Bees and bats left homeless by Bogor storm

BOGOR (JP): A storm here last Friday toppled some 40 trees in the vast Bogor Botanical Gardens, leaving animal lovers worried that large numbers of bees and bats would be left homeless.

Head of the scientific services section, which was jointly set up by the botanical gardens and the National Institute of Sciences (LIPI), Sugiarti, said on Tuesday that most of the trees, which were aged between 50 and 150 years old, were fruit trees, such as canari, nutmeg, citrus, sapodilla, and many other tropical fruit-bearing trees like sirsak and jambu.

"Most of the trees were on average between 50 and 100 years old. But the canari trees were 150 years old and stood 20 meters high," she said.

According to her, the downing of the trees would also disturb the existence of other elements in the ecosystem such as the orchids and ferns which also used to live on the trees.

Sugiarti quoted data from researchers as saying that bees had been migrating to the botanical gardens and the nearby Mt. Halimun National Park (in Sukabumi, West Java) from Sumbawa (Nusa Tenggara) and Sumatra.

"It's firmly believed that these bees, which produce the popular Sumbawa honey, have had to migrate hundreds of kilometers to reach the Bogor Botanical Gardens and the Mt. Halimun National Park as they could no longer find mature or tall trees in their original range," she said. (21/bsr)