Another Coral Garden in Singapore!?

After the exciting walk yesterday, we are out again today to catch another low tide before the year 2007 ended. Our effort proved to be fruitful. We found another coral garden in Singapore!

Just look at the photos below:
Check out the tide Chaser blog! There are a lot more of interesting creatures that was found on this secret place.
Seaweed, ascidian,... Sponges of all colours....
Sea whip
Sea fanSoft coralsand hard corals too!!

Isn't it amazing?? Can't wait to know where?

Chek Jawa Tidal Walk on 23 Dec 07

This is my first time walking at the inter-tidal area at Chek Jawa after a real long wait. I have been trying to book for a trip for the above for nearly 2 years (one & a half minus the closure after the flood). The walk was so popular that the within 30 mins whenever it open up for booking every quarterly, is all snapped up. Is either the walk was really so popular, everybody are so interested in visiting the last few natural shore that we have in Singapore or the booking system need some improvement. Hopefully under the new system, booking is confirmed only after payment will cut down those just book and didn't show up for the walkon the actual day.

After walk down from the boardwalk, we saw this tiny mangrove horseshoe crab, Carcinoscorpius rotundicauda (on the left). Coastal horse shoe crab, Tachypleus gigas tend to be bigger in size (photo on the right, was found later closer to shore). To differentiate the two, other than size, mangrove horse shoe crab are more brownish and the tail is round instead of triangle on the coastal horse shoe crabs.There are lots of peacock anemone with all diferent colours.

And also tiny sea cucumber with diferent colours too. Thorny pink sea cucumber Colochirus quadrangularis with diameter only about the size of my finger.

We also saw this ball sea cucumber, Phyllophorus spiculata that is smaller than my watch.

We spotted 2 different sea stars too. Sand star (Astropecten indicus) on the left and not sure about the one on the right. Looks either like cake or buiscuit sea star. Not sure is which one.A close-up look.

This is another sea star, a brittle star that probably a Ophiothrix fumaria that like to turn upside down for feeding during low tide.

There a lots of sand dollars (closely related to sea stars and sea cucumber - Echinoderms, spiny skinned animals) on Chek Jawa.This Sand dollar slightly smaller than a 50 cents coin. (do we call it Sand half dollar?? just joking)This are the trails left behind by the sand dollars.There are lots of this straw like things on the floor. These are the house of the tube worms which attracted lot of birds came here for feeding during low tides.This long stalked eyes crab, genus Macrophthalmus is out for feeding too. This flower crab Portunus pelagicus will not hesitate to raise up his arms to fight any creatures that comes near them.Harpiosquilla mantis shrimp that having the scissor-like front limb to catch fish or other shrimps.The real big green mussel Perna viridis about the length of my palm.This hermit crab is taking over the volute's shell as his home.This beautiful snail is called Hydatina amplustre . Little is known about this beautiful creature. There are lots more to learn about the creatures that are found in Singapore.
Razor shell that usually burried in the sands.
This Armina babai that feed on sea pen is about to burrow into the sands.This is a common scene during low tide, fishes will sometimes accidently lands on drier part of the tidal pool. Luckyly they all managed to 'jump' back to the nearer tidal pool. Part and parcel of growing up learning process??A beautiful sea squirt seen in a old lorry tyre.

Is a wonderful experience being able to visit this beautiful shore at Pulau Ubin. Thanks to RMBR in making this trip possible....... i have been trying to get entry to this place for the last 2 years!! I'm sure there are more people out there that take longer times than me. :-)

The rain was really heavy when we are on the way back to mainland. Now I understand why one will need to wait for so long to gain entry to Chek Jawa..... we have too little nature shore for too many people. sigh.....

Merry Christmas!!!

will be busy on the last few low tides of the year...... wish everyone

Merry Christmas & a hapy New Year!!!

Fun Day at Sungai Buloh 15 December 07

After the long winded monsoon rain for the past 2 weeks, the weather is extremely good on Saturday. Bunch of nature lovers cum bloggers were out on the field again. Although started slightly later than scheduled time, the temperature remains comfortable around 27 degree C throughout the trip. The low temperature helps to made taking photo easier as the insect will not be too active.

It was really fun to have a group of friends sharing the same interest out on the field trying to compete with each other who’s the “Best Photographer of The Year”!

Whenever insect was spotted, the whole gang will zoooomm….. try to get the best shot of the spiders.

We have tide chaser, urban forest, colourful clouds, ashira, where discovery begins & justin dive.


tide chaser & urban forest compete with each other (earlier photo) over this fly while c c checking the end result.
One camera always standby behind another camera....
The most enjoyable and highlight of the day as mentioned by urban forest is this high jump champion - jumping spider. Several method were seen used by the group.... whisper,

showing the spider her beautiful photo
fren-fren, buddy-buddy.....The spider seems to enjoy the hospitality provided by the group..... she visit one after another just to make sure everybody have the fair share of attention --- very professional model!!

Sometimes ago during the kampong days, before the invention of video game, catching spider and spider fighting is one of the favorites past time activities after school among kids. Well, times changed. Now with technology, the rules of the game have also changed. The winner no longer need to have the most ‘garang’ spiders but to have the best cover shot of the spiders….ha ha

Side track a bit..... Looks like Olympus & Pentax are the 2 most welcome cameras over Canon. (Mmmmm.... Canon really need to do something on the features instead of just banging on ease of printing and the pixel. )To win this kind of special competition, camera is not the only deciding factors already! The ability to communicate and talk to the insect is the key!!! Special tips.... don't apply or apply minimum insect repellent if need to.... who's the winner? I leave it to you. :-)


***************************

Noticed that the water monitor lizard are getting lesser especially the bigger one around the fresh water pond area.... just curious

Real Biscuit Star

Received this biscuit star from my colleague..... yes Real Buiscuit Star!! ha ha

Imagine

No matter what we do or think, always, there is another party that having the opposite opinion and approach (Einstein's theory of relativity?) Does this explain why there are so many “lovely feedback” posted to blogs that touches on nature or environmental??

There is only one earth – all will have to live and stay within the same planet. It will be another waste of energy and resources to argue with each other on what they believe to be TRUE. One party will always think ways to sabotage or demolish defenses put up by another party. If both parties can align their objectives, I’m sure both party will win at the end.

Those who depends on nature for there livelihood just need to exercise some discipline and take not more than needed and remove all malfunction tools or equipment including entangled line, net etc before they leave, the time needed for nature to recover will be shorten so that the catching can be sustainable. They are also the best person to provide info on places that they visited.

Can this be achieved or just imagine? mmmm.......

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

TheStainerbuG ask the ant, "How you gain access to my area?"