Large debris on Labrador explained?

For more than a year, we've been seeing these large objects on Labrador.
Comprising large plastic tubing and what looks like tough sheeting very roughly put together with cable ties.Each structure covered an area of about 2mx2m. And there were several of them.

Later, we were given to understand that the objects were part of some sort of experiment conducted on Labrador. So we left them alone.

Labrador is our last mainland reef, and among the last patches of good seagrasses accessible to the public. It is also rather narrow. It was thus really heart-breaking to see the shore being affected by such large structures.
The photos above were taken in May 06.

We continued to see the objects as time went by. And it appeared that the structures were abandoned. Because they started to disintegrate and were not anchored down or repaired.

The photos below were taken in Dec 06.
The large structures were covered with seaweed and starting to break apart.
The broken pieces move to and fro in the waves all across the rich Labrador shore.
Crushing seagrasses and corals.The parts looked very strange. The pipes were heavy as some appeared to contain concrete.
The photos below were taken in Mar 07. The pieces were STILL there. Fragmenting but still moving back and forth, affecting marine life on the shore.
You can see how large the poles are compared to the people in the background.


In Aug 07, the pieces were STILL there, floating up and down with the tide.
See the triangular piece in the bottom lower corner?

Today, there was an article "Undersea garden takes root" Straits Times 29 Oct 07, about a Singapore Poly team's effort to create a "marine site off Labrador for corals to regrow", "led by Captain Frederick Francis, a lecturer from its Singapore Maritime Academy. His team of 68 staff, students, volunteers and divers began its work in August last year with $145,000."

The diagrams of the equipment used in this project looks very familiar ...

The construction details described in the article are very similar to abandoned debris we have been seeing on Labrador for more than a year.

Does this explain the large debris we have been seeing for more than a year?

Post script
Chay Hoon found this link on the FINS forum of a similar project done in 2005 in Pulau Tenggol with links to photos of similar debris. Here's one of the photos, taken from Charlie Lee's Public Gallery.

Jeff's comments on the entry "The debris you show in your pictures look like it is the result of a poorly thought out project that has failed to take maintenace into account. PVC piping is a poor substitute to concrete, or even aluminium rods and should not have been used in the first place, despite it being light and easy to handle underwater (compared to the other two materials)."

A lively discussion started on the issue on the sgscuba forum (registration required) and clubsnap forum

Discuss this also on the nature-singapore list and FINS forum

Hai-ren submitted the post to tomorrow.sg

This issue also featured on these blogs
The Ashira blog
Project Powerplant blog
Deadpoet's Cave blog
The Singapore Daily: 31 Oct 07

Raining Cats at Chek Jawa!

Today I was out on Chek Jawa with TeamSeagrass to do the regular seagrass monitoring. The day started out fine but it started raining as soon as we arrived on Ubin. It lightened up to a drizzle and we decided to proceed with monitoring.

As soon as we started work, the heavens opened up and it really poured! We all got totally wet. Alas, of course no photos as a result since the camera had to be packed away. Not even of the required monitoring shots.

Sijie posted more about TeamSeagrass' work on his nature scouters blog

As dusk fell, soggy, grumpy and, as Marcus put it, slowly starting to mould, we were waiting around at the Information Kiosk for everyone to get ready to go home.

Suddenly, in the dim undergrowth, we noticed a large animal moving quickly up a tree. It was a civet cat!Whipping out our cameras, we managed to get some quick shots of this very shy animal.Isn't it just the cutest?!

The Common Palm Civet (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus) is also called the Toddycat for its apparent fondness for the fermented fruits of palm trees, the same fruits used to make the alcoholic drink called 'toddy'.

The Toddycat and Palm leaf is part of the logo of the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research (RMBR) at the National University of Singapore.
From the write up about the Toddycat and Palm leaf in the logo...

"Commonly residing in roofs of houses, gardens and parks, they travel between houses via telephone wires, poles and trees. Often mistaken for cats or rats in the roof, Toddy eats flesh and fruit with equal gusto.

Seven of the eight species of world's palm civets are found in Southeast Asia. They are secretive and elegant animals residing in the threatened forests of Asia, and even now, we know very little about them!"

Indeed, the Toddycat is regularly spotted on Pulau Ubin. And once, it was also spotted on the Chek Jawa boardwalk! We were really lucky though to be able to get a photo of this shy animal.

