Fisheries bycatch is a widespread and serious issue that leads to declines of many important and threatened marine species. However, documenting the distribution, abundance, population trends and threats to sparse populations of marine species is often beyond the capacity of developing countries because such work is complex, time consuming and often extremely expensive. We have developed a flexible tool to document spatial distribution and population trends for dugongs and other marine species in the form of an interview questionnaire supported by a structured data upload sheet and a comprehensive project manual. Recognising the effort invested in getting interviewers to remote locations, the questionnaire is comprehensive, but low cost. The questionnaire has already been deployed in 18 countries across the Indo-Pacific region. Project teams spent an average of USD 5,000 per country and obtained large data sets on dugong distribution, trends, catch and bycatch, and threat overlaps. Findings indicated that >50% of respondents had never seen dugongs and that 20% had seen a single dugong in their lifetimes despite living and fishing in areas of known or suspected dugong habitat, suggesting that dugongs occurred in low numbers. Only 3% of respondents had seen mother and calf pairs, indicative of low reproductive output. Dugong hunting was still common in several countries. Gillnets and hook and line were the most common fishing gears, with the greatest mortality caused by gillnets. The questionnaire has also been used to study manatees in the Caribbean, coastal cetaceans along the eastern Gulf of Thailand and western Peninsular Malaysia, and river dolphins in Peru. This questionnaire is a powerful tool for studying distribution and relative abundance for marine species and fishery pressures, and determining potential conservation hotspot areas. We provide the questionnaire and supporting documents for open-access use by the scientific and conservation communities.
A new species of Bent-toed Gecko, Cyrtodactylus gunungsenyumensis sp. nov. of the sworderi complex, is described from Hutan Lipur Gunung Senyum, Pahang, Peninsular Malaysia and is differentiated from all other species in the sworderi complex by having a unique combination of characters including a maximum SVL of 74.7 mm; low, rounded, weakly keeled, body tubercles; 34-40 paravertebral tubercles; weak ventrolateral body fold lacking tubercles; 38-41 ventral scales; an abrupt transition between the posterior and ventral femoral scales; 20-23 subdigital lamellae on the fourth toe; enlarged femoral scales; no femoral or precloacal pores; no precloacal groove; wide caudal bands; and an evenly banded dorsal pattern. Cyrtodactylus gunungsenyumensis sp. nov. is a scansorial, karst forest-adapted specialist endemic to the karst ecosystem surrounding Gunung Senyum and occurs on the vertical walls of the limestone towers as well as the branches, trunks, and leaves of the vegetation in the associated karst forest. Cyrtodactylus gunungsenyumensis sp. nov. is the seventh species of karst forest-adapted Cyrtodactylus and the sixteenth endemic species of karst ecosystem reptile discovered in Peninsular Malaysia in the last seven years from only 12 different karst forests. This is a clear indication that many species remain to be discovered in the approximately 558 isolated karst ecosystems in Peninsular Malaysia not yet surveyed. These data continue to underscore the importance of karst ecosystems as reservoirs of biodiversity and microendemism and that they constitute an important component of Peninsular Malaysia's natural heritage and should be protected from the quarrying interests of foreign industrial companies.
In this article we present a standardized dataset on 6659 songbirds (Passeriformes) highlighting information relevant to species conservation prioritization with a main focus to support the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Data were collected from both scientific and grey literature as well as several online databases. The data are structured into six knowledge categories: Conventions and Treaties, Human Use, Extinction Risk, Management Opportunities, Biological Information, and Intrinsic Values. The Conventions and Treaties category includes the listings for two international conventions, CITES and the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS), as well as EU listings for the EU Wildlife Trade Regulations and the EU Birds Directive. The Human Use category contains information on both regulated trade collected from the CITES Trade Database and the United States' Law Enforcement Management Information System (LEMIS), and highly aggregated data on seizures which we obtained from TRAFFIC, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and two data sources on traditional medicine. We also present, for the first time, the complete Songbirds in Trade Database (SiTDB), a trade database curated by taxon expert S. Bruslund based on expert knowledge, literature review, market surveys and sale announcements. Data on the types of human use, including traditional medicine are also provided. The knowledge area on Extinction Risk contains data on the species' IUCN Red List status, the Alliance for Zero Extinction Trigger Species status, site and population at the site, the species' IUCN Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment, and the listing of priority species at the Asian Songbird Crisis Summit. In the Management Opportunities category, we gathered data on ex-situ management from Species360 zoo holdings as well as species management plans from the European and North American Zoo Associations (EAZA and AZA, respectively). Biological Information includes data on body mass, clutch size, diet, availability of data from the IUCN Red List on habitat systems, extent of occurrence, generation length, migration pattern, distribution, and biological data from the Demographic Species Knowledge Index, number of occurrences recorded by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) as well as genomic data from the Bird 10 000K Genomes (B10K) project, Vertebrate Genome Project (VGP) and GenBank. Information on invasive species is also part of this knowledge area. The Intrinsic Value category refers to two measures of the species' intrinsic value, namely Ecological and Evolutionary Distinctiveness. In order to make these knowledge areas comparable, we standardized data following the taxonomy of the Handbook of the Birds of the World and Birdlife (Version 4, 2019). The data enable a broad spectrum of analyses and will be useful to scientists for further research and to policymakers, zoos and other conservation stakeholders for future prioritization decisions.
