Even though my secondary and JC were in Ang Mo Kio, I have never gone to the AMK West Town Park in my entire life. Luckily my friend who lived nearby kindly showed me around the park today. :)
I knew that there was a lotus pond there but I didn’t know that it was in such an unkempt state! A foul smell lingered from it and weeds were covering over the surface. There were a few people cleaning up the pond though, and this guy above tried pulling up a clump of grass that had covered part of the water.
There was a long climb up the park, guarded by these tall majestic cabbage palms, Roystonea oleracea.
My friend pointed out that we can sometimes find bats roosting under the folded leaves of Livistona chinensis. Sure enough, she managed to find one dog-faced fruit bat, Cynopterus brachyotis hiding at a palm leaf.
The Tembusu, Fagraea fragrans, is flowering everywhere now and we saw a bunch of small birds, like the white-eye above, feeding on the nectar.
At one end of the park, there was a big area for people who kept cage birds to let them enjoy the sunday morning. Who knows what the birds really felt though.
Most of the birds under the shelter are white-rumped shama, which is also a native bird.
Isn’t this a paddyfield pipit (another native)? What this ground dwelling bird doing it a cage? :s
I loved this park because it has a mixture of natural secondary forest (albeit a low quality one) and open spaces. Anyway, this tree with a large girth stood out among all the thin trees.
Looks like it is an Alstonia species, probably Alstonia angustiloba?
This bug looked like a hybrid of cockroach and wasp with centipede antennae. Creepy…
My friend pointed out this jackfruit tree, Artocarpus heterophyllus and we saw two plantain squirrels nibbling on the fruits. Cutez :)
After a loop, we were back to the lotus pond where the cleaners were still removing the weeds from the pond.
The pond is not entirely deprived of life though. We saw a lot of frogs inside it!
Awesome park for wildlife appreciation. I wish my neighbourhood park, Punggol Park can be half as nice as this…
6 comments:
looks like an american bullfrog
Yeah, I'm a little worried that it's an American bullfrog. Really afraid that this species is becoming established in our waters just like all those goddamned red-eared sliders, apple snails and tilapia.
The bug is indeed a wasp, spider wasp (Pompilidae) I think.
Very nice colour!
Oh wow very interesting thank you for posting. Im looking for Roystonia Oleracea seed. I live in Hong kong we only Roystonia regia here.
I dont get to Singapore very often but this will be a worth while place to look for seed. Are there any R.regia nearby because that is a problem as they can cross fertilise? I think in Singapore there are probaly more Oleracea growing around, isolated populations are best less chance of a hybrid.
Thanks again. If you go again let us know if there any seeds on the floor at the time, I might be in the area who knows.
Thanks
?????blog asleep?
Awe well my friend found the Park, actualy the consierge sent him to the wrong AMK Park, just as well he realised his mistake because that is a very big park. So he got back in the taxi and went to the West AMK and found lots of seeds of the "cabbage palm" . he found them right at the top of the steps at a round area, he said the ones on the step had no seeds as they had been raked clean by the gardeners who were busy when he was there. They arrive this Thursday with him so Im very excited. I hope many grow though I don't know how long they've been sitting on the floor till I see them and cn test their viability.
Thanx for the hot tip.
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