Landing at Terumbu Buran

 We departed from ONE°15 Marina Club which is located at sentosa cove. Look at the beautiful yacht!

It's interesting to look the navigation stuff on the boat

My 2nd amphibious landing! Terumbu Buran is surrounded by choppy waves and landing on it is fun and adventurous...

This small land/rocks (whatever you call it) or called Terumbu is located not far away from mainland Singapore. It is only 10mins boat ride from Sentosa. We took a longer time because this is to make sure that we find a right place which is safe the our boat to anchor and less choppy waves!

There are quite a few Oval sea grapes, they are actually a type of seaweed. Sea grapes are eaten in Philippines as salad or can be eaten later if preserved in salt.

 And many nice looking red sea weed.

 

Of cause not to miss out the hard corals. 

Many zoanthid too.

Orange fan worm! Too bad i only saw one. More photos on orange fan worm on Ria's site

I walked into a small area which is between two tall rocks hoping to find something interesting. As i was walking with caution because i do not want to step onto any stonefish. This Two-spot reef octopus caught my attention as it is changing its colour. I guess it feels threaten of my presence there.

Lets have a closer look at the 'suckers'.

Herrmann's sea cucumber? Or the Black sea cucumber? ID please.

Look at the Hairy crab! Its really covered with hair. This is one of the fascinating crab that i was when i started on marine stuff. I guess the first hairy crab that i saw was at P. Semakau with Raffles Museum as a 'part-time/unofficial' project semakau volunteer.

The pincer of the Red eyed stone crab (Eriphia ferox) !

 And i'm still ALIVE after this adventurous trip! hahah! Photos taken during this trip are from Nikon 55mm f/3.5 Micro lens (Thanks weixiang for lending his lens, I had a hard time trying to focus haha) on a Canon 450D body.

More Photos on my Flickr

Jackfruit (Artocarpus heterophyllus)

Jackfruit (Artocarpus heterophyllus), originally uploaded by brandon Chia.

Native to southeast asia and seen at kampong areas in singapore, the Jackfruit tree produces one of the largest tree-borne fruit in the world and can weight up to 36kg! The fruits are not only eaten raw but can be also eaten many forms: Canned in syrup, dried (jackfruit chips), fried, cooked in curry and many more.

The wood of the tree is used to make musical instruments in Indonesia.

Asian Dowitcher

Rare bird spotting at sungei buloh on 1/9/2010 :D

Big Sister Island (Subar Laut)

 

My 2nd trip to Big Sister Island! The aim of this trip is to look out for coral bleaching, what's coral bleaching? Corals will turn white because of the microorganism living on the coral, known as symbiotic relationship, has die off. The microorganism gives the coral it's colour.

Here's a closer look at the hard coral

And one that is slightly bleached.

Frilly anemone?

Let's have a look at the the Zoanthids or also known as the colonial anemones. Some Zoanthids contain toxins so DO NOT handle them with your bare hands. Toxins are to protect themselves from  predators.

 

Can you spot the Spider Conch? Though they have spines, but they do not penetrate into your skin nor contains any venom.

 

Very beautiful underside, it is often collected and cause the decrease in population. They are listed as Vulnerable on the Red List of threatened animals of Singapore.

 

A closer look...

My 2nd encounter with an octopuses, ?the Two-spot reed octopuses?
It may look small and harmless but don't underestimate it! They have sharp beak, and can inject toxins... But they are one of the smartest creature living in this planet.

Looks yummy! But this Red Egg Crab is highly toxin when eaten even after cooking. Here's a photo index to ID the crabs found in Singapore.

Leathery coral

Frilly anemone...

And the best of this trip is the hawksbill turtle! My first encounter with a hawksbill turtle! And its very close!

And off to Sungei Buloh to train our new volunteers!

From Botanic Gardens to Sungei Buloh

New volunteers from Sungei Buloh, P. Ubin & central nature reserve gather at Botanic Gardens for an orientation. The speaker is Mr Mendis Tan from Sungei Buloh. So why I'm I there? Not for the orientation  but as a photographer!

Now Volunteers are known as ''conservation division volunteers'' which mean they all will fall under the conservation division. Volunteers can attend workshops not only at the reserve that they serve but can also attend workshops by other nature reserve. CooL! Allowance will be given to volunteers at Sungei Buloh ($10) and P. Ubin ($15). The $5 extra for ubin is to cover the bum boat trip. Then why CNR does not gives allowance? It's simply because it's located at the heart of Singapore and is very accessible unlike Buloh or Ubin. BUT, you should not look at the amount of allowance each place offer you and go there because this is not the right way!

After the orientation, Shila and myself rush down to Sungei Buloh to check on the Young Naturalist Passport Camp. This photo shows Shila in action! Showing the kids how to make a tailor bird nest. If you are keen to sign your kids up for the camp please visit Sungei Buloh's website.

After the camp ends, I meet up with Wei Xiang, Wei Quan and Jaime to hunt for the Estuarine Crocodile (Crocodylus porosus)! Yeh!!!! The above photo is taken from the main bridge. Estimated size of croc is about 1.8m long?

We proceed to the platform 2, WOW! Another croc waiting for us. This time round, it's smaller about 1.2m. Yeh more crocs at buloh! Note that the crocs at Buloh won't eat you up if you don't go near them because there are plenty of food down in the river.

A juvenile monitor lizard (Varanus salvator) on the tree!

Back to the main bridge, we saw the plantain squirrel (Callosciurus notatus). Very active in the day, its diet include fruits, seeds, leaves, bark and insects!

 This pair of common greenback (Hylarana erythraea) is spotted at the fresh water pond.