Labrador Mangrove/Berlayar Creek Bay 25Nov2007

Facing Pulau Keppel. I wonder where this pipe came from? Was it left behind or did it come from the other end of Labrador where the seacils were deposited. It looks more like a sanitation pipe though. Probably left behind when the Keppel Marina vacated(?) or dumped from a passing vessel. It may have floated in.


A lone carpet anemone. No nemos or shrimp.


Fishing line with a double hook.....very dangerous for anyone walking about.



The majestic Sea Almond(Ketapang) tree below 20 Bukit Chermin. It must be very old. The trunk itself is impressive to see!


An opportunistic fisherman set up his rod all the way out at the lowest tide.


A lone stripped Hermit Crab. (Clibanarius sp.)


A lone peacock anemone.


One end of the gill net maze. The bump at the left end towards the middle of the pic is the horseshoe crab shell. See pic below! :(


A large *coastal horsehoe crab (probably female) long dead in one of the discarded gill nets.

It looks as if the gill nets were set up in a maze as there were quite a few tangents which were secured deep within the sand. Very few organisms would have escaped the tangling grasp of the nets. Once collapsed, no crawling animal would be able to escape it. The unfortunate thing about the meganet was that it started close to the channel leading into the mangrove. This effectively would catch everything trying to make way into the mangrove.

During the course of the day, we would see 6 separate discarded gill nets and two dead horseshoe crabs.


*Tachypleus Gigas, Horseshoe crabs are not crabs but are more closely related to spiders and scorpions. Sadly, the coastal horseshoe crab is listed as one of the threatened animals and this is mainly due to habitat destruction. **There is virtually no other mangrove ecosystem on the southern coast of Singapore except that at Berlayar. All the rest has been cleared for development.


Broken glass bottle piece...one of many such smaller pieces...too bad for anyone walking about thinking it was safe to do so.


Table frame...huh? Where did this come from? This was new as it was not seen the weekend earlier. However, judging from the encrusting barnacles, it must have been in the water for some time but only moved out onto the beachfront during the week. How???


Another shot of the table frame in front of the Keppel Club.


Another discarded fishing hook....the colourful ones are supposed to be better to fish with?





We came across this abandoned boat on wooden poles about 100m in. Looks like someone was using it but was not at home.

Syrofoam box and dark green container to it's left purposefully left behind by visitors to the docked boat. The containers were uncovered and full of water. Lovely place to breed mosquitoes!


Discarded netting and traps below the boat.


Evidence of the sticky chewy mudcapade. Never go in alone. If you get stuck (and you really may...two of us did...and one was the rescuer of the other who in turn needed rescuing), you will most certainly have to brave drowning or the other mangrove inhabitants as the tide rises. [Imagine the newspapers quoting the golfers across saying that they thought they heard screams but thought nothing of it as winds have a similar effect around the evergreen grassy knolls.]



Plastic up on a tree and a tin can snug in a crevice.


Anyone know what kind of snail this is? A not-so-common common nerite?


A tree-loving onchidium! The only one seen!


Rock oyster...only a few seen.


Another coastal horseshoe crab (triangulated tail section) long dead due to a discarded gill net.


Another discarded gill net and trap....waiting to snare another crab.


It is ironic that so many nets and traps were found and so few sign of life we are accustomed to seeing even as near away as Sentosa's shores just across from Berlayar Creek. Why does Berlayar have so little? Could this be a seasonal occurrence or could there be some residual form of pollution making life difficult? With so much junk on our shores and so many threats, there is a slim chance that Berlayar Creek will regain it's old splendour. But we can do as much as we can to ensure that it does. We have to care about our last remaining shores and mangroves and hope that whatever the rich biodiversity returns.

Members of the public appreciating the wonderful sightings.