Malayan box turtle (Cuora amboinensis) has been a wildlife-protected vulnerable turtle species in Malaysia since 2005. However, because of its purported usage in traditional medicine, tonic foods and feeds, clandestine black market trade is rampant. Several polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays for the taxonomic detection and classification of turtle species have been proposed. These assays are based on long-length target amplicons which are assumed to break down under compromised states and, hence, might not be suitable for the forensic tracing and tracking of turtle trafficking. For the first time this paper develops a very short-amplicon-length PCR assay (120 bp) for the detection of Malayan box turtle meat in raw, processed and mixed matrices, and experimental evidence is produced that such an assay is not only more stable and reliable but also more sensitive than those previously published. We checked the assay specificity against 20 different species and no cross-species detection was observed. The possibility of any false-negative detection was eliminated by a universal endogenous control for eukaryotes. The assay detection limit was 0.0001 ng of box turtle DNA from pure meat and 0.01% turtle meat in binary and ternary admixtures and commercial meatballs. Superior target stability and sensitivity under extreme treatments of boiling, autoclaving and microwave cooking suggested that this newly developed assay would be suitable for any forensic and/or archaeological identification of Malayan box turtle species, even in severely degraded specimens. Further, in silico studies indicated that the assay has the potential to be used as a universal probe for the detection of nine Cuora species, all of which are critically endangered.
Infant survival is a major determinant of individual fitness and constitutes a crucial factor in shaping species' ability to maintain viable populations in changing environments.1 Early adverse conditions, such as maternal loss, social isolation, and ecological hazards, have been associated with reduced rates of infant survivorship in wild primates.2,3,4 Agricultural landscapes increasingly replacing natural forest habitats may additionally threaten the survival of infants through exposure to novel predators,5 human-wildlife conflicts,6,7 or the use of harmful chemicals.8,9 Here, we investigated potential links between agricultural habitat use and high infant mortality in wild southern pig-tailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina) inhabiting a mosaic landscape of rainforest and oil palm plantation in Peninsular Malaysia. Longitudinal data revealed that 57% of all infants born during the study period (2014-2023) died before the age of 1 year, far exceeding mortality rates reported for other wild primates.10,11,12,13,14 Importantly, prolonged time spent in the plantation during infancy decreased the likelihood of infant survival by 3-fold, likely caused by increased exposure to the threats inherent to this environment. Further, mortality risk was elevated for infants born to primiparous mothers and predicted by prolonged maternal interbirth intervals, suggesting potential long-term effects attributed to the uptake and/or accumulation of pesticides in mothers' bodies.15,16,17 Indeed, existing literature reports that pesticides may cross the placental barrier, thus impacting fetal development during pregnancy.18,19,20 Our findings emphasize the importance of minimizing anthropogenic threats to wildlife in agricultural landscapes by establishing environmentally friendly cultivation practices that can sustain wildlife populations in the long term.
Balancing economic development with international commitments to protect biodiversity is a global challenge. Achieving this balance requires an understanding of the possible consequences of alternative future scenarios for a range of stakeholders. We employ an integrated economic and environmental planning approach to evaluate four alternative futures for the mega-diverse island of Borneo. We show what could be achieved if the three national jurisdictions of Borneo coordinate efforts to achieve their public policy targets and allow a partial reallocation of planned land uses. We reveal the potential for Borneo to simultaneously retain ∼50% of its land as forests, protect adequate habitat for the Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus) and Bornean elephant (Elephas maximus borneensis), and achieve an opportunity cost saving of over US$43 billion. Such coordination would depend on enhanced information sharing and reforms to land-use planning, which could be supported by the increasingly international nature of economies and conservation efforts.
