On a quiet morning in early 2026, Tipusa Sangsawang watched through binoculars as a mother dugong surfaced beside her calf near the shallow banks of Koh Libong, a rare and tender sight after years of loss. Just a few years earlier, the waters around this sleepy Thai island had grown eerily silent, their once-thriving seagrass meadows reduced to barren sand, and the dugong population teetering on local extinction. Now, with 33 individuals counted in recent aerial surveys—up from an estimated 10 in 2025—the return of these gentle marine mammals is a quiet triumph of community resilience.
Koh Libong, home to 3,000 people and once surrounded by Thailand’s largest seagrass meadows, saw up to 50% of its underwater grasslands vanish between 2020 and 2024. The loss, driven by marine heat waves and river-mouth dredging, shattered the delicate food web. Dugongs, which rely almost entirely on seagrass, began starving—autopsies of emaciated animals washing ashore confirmed it. The decline didn’t just threaten wildlife; it upended lives. Fisher Torfar Jongarap recalls walking the shore to gather food for his family. Now, with nearshore catches gone, he spends triple the fuel venturing farther out to sea. “The food chain is degraded,” he says. “Before, everyone could go looking for food near to the shore. But now we all need boats.”
In response, a grassroots movement took root. The Dugong Guardians, a volunteer network led by Tipusa across the island’s eight villages, began monitoring dugong sightings, rescuing stranded animals, and partnering with scientists from Prince of Songkhla University to trial seagrass transplantation. Their work is fueled by memory and mission: Tipusa once cared for Marium, a baby dugong who captured the nation’s heart before dying in 2019 from a blood infection caused by ingesting plastic. “The day she died, I promised her I’d look after her family,” Tipusa recalls. That promise now echoes in classrooms, where children sketch dugongs and learn to protect seagrass beds.
The rise to 33 dugongs—including mothers with calves—isn’t just a number. It’s evidence that recovery is possible, even in damaged ecosystems. But the path remains fragile. Tipusa recently spotted a speedboat racing through a feeding zone, a stark reminder that enforcement and awareness must grow alongside the population. Still, she finds hope in the next generation. “The energy I received through Marium, I now feel it in the children,” she says. “That keeps me going.” As seagrass patches slowly regrow and dugongs return to graze, Koh Libong is proving that when a community rallies around a species, it’s not just saving an animal—it’s restoring a future.