Labour day at Semakau

It was May day and RMBR is here at Semakau again for a public walk.


It was really a good start with LK spotting about three dolphins swimming very near Semakau's jetty. Unfortunately, I did not bring my x12 zoom camera but still, I am glad that the participants were able to see this amazing scene. This really shows what amazing life we still have in our waters!


Here is my team mangrove with my friend Mervyn in the green shirt also coming to join as participant.


My group had several eagle eyed participants and Celina managed to find a spider conch (Lambis lambis) crawling on the seagrass using its sickle shaped and razor edge operulum showed in the picture. Like all true conches, they have a pair of long eye stalks that can peep out of their shells to scan the surroundings.


Residing on this gigantic anemone (Stichodactyla gigantea) was a anemone shrimp (Periclimenes brevicarpalis) at the centre of this picture. Besides gaining considerable protection from the stinging tentacles of its host, it also have a partially translucent body to break its body outline, making it difficult to spot.


We saw several upside down jellyfishes (Cassiopea sp.) in the tidal pools. As its name indicates, it normally lie in an upside-down manner to allow its symbiotic algae in its tentacles to photosynthesize.


This is the top view of a seahorse (Hippocampus comes). They cannot swim fast thus rely a lot on camouflage and simply staying still by hooking themselves to seagrasses or other structures using their prehensile tail.


The hunter seekers also found a tiny little frog fish. This adorable creature has a pair of frontal fins positioned in a way to allow to walk. Notice that there is an extension from the tip of the head. This is actually a bait to lure fishes towards it.


A huge ocellated sea cucumber (Stichopus ocellatus) named because of their eye spots on its body which to me looked more like pimples with white pus. eww...


Last but not least was this star, which happens to be a baby cushion star (Culcita novaeguineae). When they mature to become an adult, they will look very much inflated like a pillow thus earning its common name.


Last but not least was our traditional group photo with the iconic knobbly seastar (Protoreaster nodosus). Another nice day with great discoveries and an enthusiastic gang of participants!

Softies at Pulau Jong

I had the chance to dive at Pulau Jong more than a year back and the corals underneath were really fantastic. How about the intertidals here?


The sun came out as an eerie orange ball. Somehow, weather this month is unusually sorching hot. Could this be a result of global warming?


We often called Jong as the "bun" island due to its characteristic shape. It also had a rather extensive intertidal flat that stretches out in the southeastern direction. The sky was overcast when me, Robert and RY got to the island first.


A heavy downpour occured soon and Robert managed to find a natural tent which was actually a cave with overhanging trees while the rest of the gang stayed in the boat. Luckily the rain clouds were blown over to Pulau Bukom and Semakau, allowing us to carry on the exploration.


The intertidals on this small island is very unique compared to others because of their soft corals (thats the reason for my title btw). They were basically so many of them in huge sizes that they seemed like carpets on the seafloor!


RY managed to find what seemed to be like a spotted belly crab (Ozius guttatus).


There were lots of red eye reef crabs (Eriphia ferox) that were hiding inside rock cervices.


KS remembered that there was a resident giant clam (Tridacna maxima) here and he bought us there to have a glimpse. You can see that it was also completely surrounded by soft corals. Their colourful mantle actually contained symbiotic algae that can make food from the sun and transfer some to its host.


The tide is just at the right level, thus I saw a lot (at least 4) blue spotted fan-tailed ray (Taeniura lymma). Even though they are very shy creatures, be wary as they are armed with a venonmous barb at the tail.


Typical in the rocky shore was this giant top shell which was about 20cm in height....


and the black sea cucumber (Holothuria leucospilota). This timid cucumber often peep out from under the rocks and extend out their feeding tentacles to suck out any detritus on the sand. When disturbed, they can spill out lengths of sticky white paste to entangle their predators.

Last but not least are the slugs~ Apparently, the Bryopsis algae is in season now and we managed to see many sap-suckers of these seaweeds another than the leaf slug which we saw at cyrene reef.


First up is this slug Dermatobranchus sp. It was really a challenge photographing them and me, RY and KS almost broke our backs bending over to take a nice shot of it on the waving algae.


I finally gave up after the first picture and just causally took pictures of the two remainding slugs. This is Thuridilla gracilis.


And the hairy one was the smallest of all, about 5mm! Not sure about the ID though.


KS found these three nudibranchs (Chromodoris marginata). Nudibranch is actually a combination of Latin and Greek words called naked gills. This is because their gills are located externally, which is the fluffy cauliflower structure at its back.

A nice day at Jong with several satistifying photographs. I will blog about today's Semakau public walk soon. We actually saw dolphins!

Starry day at Cyrene Reef

This was my first trip to cyrene and after hearing so many stories and seeing so many blogs about this amazing reef, one will just have to see for himself to believe.


We set off from 1 degree Marina at Sentosa on a boat. Luckily, the owner have a rubber dingy, thus avoiding an amphibious landing.


There were really so many knobbly seastars (Protoreaster nodosus) here with many varying colouration, knobs and patterns. RY found this which was feeding on a soft coral.


Seastars feed by eviscerating one of their stomachs out their mouth to engulf and digest their prey. I managed to capture one with its stomach extended. It seems like they are also not just carnivores, but we found a few others that were feeding on seagrasses too!


I finally had the chance to see this newly recorded seastar, Pentaceraster mammilatus. As described by some, it looked like a knobbly that have turned over to the dark side~


We also found this peculiar star that was highlighted in wildfilms blog last time. To me, it seems like a cross between the knobbly and the Pentaceraster seastar. Who knows? I might just be right~ ^^


Another star which do not really look like one because of its inflated body. True to its name, the cushion star (Culcita novaeguineae) looks like one that will be a great pillow.


The last species of star that we saw was the common seastar (Archaster typicus), which were scattered all over the sandy intertidals.


There were also several Salmacis sp. sea urchin. These spiny animals camouflages itself by trapping pieces of debris on its short spines.


Another common resident here is the placenta sand dollar (Arachnoides placenta). Just like starfishes, these animals also have five lines of symmetry radiating from the center.


Bryopsis algae is abundance again, and together with it comes the leaf slug (Elysia ornata) which "sap-suck" on them.


One must always remember not to take off one's booties especially here as there are lots of fan shells (Family Pinnidae) sticking out of the mud.


It has been awhile since I last saw this most poisonous crab, a mosaic crab (Lophozozymus pictor). Don't be mistaken that it is an edible crab, even though it might look tasty and cooked!


I found this weird looking anemone that seemed to be detached from its burrow. ID anyone?


Just before we leave as the tide starts to rush in, I managed to capture this pair of intricate fan worms (Sabellastarte indica). Yes, these are actually segmented worms with their main body burrowed in tubes while extending their feathery mouthparts to filter feed.