The Toddycats is also the name of the volunteers at RMBR! Here is the really delightful mascot of the volunteers...
Wow, what a great ending to a really wet day!

Kevin also got a shot of the Toddycat, see his nature spies blog

Checking out Chek Jawa

I joined Kok Sheng and his team of enthusiastic volunteers on Chek Jawa as part of his project to monitor the recovery of marine life there following the mass deaths earlier this year.
It was another scorching day out on the shore.

YC and I were paired up to document the carpet anemones. Seems a simple enough job.

First, to find the poles we placed during our earlier trip...hmmm where are they? Ah, there's a little white stick!Although it was horribly tedious and sometimes hard, YC and I managed to get it done in good time. All thanks to YC's great knees. Great because his knees work very well. So he did all the fiddly bits over the anemones at ground level, while I took photos. Yay! For a change, my back didn't break.

We documented big anemones ...And small ones.As we were doing it, we also explained to visitors on the boardwalk, and later those we met on the intertidal walk, about the project. It was a great opportunity to share about Chek Jawa's vulnerabilities.

Along the way, as we hunted and documented the anemones, we saw lots of interesting things. Like enormous jellyfish!This one was really large!Also well camouflaged crabs. The little Velcro crab (Camposcia retusa) with the yellow sponges on its body and legs was actually next to one of the anemones we were measuring!And YC found a very ambitious tiny porter crab hauling a huge leaf (relative to the crab's size).

And the sponges were recovering! With large specimens in the coral rubble area...And several varieties too!On the legs of the boardwalk were several large flowery soft corals.It was also very nice to see the Warty seacucumber (Cercodemas anceps). In fact, I saw three of them! I rarely saw these seacucumbers even before the flood. This is my first photo in the seven years that I've been photographing the shores, of this sea cucumber with its beautiful feeding tentacles extended!And another heartening sight, several large and active Noble volutes (Cymbiola nobilis)! These handsome snails were among those observed dead in large numbers following the flood.But most exciting yet, was the FIRST sighting of a Knobbly sea star (Protoreaster nodosus) since the flood! Wow! The hunter-seekers for the intertidal walk found it. It was large and seemed healthy and happy. Chay Hoon speaks for the star on her colourful clouds blogI'm so glad the visitors today got to see these special animals. Hopefully Chek Jawa's recovery will continue. And also, hopefully, that this year's December monsoon will not lead to another massive flood...

Alas, as usual, there were lots of abandoned traps and nets on the shore. Dr Chua Ee Kiam and Lioe did the needful by carrying them all out so these deadly rubbish would stop killing our marine life.As the sun set, as we headed back, I had a look at the coastal forest. Wow, the Delek Air (Memecylon edule) was fruiting! This tree is considered rare and threatened in Singapore.

I feel Chek Jawa seems to be doing better. Chek Jawa and the rest of our shores depend on us to ensure that they remain alive and well.

Mudskipper Morning

This morning, November and I decided to visit Chek Jawa with some special friends. It was such a relaxing leisure trip. The first in a long long while where we could just stroll and not stress out documenting.

Although it was high tide, the shores were very much alive! With mudskippers of all manner.

Some were well mannered.
Like this peaceful group of a Gold-spotted mudskipper (Periophthalmus chrysospilos) (lower left corner) and several unknown mudskippers.

Others were rather bad-mannered. As this pair of quarreling mudskippers.
I'm not really sure what kind of mudskippers these are. Both were flushed, eyes bulging and flashing their dorsal fins! Ooo...

Further in the back mangroves, there were small Giant mudskippers (Periophthalmodon schlosseri). There were several of them skulking in the cool mud. I almost missed them as they were so small and still.

Also among the mud were some strange red-eyed crabs.
I'm still trying to figure out what they are.
This one was particularly handsome!

And finally! I spotted the Blue-spotted mudskipper (Boleophthalmus boddarti)!
It wasn't really large, and was quietly grazing by moving its head from side to side.

Here's another look at it from another angle.It's such a pretty mudskipper! I saw it once while I was guiding and thus couldn't take a photo. And when we did go out to photograph it on another visit, we couldn't find it again. How nice to finally see it and get a shot. Unfortunately, it was rather far away from the boardwalk so I couldn't get a really nice photo of it.

