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?

Bizarre Encounters At Lower Peirce

9:43 AM  , , , , , ,  

Lower Peirce Reservoir
North, Singapore
September 2012
Cloudy

Today seemed to be a bad day for a nature walk. There were several zones along the track with sheets of stationary bees. The honey bees and carpenter bees also seemed more active than usual. Definitely not a time to be putting on your favourite perfume today!

After the recent newspaper reports about aggressive wild boars in the Central Catchment Nature Reserve, Merlion Wayfarer was quite wary of them. The visible tracks at the edge of the water certainly didn't help to relieve her unease... 

Merlion Wayfarer had often spotted millipedes in the Central Catchment Area. Spotting this little one was no surprised. Unlike the brown ones that are often found in leaf litter, the ones here are more brightly-coloured.  

She was also surprised by the size of its droppings and little red bits which appeared to be legs which had dropped off!

(Merlion Wayfarer had another simliar encounter in March 2012 here.)

A few steps away, she was surprised to find a moss-covered mass. It looked like a pile of strands encrusted in some brown and green stuff. Almost seemed not alive. Just that it was moving And moving fast. And try as she might, she could not locate its head...
(Merlion Wayfarer had another simliar encounter in March 2012 here.)

Have you ever seen a woodcutter? A woodcutter is one who chops wood in the forest, piles it in a stack, and carries it back to his shack on his back. And... Have you ever seen a woodcutter bug - Errrm, doesn't this look just like a woodcutter? 

On a closer look, Merlion Wayfarer realized that it looked more like a caterpillar!

Next, a wriggley made its appearance. Its cartoon-like movements made it quite endearing to watch. Here's a video...

As she left the boardwalk, she had a strange feeling that she was being watched. A look across the calm waters with her binoculars, and there it was - A White-Bellied Sea Eagle in a barren tree. Phew, what a day!

Read Also : Merlion Wayfarer's "Those Captivating Round Eyes"...


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Low Tide In The North-East

2:46 AM  , , , ,  

North-East, Singapore
September 2012
Cloudy
 
Merlion Wayfarer had embarked on her Journey To The East. At low tide, Merlion Wayfarer discovered that, if one pays attention, there can be lots of fascinating macro subjects.
  
Tiny shrimps no bigger than a thumbnail.
Notice how their transparency and orange-brown camouflages them against the sand and coral...
  
 
 (How many can you spot in this photo?)

The bigger shrimps are often found hiding under rocks...


 The sea urchins in Singapore are more well-fed - They are bigger and a lot fatter! (*hiak hiak hiak*)
    
See how they use their spikes to move...
(Click on the photo to watch the video)
 
Merlion Wayfarer then noticed lots of little fishes darting about...

It was only after doing some research that she realized that there was a symbiotic relationship there - where there is a fish, there will be a shrimp...
   
"The shrimp goby lives in the same burrow with a snapping shrimp. With keener eyesight, the goby keeps a look-out while the shrimp busily digs out and maintains their shared home. The shrimp is literally constantly in touch with the goby with at least one of its antennae always on the goby."
(Wild Singapore, 2008)

Merlion Wayfarer also encountered "Nature's Sonic Boooom"...
 
   
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Nature's Sonic Boooom

2:45 AM  , , , , ,  

North-East, Singapore
September 2012
Cloudy

It was "Low Tide In The North-East" when Merlion Wayfarer kept hearing cracking sounds in the water.


Remember the scene in Street Fighter when Guile (Yeah, that spiky yellow-haired guy with bulging muscles!) bends his body and two blinding arcs of light emit from his hands? Sonic Boom!!!


In the natural world, there is a finger-sized shrimp with an oversized claw that does just that. The claw, resembling a boxing glove, is used to stun its prey. By snapping it shut, a sharp cracking sound is produced. When colonies of the shrimp snap their claws, the cacophony is so intense that submarines can take advantage of it to hide from sonar. (Roach, 2001)


In 2000, a team of European scientists revealed that the sound is caused by the bursting of a bubble that forms when a shrimp snaps its claw shut. Now, the team reports that the bubble emits not only sound but a flash of light—indicating the extreme temperature and pressure inside the bubbles before they burst. The stunning snap comes not from the clap of the claws coming together but from a bubble generated by the claws' rapid closing motion. (Roach, 2001)
   
Today Merlion Wayfarer finally saw one. She has heard these snapping sounds often near beaches and in Pulau Ubin's Chek Jawa. But these shrimps are kinda skittish, and it is hard to spot one before it scuttles into some burrow or digs into the sandbed.
   
So when there were puddles near the shore, it was time Merlion Wayfarer took out her lens and try to spot one. Ain't easy... There were lots of little creatures zipping about in the puddles. A wait of at least 15 minutes was required to allow them to settle down.
  
And then... underneath a stone no bigger than an egg, she found a bigger shrimp. And on closer look, it had a claw so huge that it looked like some debris floating nearby...
  

Merlion Wayfarer discovered that this shrimp also has a little friend. Who is it? Find out in "Low Tide In The North-East.
   
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Journey To The East

4:24 AM  , , , , ,  

Punggol
North-East, Singapore
September 2012
Cloudy
     
The first day of September seemed to be a good day to wake up early to see sunrise. At 0600h, when the skies were still pitch black, Merlion Wayfarer set off on her journey to the east...

   
Today happened to be a cloudy day, and her hopes were not high as she looked out of the window. (Haiz!)

Monet-like clouds in the lightening skies...

Early morning boats zip past to the kelongs nearby...

Birds are up early too...

   
A lone stroller picking up shells on the shores for breakfast...
 
And... there is always a silver lining in the clouds. And at 0730 hours, the golden orb broke through the cumulus clouds and created an expanse of brilliant yellow which reflected off the sea in a golden stream.

   
It was Low Tide In The North-East when Merlion Wayfarer encountered Nature's Sonic Booooom at the beach. Did she get stunned?

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