BACKGROUND: Asian slow lorises (Nycticebus spp.) are one of few known venomous mammals, yet until now only one published case report has documented the impact of their venomous bite on humans. We describe the reaction of a patient to the bite of a subadult Nycticebus kayan, which occurred in the Mulu District of Sarawak in 2012.
FINDINGS: Within minutes of the bite, the patient experienced paraesthesia in the right side of the jaw, ear and right foot. By 40 minutes, swelling of the face was pronounced. The patient was admitted to Mulu National Park Health Clinic/Klinik Kesihatan Taman Mulu Tarikh, at which time he was experiencing: swollen mouth, chest pain, mild abdominal pain, nausea, numbness of the lips and mouth, shortness of breath, weakness, agitation and the sensation of pressure in the ears due to swelling. The blood pressure was 110/76, the heart ratio was 116 and oxygen saturation was 96%. The patient was treated intramuscularly with adrenaline (0.5 mL), followed by intravenous injection of hydrocortisone (400 mg) and then intravenous fluid therapy of normal saline (500 mg). By 8 h10 the next day, the patient's condition had significantly improved with no nausea, and with blood pressure and pulse rate stable.
CONCLUSIONS: A handful of anecdotes further support the real danger that slow loris bites pose to humans. As the illegal pet trade is a major factor in the decline of these threatened species, we hope that by reporting on the danger of handling these animals it may help to reduce their desirability as a pet.
The Tapirus indicus, also known as Malayan tapir, has been listed as a rapidly declining animal species in the past decades, along with being declared and categorized as an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) 2016. This tapir species is geographically distributed across several countries in Southeast Asia such as Peninsular Malaysia, Indonesia (Sumatra), South Thailand, and Myanmar. Amongst these countries, the Peninsula Malaysia forest is recorded to contain the highest number of Malayan tapir population. Unfortunately, in the past decades, the population of Malayan tapirs has declined swiftly due to serious deforestation, habitat fragmentation, and heavy vehicle accidents during road crossings at forest routes. Concerned by this predicament, the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (DWNP) Peninsular Malaysia collaborated with a few local universities to conduct various studies aimed at increasing the population number of tapirs in Malaysia. Several studies were conducted with the aim of enhancing the well-being of tapirs in captivity. Veterinarians face problems when it comes to selecting healthy and suitable tapirs for breeding programs at conservation centers. Conventional molecular methods using high-throughput sequencing provides a solution in determining the health condition of Malayan tapirs using the Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) technology. Unaware by most, gut microbiome plays an important role in determining the health condition of an organism by various aspects: (1) digestion control; (2) benefiting the immune system; and (3) playing a role as a "second brain." Commensal gut bacterial communities (microbiomes) are predicted to influence organism health and disease. Imbalance of unhealthy and healthy microbes in the gut may contribute to weight gain, high blood sugar, high cholesterol, and other disorders. In infancy, neonatal gut microbiomes are colonized with maternal and environmental flora, and mature toward a stable composition in two to three years. Interactions between the microorganism communities and the host allow for the establishment of microbiological roles. Identifying the core microbiome(s) are essential in the prediction of diseases and changes in environmental behavior of microorganisms. The dataset of 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing of Malayan tapir was deposited in the MG-RAST portal. Parameters such as quality control, taxonomic prediction (unknown and predicted), diversity (rarefaction), and diversity (alpha) were analyzed using sequencing approaches (Amplicon sequencing). Comparisons of parameters, according to the type of sequencing, showed significant differences, except for the prediction variable. In the Amplicon sequencing datasets, the parameters Rarefaction and Unknown had the highest correlation, while Alpha and Predicted had the lowest. Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, Bacilli, and Bacteroidia were the most representative genera in Malayan tapir amplicon sequences, which indicated that most of the tapirs were healthy. However, continuous assessment to maintain the well-being of tapir for long term is still required. This chapter focuses on the introduction of 16S rRNA amplicon metagenomics in analyzing Malayan tapir gut microbiome dataset.
