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WELCOME!!

This blog serves to document my sightings of fauna/flora in Singapore!! And by doing so, I hope that the reader would realise that there are still pockets of natures even though most of Singapore is urbanised. Also, more importantly, knowing what we have could be the first step to protecting them. :)

CONSERVATION starts right here at home!!!

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

A mysterious reef (Beting Bronok) 26May 09

Hi all!!! I was out to a REALLY pretty intertidal shore yesterday morning from 4.30am to 7.30am. Heard from the Kok sheng that we only visit this shore once a year!! So, i really keep my eye open and try to spot as many faunas as possible!! Practically all the faunas I found were my first sightings of them! *feeling proud!

There were some amount of corals here and there. There were the hard corals.
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And also the soft corals
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Carpet anemone
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Glass anemone (Dofleinia sp.). By looking at it, you could understand why it's common name is glass anemone~
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Peacock anemone. These are not true anemone. Something new I learnt from Mei lin!! :)
When I was photo-editing, I found a pair of tiny elbow crab on the peacock anemone!!
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Bailer Snail (melo melo) quite a huge snail. This snail is listed as an endangered animal but it seems that it is doing rather fine at Beting Bronok.
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Blue Dragon Nudibranch (Pteraeolida ianthina). Pretty nudibranch. Its projections do make it look like it could glow in the dark!!
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Denison's nudibranch (Dendrodoris denisoni). This cool nudibranch eats sponges.
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Bushy slug (Polybranchia orientialis). At first I thought it was just seaweed, but Chay Hoon's sharp eyes and experiences says that it is a sea slug!!! What a way to camouflage... This is definitely an unusual find!
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Starry mouthed nudibranch (Bornella sp.). Another great find by Chay Hoon!!!
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Unknown Nudibranch. According to chay hoon, this is a Mexichromis sp. and it's rare. But as this nudibranch is not underwater, it has curled itself up...
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Flatworm. Moving really fast.. maybe it was trying to get away from me.. HAHA.
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False scorpion fish (Centrogeny vaigiensis). Really really really small!!! Only saw it when I bent down to study the area around me.. They have prickly dorsal spines but no spines on their head. This is one way to distinguish them from the true scorpionfish!!
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Many Banded Snapping shrimp? I'm not too sure about the ID of this shrimp. If you look closer at its tail, you can see blue and pink shades...
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But I had fun watching it arranging the rocks around it!! It seems so busy!! probably making it new home?
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Other than catching shrimp in action, I also caught a rather large octopus (~10cm) "hopping" around.
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And also a pair of mating crab which was caught red-handed probably felt really embarrassed that they stop whatever they were do!! Maybe I interupted them... HAHA.
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Biscuit Seastar were very common there...
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I found this seastar really cute. It kept stretching its arms!! Morning exercise??
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Brittle Star. Very flexible fauna. But this brittle star wasnt moving.
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Knobbly Seastar (Protoreaster nodusus). These HUGE seastar are currently listed as an endangered animal too. I found 3 of them. I wonder if that's consider little...
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Ball Sea cucumber.
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Sea urchin.
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Thorny Sea urchin (Prionocidaris sp.). Really interesting sea urchin. It doesnt have the usual spikes..
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Onyx Cowries. One of the abundant cowries around.
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Cuttlebone!!!
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Rare-spined murex snail's shell. I really thought I found the snail but the original owner was gone and it is now a home to a hermit crab. Well, maybe next time!!
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Seahorse!!!! It hook itself to a seapen. My best find of the day as I've always wanted to see them!! :)
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1 comment:

  1. What great sightings! Thanks for sharing them! You are really good at finding stuff!

    ReplyDelete