Let’s Save Real-life ‘SIRENAS’

Last January 9, the Biodiversity Management Bureau (BMB) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DNER) had rescued a neonate, a male dugong or sea cow that got stranded in a coastal village in Quezon province. But unfortunately 10 days after being saved the baby dugong died. Binu, the dugong, was the youngest recovered sea cow by the department for the past ten years.

Dugong (Dugong dugon) or duyong, is a sea mammal that belongs to a group of animals known as Sirenians. They are called sirenians because in the olden days, sailors mistook these animals for mermaids or ‘sirena.’ Like whales and dolphins, they have to surface from the water in order to breathe air. And like any other mammal, they feed their infants with their milk. They are classified as grazers and only eat sea grasses. Dugongs, the only survivor of Family Dugongidae, are can be found along the coast of 42 countries within the warm and shallow waters of the Indian and West Pacific Oceans. Also, they live in the northern waters of Australia then extend to coast of Africa and Arabian regions.