The seriously endangered Mediterranean monk seal has not been recorded off Libya since 1810. Mr Norris lived in Libya in 1966–68, and is able to report regular offshore sightings on the inaccessible Marmarican coast, two occasions in the early 1960s when a ‘strange fish’ with ‘whiskers like a man’ and a cry ‘like a woman’ hauled up on a beach within Tobruk harbour, and one established breeding colony of 20 or more animals living in submarine offshore caves, known to local fishermen and never molested by them.

Colombia has one of the largest bird faunas in the world – over 1550 species, over 300 mammals, including the endangered spectacled bear and mountain tapir, 350 reptiles and over 1000 fish, and a vast range of habitats, from the tropical rain forest of the Pacific coast and lowland swamps to the spectacular peaks of the high Andes, 20,000 feet and more. In recent years Colombia has set aside over 3½ million acres for national parks and reserves, which are described here by Dr Hunsaker, Conservation Co-ordinator with INDERENA (the Government department concerned) for the Peace-Corps-Smithsonian Program in Bogotá. Colombia's conservation efforts began in 1919 with the passing of the first laws protecting the fauna and flora. In 1941 the Government introduced hunting regulations, and in 1948 the first biological reserve, La Macarena, was set aside. A law passed in 1954 made the condor the first fully protected species. Since then government, universities and interested people have worked to coordinate, in so far as possible, the national park system, the wildlife service and university projects to protect wilderness and wildlife in this extremely critical region of South America.

Man is the only land vertebrate to have successfully colonised the remote Easter Island, and his domestic animals graze almost the whole island. Three, perhaps four species of sea turtle occur, and of fourteen species of seabird, eight breed, some in very large numbers. Five bird species have been introduced with unhappy results. There is now a weekly air service to Easter Island, and Dr. Harrisson, who spent eight days there early this year, urges the need for careful study of conservation problems and support for the Chilean government.

A footnote to the article on vicuna by Dr H. Jungius in the last Oryx, May 1972, reported that Jeffery Boswall had seen numbers of vicuna in Argentina, where Dr Jungius feared they were extinct. In this article Mr Boswall describes the sightings made by his party and his reasons for thinking there may still be several hundreds, perhaps more, in Argentina.

In the December 1970 Oryx we published an article by Dr Laws on his elephant research in the Tsavo National Park. This was written in 1968, and in this additional note he summarises the findings of later research, both by him and by other research workers, which support its conclusions, and also comments on the article by Dr P. E. Glover, Botanist Warden of the Tsavo Research Project, published in the September 1970 Oryx.

In an eight-month field study of the pygmy hippopotamus, an endangered Red Book species, the author was able to make some assessment of the status of other animals in Liberia and Sierra Leone and shows how the danger is increasing for most of them. Chimpanzees in particular are exported in large numbers, and in order to catch the young animals whole family groups may be eliminated.

The author suggests that the leathery turtle, the world’s largest species, is seriously endangered despite the discovery a few years ago of a big new rookery in French Guiana. He urges that part of the only other known large rookery — at Trengganu, in Malaysia — should be declared a national park, where tourists would be encouraged under careful supervision, and a much increased hatchery programme initiated by the government.

Two members of the Rhodesia National Parks Department make a preliminary reassessment of the status of the black rhinoceros Diceros bicomis in Rhodesia, and examine the techniques for estimating numbers used by Dr. H. H. Roth in his paper on White and Black Rhinoceros in Rhodesia, in ORYX, December 1967 and which, they believe, led him to overestimate the situation. They call the black rhino the hook-lipped rhino, but the more usual name has been retained in the title as being more widely understood.

Ruthless exploitation of the seals and penguins and destruction by domestic stock of the tussac grass – which provides food and shelter for both wildlife and sheep – have characterised the Falkland Islands in the recent past. Today, however, the outlook is brighter and both the government and private individuals are creating reserves and sanctuaries, including the 14 islands of the Jason group which are one of the richest untouched wildlife areas. The author, a naturalist living in the islands, and responsible for much of the survey work he describes, pleads for a rational use of the wildlife so that a balance can be achieved. Fortunately, tourism is already showing that wildlife has a new commercial value.

Of the two rhinos formerly found in Thailand, the Javan is believed now to be extinct there, although the authors of this survey report that some villagers in southern Thailand insist that the rhinos in their area are Javan. The Sumatran rhino is in desperate straits, with poaching a major threat – not surprisingly when a dead animal can be sold for die equivalent of up to twenty years' wages for a farmer.

The lion-tailed macaque of southern India is in danger; even in 1963 there were probably fewer than a thousand in the wild. But zoos have found them easy to obtain, and a survey this year showed 79 in US zoos. The author, who is Associate Curator of Mammals at San Diego Zoo, having visited India and seen how precarious was the monkey's situation in the wild, proposed that AAZPA (American Association of Zoological Parks and Aquariums) should consider starting a captive breeding project using animals already in American zoos. In September 1970 AAZPA agreed to do this and also placed restrictions on imports of the macaque by its members. The author is chairman of the committee that is running the project, and appeals for European and other zoos to take part.

West Malaysia has elephants, tapir, seladang, tiger and the Sumatran rhinoceros among its fauna, and a wealth of flowering plants – some 8000. The author spent a year attached to the Federal Game Department, with the task of surveying all likely areas for national parks in order to preserve a representative selection of this remarkable wildlife. His report to the Game Department, of which this is a summary, proposed seven major reserves – one national park (already in existence) and six national monuments.

A paper in Oryx, May 1970, Elephants or Fire – Which to Blame?, by R.M. Lawton and Mary Gough, may have given a wrong impression of the ecological work being carried out by the Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and National Parks in the Luangwa Valley game reserves. The authors of the paper disagree with the policy of culling animals within the game reserves, and consider that the Control of fire should be a primary aim in management.

Until 1966 the parma or white-throated wallaby Macropus parma was believed to have been extinct in Australia for over thirty years. But in that year the authors discovered a considerable number on the New Zealand island of Kawau, where they had been introduced a century ago, as described in Oryx December 1969. Like other wallabies they had been shot and poisoned in considerable numbers because of the damage they do to tree seedlings and agricultural land, but the authors are hopeful that management plans now in hand will ensure their survival unmolested.