Plants play a crucial role in foodstuff, medicine, industry, and environmental protection. The skill of recognising plants is very important in some applications, including conservation of endangered species and rehabilitation of lands after mining activities. However, it is a difficult task to identify plant species because it requires specialized knowledge. Developing an automated classification system for plant species is necessary and valuable since it can help specialists as well as the public in identifying plant species easily. Shape descriptors were applied on the myDAUN dataset that contains 45 tropical shrub species collected from the University of Malaya (UM), Malaysia. Based on literature review, this is the first study in the development of tropical shrub species image dataset and classification using a hybrid of leaf shape and machine learning approach. Four types of shape descriptors were used in this study namely morphological shape descriptors (MSD), Histogram of Oriented Gradients (HOG), Hu invariant moments (Hu) and Zernike moments (ZM). Single descriptor, as well as the combination of hybrid descriptors were tested and compared. The tropical shrub species are classified using six different classifiers, which are artificial neural network (ANN), random forest (RF), support vector machine (SVM), k-nearest neighbour (k-NN), linear discriminant analysis (LDA) and directed acyclic graph multiclass least squares twin support vector machine (DAG MLSTSVM). In addition, three types of feature selection methods were tested in the myDAUN dataset, Relief, Correlation-based feature selection (CFS) and Pearson's coefficient correlation (PCC). The well-known Flavia dataset and Swedish Leaf dataset were used as the validation dataset on the proposed methods. The results showed that the hybrid of all descriptors of ANN outperformed the other classifiers with an average classification accuracy of 98.23% for the myDAUN dataset, 95.25% for the Flavia dataset and 99.89% for the Swedish Leaf dataset. In addition, the Relief feature selection method achieved the highest classification accuracy of 98.13% after 80 (or 60%) of the original features were reduced, from 133 to 53 descriptors in the myDAUN dataset with the reduction in computational time. Subsequently, the hybridisation of four descriptors gave the best results compared to others. It is proven that the combination MSD and HOG were good enough for tropical shrubs species classification. Hu and ZM descriptors also improved the accuracy in tropical shrubs species classification in terms of invariant to translation, rotation and scale. ANN outperformed the others for tropical shrub species classification in this study. Feature selection methods can be used in the classification of tropical shrub species, as the comparable results could be obtained with the reduced descriptors and reduced in computational time and cost.
The Bukit Merah Orang Utan Island (OUI) Foundation has been conducting behavioral and veterinary research on orangutans as an attempt at ex situ conservation. Since 2010, the Primate Research Institute, Kyoto University has been collaborating with OUI to promote environmental enrichment and infant rearing by biological mothers in addition to the continuous efforts of refining the veterinary management of the endangered species. In 2011, three Bornean orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus pygmaeus) were released on an island, called BJ Island, adjacent to OUI. This island is approximately 5.6 ha in size, and 635 trees belonging to 102 plant species were identified prior to their release. Behavioral monitoring of the released individuals has been conducted to evaluate their behavioral adaptation to the new environment. Two of the three released orangutans were born in the wild, whereas the youngest individual was born on OUI and expected to learn forest survival strategies from the two older individuals. One of the orangutans was pregnant at the time of release and subsequently gave birth to two male infants on BJ Island. The behavioral monitoring indicated that these orangutans traveled more and spent more time on trees following their release onto BJ Island. However, resting was longer for two females both on OUI and BJ Island when compared to other populations. The orangutans consumed some natural food resources on BJ Island. The release into a more naturalistic environment may help the orangutans to develop more naturalistic behavioral patterns that resemble their wild counterparts.
This study explored the conservation values of communally reserved forests (CRFs), which local indigenous communities deliberately preserve within their area of shifting cultivation. In the current landscape of rural Borneo, CRFs are the only option for conservation because other forested areas have already been logged or transformed into plantations. By analyzing their alpha and beta diversity, we investigated how these forests can contribute to restore regional biodiversity. Although CRFs were fragmented and some had been disturbed in the past, their tree species diversity was high and equivalent to that of primary forests. The species composition of intact forests and forests disturbed in the past did not differ clearly, which indicates that past logging was not intensive. All CRFs contained unique and endangered species, which are on the IUCN Red List, Sarawak protected plants, or both. On the other hand, the forest size structure differed between disturbed and intact CRFs, with the disturbed CRFs consisting of relatively smaller trees. Although the beta diversity among CRFs was also high, we found a high contribution of species replacement (turnover), but not of richness difference, in the total beta diversity. This suggests that all CRFs have a conservation value for restoring the overall regional biodiversity. Therefore, for maintaining the regional species diversity and endangered species, it would be suitable to design a conservation target into all CRFs.