At least there are some birds who have the ability to find better feeding grounds but monitor the background as well..or you'll just miss monitoring the monitor!



other blogs on the same trip :-
http://ashira.blogspot.com/2007/11/mucking-around-berlayar-creek.html
http://wherediscoverybegins.blogspot.com/2007/11/discovery-labrador-mangroves-on-25-nov.html

Labrador Mangrove/Berlayar Creek Bay

Managed to get the boss to let me use a little hard-earned off-time to rush off to Labrador Park today. The tidetable showed a 0.3m tide at about 6.15pm. Same as the day before when RT and SK were checking out reef building materials 'thoughtfully' left behind by the SP Project Team at the pier end of Labrador.

First thing I noticed when I got to the newly opened park extension (towards Keppel Club) was that there was someone (in green shirt) else who beat me to the mudflat...only she was on the Club side in sneakers trying to get closer to the sticky chewy part of the mud. She turned back after a few brave and cautious steps...i guess realising that she would soon loose her sneakers to the mud if she persisted. Eventually, she made her way back to the safety of the Club path. It looked like she was looking to do some exploring on her own and she had some paper with her as if she was taking notes.

The first thing you see after you get down the rock face opposite the Club is a green bundle. Looked like a bush of sorts but only much more dangerous than a regular bush. It was a thoughtlessly discarded bundle of barbed wire which had collected seaweed.




There was quite a fair bit of rubbish all along the estuary mouth.

There were quite a few abandoned rubber tires(which will take a very long time to disintergrate)




As usual, no coastal habitat would be complete without plastic...


and even plastic high on the trees...


The Keppel Club has a golf course which runs parallel to the back mangrove. And naturally, X amount of Golfers aren't that good and this results in a fair number of balls swimming away.
There are probably a few hundred golfballs all along the mangrove.


Coral Rubble :
There was also lots of examples of coral rubble here and there. Some small pieces and some large.



Just like the area opposite on Sentosa, there must be good coral growing somewhere along the seaward front. Needs more exploring. Despite having not very clear water, Singapore does have amazing variety of coral.

The MOTHER of all abandoned gill nets:
At first I thought there was just one abandoned gill net sprawled on the muddy-sand. But later managed to locate at least three such nets with the last one stretching all the way from the Club side and onto the Labrador Park side. This is the mother of all abandoned gill nets and the total length could be more than 50m.

Abandoned gill nets still keep trapping organisms like crabs which get entangled and drown or starve eventually. There are such abandoned nets all over Singapore and including at some protected areas like Sekudu and Chek Jawa and at other areas rich in marine biodiversity like Semakau, Changi and Kranji( just to name a few places). Horseshoe crabs are commonly found stuck and very dead although the Beachfleas did manage to save some on Sentosa some time ago.






Careless or reckless fishermen who do not take adequate care of their nets cause more biodiversity loss by not disposing of the nets properly.
The Govt should put in place restrictions on the use of such nets...or just plain ban the nets ... like chewing gum.

A little into the mangrove, one can see vertical long wooden sticks placed at opposite ends of the mangrove channel. These probably were used to hold the gill nets in place to catch everything which flowed in and out of the mangrove with the change of tides. The clip shows the crude but effective giant trap without the net in place.

Our already threatened Mangrove biodiversity stands little chance against such practices.

Seagrass!

There is also seagrass (Halophila Ovalis or H. Minor) at the mouth of the mangrove estuary just in front of the Club. These looked very healthy. I could not see any Enhalus or Thalassia. Maybe a search further along the rocky shore below the magnificient bungalow may reveal other seagrass varieties. The back mangrove may also surprise us with Halophila beccarii as it is found close to mangrove areas (as in Sg. Buloh). [That would be an interesting find as even Seagrass Watch Australia were surprised by it when they saw it in Singapore.] I decided that the deeper part of the mangrove should best be tackled with an emergency pull-me-out friend just in case I got irretrievably stuck and the tide started to come in. I'd also have to duck the misguided gold balls as they flew into the mangrove from the golf course. The mud banks of the mangrove looked really sticky and chewy and I certainly do not want to get stuck in that alone without a backup plan. Another adventure for another day.

