THE PRELIMINARY SURVEY OF COASTAL VEGETATION AT MANTANANI BESAR ISLAND Andy R. Mojiol¹, Jephte Sompud¹, Ejria Saleh² and Flake Alip¹ ¹ Faculty of Science and Natural Resources, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, 88400 Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. ²Institute for Marine Borneo Research, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, 88400 Kota Kinabalu, Sabah Abstract. To date, there is lack of baseline information of the status of vegetation in Mantanani Island. We have conducted a preliminary survey of coastal vegetation in Mantanani Besar with the aim to gather information about plant species that grow around the coast of the island. A three days survey was conducted from 11 November to 13 November 2013. The main method used was collecting sample derived from plants and trees following the existing trails around the coastal area and plant identification using pocket checklist. The trail traveled in the island is estimated about 4 km long started from the Mari-Mari backpackers lodges to west side of the island are Kampung Siring Bukit until the Mantanani Proboscis lodges at the edge. While on the east side of Mari-Mari backpacker lodges are Kampung Padang until the Bembaran Mantanani Beach Resort at the northwest of the island. A total number of 28 species of plants were identified. With 8 shrubs species and 20 species of trees were recorded. The majority of the vegetation species collected are from the family of Leguminosae. The result of this preliminary survey provides a general view of the coastal vegetation of plants in Mantanani Island. Keywords. Mantanani Island, Sabah, Coastal Vegetation, Tree and Shrub. INTRODUCTION The Mantanani Islands form a small group of three islands off the north-west coast of the state of Sabah, Malaysia, opposite the town of Kota Belud, in northern Borneo. The largest island is Mantanani Besar; the other two are Mantanani Kecil and Lungisan. It is a popular site for recreational diving as there are three nearby dive wrecks dating from the Second World War, as well as being known for its dugongs (Wikipedia, 2014) The southern coast of Mantanani Besar Island is heavily developed by tourist operator and human settlements; there are two Village areas named Kg. Siring Bukit and Kg. Padang and the occupants are largely the Ubians. There are many resorts which estimated about 5 operators that are fully operated. To date, there is lack of baseline information of the status of vegetation in Mantanani. We only found few studies that mentioned Mantanani Island in their study site such as Oldfield Thomas (1894), with the title ‘a preliminary revision of the Bornean species of the genus Mus’. Sodhi et al. Expedition Seminar of the Institute of Marine Research, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Kota Kinabalu. 24 June 2014.