The Flying Saucer At Sunset

Lenticular clouds (Altocumulus lenticularis) are stationary lens-shaped clouds with a smooth layered appearance that form in the troposphere, usually above mountain ranges. One was spotted in Singapore recently...

Eyes Of 30,000 Honeycombs

With 30,000 individual facets, dragonflies have the most number of facets among insects. Each facet, or ommatidia, creates its own image, and the dragonfly brain has eight pairs of descending visual neurons to compile those thousands of images into one picture...

A Kaleidoscope Of Colours, Shapes And Patterns

Spectacular and innovative in design, the Flower Dome replicates the cool-dry climate of Mediterranean regions like South Africa, California and parts of Spain and Italy. Home to a collection of plants from deserts all over the world, it showcases the adaptations of plants to arid environments...

Lightning Strikes, Not Once, But Many Times

Unlike light, lightning does not travel in a straight line. Instead, it has many branches. These other branches flashed at the same time as the main strike. The branches are actually the step leaders that were connected to the leader that made it to its target...

Are You My Dinner Tonight?

A T-Rex has 24-26 teeth on its upper jaw and 24 more on its lower jaw. Juveniles have small, sharp blade-shaped teeth to cut flesh, whereas adults have huge, blunt, rounded teeth for crushing bones. Is the T-Rex a bone-crushing scavenger?

A Chance Sighting Of Mating Cobras

Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve
North, Singapore
07 December 2013

"Ssssshhh!" The man signalled. Thinking that it is a sighting of a bird or a monitor lizard, Merlion Wayfarer approached quietly, respecting the uncle's need for silence. Tough, in the gravel-lined path with thousands of loose pebbles that crunch with every single step.

Reaching there, the question was asked, "What is it, Uncle?"

"Cobras!" he replied.

And there they were. Two dark shapes entwined with each other. Like sea serpents, they churned in the shallow forest stream, seeming at odds with each other.


At times, they separated, rearing up with their notorious hooded heads in some trance-like dance.


And when it finally ended, the female slithered away into the other bank of the stream, while the male suspiciously monitored his surroundings, looking in our direction before moving parallel to our direction.


Merlion Wayfarer knew when to keep her distance. These were after all, 2m-long Equatorial Spitting Cobras (Naja Sumatrana) with a potential spitting distance of up to 2m and a potentially fatal hemotoxic and neurotoxic venom.

It was a truly magnificent experience to be there to experience this!


More photos are available on Merlion Wayfarer Goes Green's Picasa at :