See :
i. http://www.wildsingapore.com/chekjawa/text/g002.htm

ii. http://teamseagrass.blogspot.com/

iii. http://www.seagrasswatch.org
for more info on seagrass.

Marine Litter at Labrador 1

Here's a short clip on marine litter seen floating in at Labrador Park on 11Nov2007.
The only natural thing was a coconut. The sea has become our bottomless garbage pit. There is just soooo much plastic in it. With all this rubbish going into it, surely the sea levels will rise notwithstanding the global warming and polar ice melting. :o



Visit www.oceanconservancy.org for more information on the Planet's marine litter woes.
Singapore's coastal cleanup efforts are summarised here :
1. http://coastalcleanup.nus.edu.sg/
2. http://coastalcleanup.wordpress.com/

synaptic cucumber @ cyrene

Was plodding along Cyrene and came across this unusual sea cucumber...a synaptic sea cucumber looking for food. It's actually feather-light as it fills itself up with seawater to give it some shape. If one were to try to pick it up, it deflates itself by expelling all the water out. You can see the feeding tentacles around it's mouth which are very active as can be seen from the video clip. Synaptic Cucumbers like this one are smooth skinned and lack obvious tube feet. Most other sea cucumbers appear hairy because of their tube feet. Sea cucumbers generally feed on detritus...either deposited on/within the substrate or suspended in the water. Sea Cucumbers are generally poisonous (not venomous) except for those few species which are sold for food.

Team Seagrass @ Cyrene 26Oct2007

a very short (and somewhat incomplete) primer on seagrassing...showing the all important 50m tape measure, quadrat, nice people with soggy feet collecting data, hydrophobic Enhalus seagrass male flowers (the white styrofoam looking bits) floating on the water and the seagrass meadow at sundown.


had to take precious leave for this rare cyrene trip...well worth it as usual!

Look at the other blogs (lots of cool photos) about the seagrass session at Cyrene :-
http://teamseagrass.blogspot.com/2007/10/cyrene-reef-26-oct-07.html
http://budak.blogs.com/the_annotated_budak/2007/10/blue-on-cyrene.html
http://tidechaser.blogspot.com/2007/10/back-to-cyrene.html
http://wondercreation.blogspot.com/2007/11/lush-seagrass-meadow-of-cyrene-reef.html

a Changi octopus encounter

30 Oct 07 - Managed to catch a low tide at Changi after going back early from work for a change.

Also met with Mr & Mrs L... (who i met briefly with their kids at Labrador before I spotted the Nemo). Nice to see them exploring the intertidal and occasionally hearing excited exclamations when various specimens were seen.

Was plodding around stirring up the mud when my brother shouted out "eh squid...er...no Octopus!". (This being the last day of exams, the nieces had been invited along too and along came the parents as well.) True enough, there was a fist sized red octopus hunting in the seagrass/algae shallows. Lovely! all were enthralled by a real live wild octopus crawling around just a few feet away. Strange but this red octopus did not change colour or skin pattern during the few minutes we observed it. The video shows the octopus feeling around and causing a crab near a large sand dollar to flee in a flash.




(testing out youtube vs blogger video)

Unfortunately, the 'biodiversity challengers' were out too. All prepared with dark phua-chu-kang boots. The seemed to be looking for hermit crabs and fan shells. The group looked like two skinny workers taking instructions from a rather plump male boss.

A lady waited at the high tide mark with fishing gear but only she wasn't preparing any fishing equipment. Maybe the group was looking for bait. Funny kind of bait they were intending to use. And funny time to fish from the high tide mark when it was a really low tide. Were they there for something else?

Also saw the 2 resident Aero2000 trucks parked at the carpark as usual as if the drivers lived at the beach. Talk about choice real estate.