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?

Punggol Beach - Mainly Crustaceans Left

10:53 PM  , , , , , , ,  

Punggol Beach
North East, Singapore
February 2015

It does seem that crustaceans and a host of smaller organisms survive well despite the pollution on Punggol Beach. (See "Punggol Beach - Polluted & Deforested").

Crabs

Hermit crabs with their pearly bead-sized eyes...

What a beard!

A crab with a bleached claw and another one with a white stripe down its face...

Hairy Crab...

A whole host of other crabs...

Some well-hidden by camouflage or in crevices...

Myomenippe harwicki (Thunder Crab)  

When a stone is overturned, other crabs usually madly dash out helter skelter. The Thundr Crab merely tucks its limbs under its body and remains motionless. In this way, predators overlook it as they focus instead on the more nervous crabs.

"Mini-Me" Thunder Crabs...

The size compared to an adult's thumb - Its body is the length of the thumb...

The muscularity of its huge pincers...

There are lots of ways to make the crab angry...

Nasty look from the crab when disturbed - as if looks can kill...

Alpheidae (Snapping Shrimp)

This Snapping Shrimp was spotted wandering out of its burrow. It appeared lost. There was no Goby watchdog to keep a lookout. Could it be because the Goby did not survive the polluted waters?


Other Shore Life


A coin-sized mollusk plastered onto the surface of a rock...

A stubby Aquilonastra coronata (Crown Sea Star)...
 

A deceptively long Eurythoe complanata (Reef Bristleworm) spiraling out of its burrow...

The Land Creatures

On land, due the heavy deforestation, only several creatures were spotted along the regular Park Connector paths.

 An adorable Planthopper (Fulgoromorpha) looking back with its "crossed eyes"...

A female Hasarius adansoni (Adanson's House Jumper) Spider devours its freshly-caught prey...


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Punggol Beach - Polluted & Deforested

9:34 PM  , , ,  

Punggol Beach
North East, Singapore
February 2015

Punggol End used to be a favourite haunt of Merlion Wayfarer. Before the recent developments these few years, it was a place abound with bird life, where mating butterflies, huge thumb-sized spiders and the occasional snakes can be found. By the waters, there were sea urchins, anemones, starfish, horseshoe crabs and jellyfish.


Today, it is a place polluted with oil found even under layers of sand and debris washed up ashore. In her latest outing during the CNY long weekend, Merlion Wayfarer was dismayed to see the amount of pollution in the murky water.

Light brown pollution all over the shore at low tide...

The polluted foam is light, floats on water, and coagulates when in contact with any solid surface or other similar blobs...

A likely reason might be the new construction projects on the opposite shore -
These structures are at least 5 floors high...

These looked like signs of bleaching -
Crabs with white streaks across their exoskeletons and pincers...

This Snapping Shrimp was spotted wandering out of its burrow. It appeared lost. There was no Goby watchdog to keep a lookout. Could it be because the Goby did not survive the polluted waters?


What made it worse was there a whole patch of forest was cleared nearby. This patch contained trees where bird life was thriving. It was also the regular perch of a pair of White-Bellied Sea Eagles (Haliaeetus leucogaster). A nest was even spotted there before.


With this post, Merlion Wayfarer hopes that the relevant authorities
will take measures to protect the shore life and other marine organisms.

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