The one that ends up chasing us through the forest is a rescue that had been used to receiving bananas from rangers. Orangs are generally not aggressive towards humans but they’re incredibly strong so it’s better to avoid rehabilitated individuals looking for a handout.

I also manage to get beautiful footage of a Sunda clouded leopard with my camera trap. It’s encouraging to see these cats survive and thrive while a lot of their habitat is being lost to human activity. Fortunately for them they sometimes benefit from access to plantations where they can catch wild pigs much more easily than in dense rainforest.

Tabin is overall a good introduction to the wilderness of Borneo. Access isn’t too difficult, leech density is manageable and Mawi’s help and knowledge are invaluable. Unfortunately the soundscapes aren’t 100% free of anthropophony. More than half of the recordings I make here feature distant engines sounds, mainly from the plantations nearby. Luckily I make a LOT of recordings so I have enough material to work with.

Tawau Hills

After more than a week at Tabin it’s time to move on to Tawau Hills. We drive for another whole day before we reach the national park headquarters in a huge downpour. Tawau Hills seems much more humid and rainy than Tabin. I think it’s because most of the clouds that come in from the Celebes Sea in the South cannot cross these hills and end up turning into rains and storms. The results are immediately visible: loads of frogs and insects can be spotted everywhere, way more than at Tabin. The undergrowth is denser and more difficult to navigate. There are also leeches, in huge numbers.

We’re staying at the National Park headquarters and our guides are Chun and Shavez from 1StopBorneo. They’ve been working towards conserving the park and its wildlife for many years and have been successful in convincing plantation owners to consider wildlife and nature, not just profit. We’re happy to support them in their initiatives.

We go into the forest at least 3 times a day for several hours, at dawn, in the afternoon and at night. We spot different wildlife in each part of the day and I manage to get decent photos. We also go on a boat trip looking for river dolphins and Proboscis monkeys which we manage to find.

The recording opportunities are rather scarce here unfortunately. The location is right under the flight path from Kota Kinabalu to Tawau town so there’s the occasional aircraft flying over. This by itself would be acceptable, but everywhere we hike in the forest there are rivers and creeks. Since this is a hilly, place the water flowing is fast and noisy.

After a couple of days we manage to find a pocket of vegetation nestled between two small hills where distant creeks and rivers can barely be heard. This is also quite difficult to reach since it’s off-trail, so the danger of random hikers finding my gear is minimal. The recordings I make here are OK overall but not as varied and lush as the soundscapes at Maliau Basin.

Having Chun and Shavez take us on walks and find wildlife for us is a huge plus. A lot of insects here are masters of disguise, including huge stick insects and leaf crickets. Snakes are so well camouflaged that we pass by them without having the slightest idea.

Maliau Basin

This is by far my favorite location of the trip, but getting here is not without adventures. While everywhere else in Sabah we can find fuel easily, there are no petrol stations for more than a hundred miles in either direction from Maliau. We learn that the hard way and we end up driving back and forth for an entire day before we buy diesel from a few shacks selling vegetables. There’s also a guy smoking right next to the gasoline bottles to complete the picture!

At any rate, we finally arrive at the park headquarters and settle in for a few days. It’s possible to do multi-day hikes into the forest apparently, but we don’t have enough time so we end up driving and walking along the main road. This is still pretty cool since the basin is surrounded by hills and there are no plantations within it. There’s hardly any traffic and birdlife is incredibly lush.

We find lots of elephant dung on the road and eventually meet the elephants themselves, a family of about 10 lead by a large female. It’s great to see that they aren’t alarmed by our presence which means poaching here is not rampant like in other places.

The observation tower at Maliau is simply awesome. It’s on a small hill overlooking a huge valley which makes it perfect for early mornings when humidity rises from the jungle forming gorgeous clouds and mist. You can hear sounds coming from miles away, especially the ever-present Gibbons and their fluting calls. If I ever come back to this part of Borneo, this is a place I will surely revisit.

Conservation

Everywhere we go, there are signs that people take conservation seriously. No one sits around waiting for NGOs or the government to do it for them. 1StopBorneo work with locals, offering them an alternative to fishing or hunting. Tabin hires local poachers and turns them into guides. At Maliau there is a research centre where students and researchers are welcome to come and study.

Of course, this may not be enough. For two very long stretches of our trip we drive through endless plantation. 100 years ago Borneo was 100% rainforest, now that figure is closer to 30% and going down. A square kilometer of rainforest can support hundreds of species of animals, while a similar area of plantation supports less than 10. Of course, some wildlife will raid the plantation and then return to the forest, but this is nowhere near sustainable. Do your own research and learn about how unsustainable and pervasive palm oil really is.

Conclusion

Borneo is the most biodiverse place I’ve ever visited, more so than the Congo or Amazon rainforests. Much of it is because Borneo and Sundaland in general are older than the other rainforests of the world. That amount of biodiversity is certainly visible and audible on the ground. This expedition was a humbling experience and a sobering reminder that we stand to lose so much if we don’t make huge changes in our lives.

I’ve uploaded some recordings to Soundcloud and a long soundscape to Youtube (check it out below). I’m in the process of editing more than one Terabyte of recordings and putting together more content. Expect a sound effects library and several Bandcamp albums. If you’ve made it this far, feel free to check out my Patreon page (there are goodies to be had) or buy me a coffee. Thanks and see you in the next blog post (or video)!