We describe unique reproductive features of two threatened Galliformes species, the Malaysian peacock-pheasant (Polyplectron malacense) and Bornean peacock-pheasant (P. schleiermacheri). These features pose challenges to successful captive breeding to build up sustainable populations for conservation purposes. Single egg clutches in both species mean that reproductive rates are low and population increase is slow. The very rounded eggs of Bornean Peacock-pheasant cause difficulties for egg orientation in incubators. Single chicks with special requirements are poorly suited to rearing by broody bantams and successful husbandry requires increased human time, commitment, and skills.
Mammalian carnivores play a vital role in ecosystem functioning. However, they are prone to extinction because of low population densities and growth rates, and high levels of persecution or exploitation. In tropical biodiversity hotspots such as Peninsular Malaysia, rapid conversion of natural habitats threatens the persistence of this vulnerable group of animals. Here, we carried out the first comprehensive literature review on 31 carnivore species reported to occur in Peninsular Malaysia and updated their probable distribution. We georeferenced 375 observations of 28 species of carnivore from 89 unique geographic locations using records spanning 1948 to 2014. Using the Getis-Ord Gi*statistic and weighted survey records by IUCN Red List status, we identified hotspots of species that were of conservation concern and built regression models to identify environmental and anthropogenic landscape factors associated with Getis-Ord Gi* z scores. Our analyses identified two carnivore hotspots that were spatially concordant with two of the peninsula's largest and most contiguous forest complexes, associated with Taman Negara National Park and Royal Belum State Park. A cold spot overlapped with the southwestern region of the Peninsula, reflecting the disappearance of carnivores with higher conservation rankings from increasingly fragmented natural habitats. Getis-Ord Gi* z scores were negatively associated with elevation, and positively associated with the proportion of natural land cover and distance from the capital city. Malaysia contains some of the world's most diverse carnivore assemblages, but recent rates of forest loss are some of the highest in the world. Reducing poaching and maintaining large, contiguous tracts of lowland forests will be crucial, not only for the persistence of threatened carnivores, but for many mammalian species in general.
The Klang Gates Quartz Ridge (KGQR) is proposed for protection as National Heritage and as a UNESCO World Heritage Site because of its spectacular size, exceptional beauty and significant biodiversity. The checklist of vascular plants documents 314 species that comprise a unique combination that grows on lowland quartz and that is distinct from the surrounding lowland equatorial rain forest by the absence of orchids, palms, gingers and tree canopy families. The Rubiaceae, Gramineae, Moraceae, Apocynaceae, Melastomataceae and Polypodiaceae are the most speciose families. The summit vegetation at 200-400 m elevation is dominated by Baeckea frutescens (Myrtaceae) and Rhodoleia championii (Hamamelidaceae) and shows similarities to the plant community on rocky mountain peaks above 1500 m. About 11% of its species are endemic in Peninsular Malaysia and four are endemic to KGQR: Aleisanthia rupestris (Rubiaceae), Codonoboea primulina (Gesneriaceae), Spermacoce pilulifera (Rubiaceae), and Ilex praetermissa (Aquifoliaceae). All four are provisionally assessed as Critically Endangered. Two, Eulalia milsumi (Gramineae) and Sonerila prostrata (Melastomataceae), are endemic to KGQR and a few neighbouring smaller quartz dykes. They are assessed as Endangered. The KGQR is a fragile habitat and conservation management is urgently required to halt the spread of the aggressive alien grass, Pennisetum polystachion and to prevent further habitat degradation from visitors. Based on KGQR being a threatened habitat, its biodiverse flora, and endangered species, it qualifies as an Important Plant Area.
We report here the complete mitochondrial (mt) genomes of six individuals of Cheilinus undulatus (Napoleon Wrasse), an endangered marine fish species. The six mt DNA sequences had an average size of 17,000 kb and encoded 22 tRNA, two sRNA, 13 highly conserved protein coding genes and a control region. The polymorphic variation (control region) in these six individuals suggests their potential use as a specific marker for phylogeographic conservation. Moreover, the sequence polymorphism within the control region (D-loop) suggests that this locus can be applied for phylogenetic studies.
The Sumatran orangutan is currently listed by the IUCN as critically endangered and the Bornean species as endangered. Unless effective conservation measures are enacted quickly, most orangutan populations without adequate protection face a dire future. Two main strategies are being pursued to conserve orangutans: (i) rehabilitation and reintroduction of ex-captive or displaced individuals; and (ii) protection of their forest habitat to abate threats like deforestation and hunting. These strategies are often mirrored in similar programs to save other valued and endangered mega-fauna. Through GIS analysis, collating data from across the literature, and combining this information within a modelling and decision analysis framework, we analysed which strategy or combination of strategies is the most cost-effective at maintaining wild orangutan populations, and under what conditions. We discovered that neither strategy was optimal under all circumstances but was dependent on the relative cost per orangutan, the timescale of management concern, and the rate of deforestation. Reintroduction, which costs twelve times as much per animal as compared to protection of forest, was only a cost-effective strategy at very short timescales. For time scales longer than 10-20 years, forest protection is the more cost-efficient strategy for maintaining wild orangutan populations. Our analyses showed that a third, rarely utilised strategy is intermediate: introducing sustainable logging practices and protection from hunting in timber production forest. Maximum long-term cost-efficiency is achieved by working in conservation forest. However, habitat protection involves addressing complex conservation issues and conflicting needs at the landscape level. We find a potential resolution in that well-managed production forests could achieve intermediate conservation outcomes. This has broad implications for sustaining biodiversity more generally within an economically productive landscape. Insights from this analysis should provide a better framework to prioritize financial investments, and facilitate improved integration between the organizations that implement these strategies.
As wild population threats for the endangered false gharial (Tomistoma schlegelii) persist, conservation breeding programs, including developing semen collection techniques for subsequent artificial insemination, are becoming important species conservation measures. Developing reproductive biology understanding of a species is important to developing best practices and hopefully maximizing reproductive successes. However, information on crocodylians functional copulatory anatomy in general is lacking. To that end, zoological facilities and conservation centres have the exceptional opportunity to contribute new understandings that may not otherwise be attainable regarding crocodylian reproductive anatomy, particularly during routine physical examinations or post-mortem necropsies. Therefore, to better understand T. schlegelii reproductive biology, to contribute knowledge in support of zoo breeding conservation efforts and to contribute to what is known overall about crocodylian reproduction, we investigated phallic anatomy of adult male Tomistoma from two zoological populations, the St. Louis Zoo, USA and Sungai Dusun Wildlife Reserve, Peninsular Malaysia. Here, we present the gross anatomical features and histological analysis of underlying tissue-level details in pursuit of a better understanding of copulatory function and associated gamete transfer mechanisms. While much of the overall Tomistoma phallic morphology and inferred function corresponds to that of other crocodylian species and speaks to conserved aspects of functional anatomy across taxa, species-specific aspects of glans and glans tip morphology are also identified. These novelties are discussed in a general function and overall broader evolutionary contexts.
The identification of Aquilaria species from their resinous non-wood product, the agarwood, is challenging as conventional techniques alone are unable to ascertain the species origin. Aquilaria is a highly protected species due to the excessive exploitation of its precious agarwood. Here, we applied the DNA barcoding technique to generate barcode sequences for Aquilaria species and later applied the barcodes to identify the source species of agarwood found in the market. We developed a reference DNA barcode library using eight candidate barcode loci (matK, rbcL, rpoB, rpoC1, psbA-trnH, trnL-trnF, ITS, and ITS2) amplified from 24 leaf accessions of seven Aquilaria species obtained from living trees. Our results indicated that all single barcodes can be easily amplified and sequenced with the selected primers. The combination of trnL-trnF+ITS and trnL-trnF+ITS2 yielded the greatest species resolution using the least number of loci combination, while matK+trnL-trnF+ITS showed potential in detecting the geographical origins of Aquilaria species. We propose trnL-trnF+ITS2 as the best candidate barcode for Aquilaria as ITS2 has a shorter sequence length compared to ITS, which eases PCR amplification especially when using degraded DNA samples such as those extracted from processed agarwood products. A blind test conducted on eight agarwood samples in different forms using the proposed barcode combination proved successful in their identification up to the species level. Such potential of DNA barcoding in identifying the source species of agarwood will contribute to the international timber trade control, by providing an effective method for species identification and product authentication.