Mudskippers are such endearing and amazing creatures!

Besides the marvellous mudskippers, the other highlight for the day was breakfast of fabulous Only-on-Sunday and Only-on-Ubin Lontong served at Pak Ali's shop at Ubin Jetty. I still can't believe that November had never tried it before.

15 Fabulous Facts about Singapore's Shores

In support of Blog Action Day on 15 Oct, here's 15 facts about Singapore's fabulous shores!

1. Accessible

Singapore's shores are easy to get to! We forget we live on a tiny little island, with shores all around. And we have lots of off shore islands. Here's the view of the city centre from the reefs of Kusu Island, just 15 minutes away from the mainland by fast boat.
Uniquely Singapore! Where else in the world can you go from a first world business district to a great reef or shore. In under half an hour? More thoughts about our city reefs.

2. Alive!

Many people think Singapore's shores are dead. Not!

Even our reclaimed shores are very much alive. On Tanah Merah and the East Coast, you can still see sea fans, button shells and sand dollars!
On Changi, you will commonly encounter cuttlefishes, sea horses and sea stars!
More blog entries about Changi shores.

3. Reefs galore!

And our Southern Islands have fabulous shores packed with corals and other reef life.

The Blue Water Volunteers saw this underwater garden when they conducted the reef survey at Kusu Island on Jun 07! Minsheng took the photo.

No need to swim, no need to dive! At low tide, the fabulous reefs are easily explored by all. Here's the reef at Pulau Semakau, located right next to our landfill, where every single piece of rubbish you throw ends up.
The landfill is well constructed and operated. So much so that various marine habitats nearby are thriving. AND open for public visits! Here's some visitors on the Raffles Museum intertidal walk of Pulau Semakau exploring the reefs there.
This shows that if we try and make the effort, we can retain our special wild places AND enjoy urbanisation and development. More about Pulau Semakau and other nature activities there.

4. Wild dolphins!

Wild dolphins are regularly sighted in our waters! This photo by Tan Ching Kian taken in May 07 is "the closest photo of a wild dolphin that we know of".
More about this sighting and other sightings over the past few years on the habitatnews blog

AND there were other sightings reported this year on the ashira blog and urban forest blog

5. Sea turtles!

In May 06, baby sea turtles were spotted hatching on the East Coast! Baby turtles naturally head for the sea when they first hatch. In nature, moonlight over the water tells them were the sea is. Unfortunately, in urban Singapore, our lights distracted them. Volunteers turned up rapidly to help rescue the lost baby turtles and send them back where they belonged.
More about the Hawksbill turtle hatchling rescue at East Coast Park on the habitatnews blog

This year, we learnt that sea turtles which nest in Malaysia spend their time in our Southern Islands!
More about the Hawksbill turtle tagged with satellite transmitter seen near Sentosa on the News from International Coastal Cleanup blog and the WWF Malaysia Satellite Tracking of Hawksbill Turtles page

More about sea turtles in Singapore on the habitatnews blog

6. Underwater Meadows

Seagrass meadows are less well known than reefs, but they are vital habitats for marine life. And Singapore has huge seagrass meadows!
The best known is the one at Chek Jawa. But we also have meadows kilometres long at Pulau Semakau (above).

And an amazing stretch of seagrass meadows at Cyrene Reef (below) which lies in the midst of our industrial installations, container port and major shipping lanes.
On the mainland, there are also good growths at Changi and Labrador.

Seagrasses are eaten by .... the sea cow! The shy dugong or sea cow is rarely seen but we regularly see signs of them on Chek Jawa.
This photo above was a feeding trail made by a dugong on Chek Jawa! More about this sighting on the teamseagrass blog.

Even more amazing than our marine wildlife are the wild volunteers who work tirelessly for them. Many are committed to gathering data to better understand our shores. While many more work as volunteer guides to share these shores with ordinary people.

7. TeamSeagrass

The volunteers of teamseagrass collect vital data about our many seagrass meadows. This data helps us better understand our seagrasses as well as global seagrass health (data is submitted to NParks and to International Seagrass-Watch).
Watching seagrasses is fun and meaningful! More on the teamseagrass blog. A group of young seagrassers are also part of this effort and they are looking after the seagrasses at labrador park.

8. International Coastal Cleanup Singapore

It's NOT just about picking up litter! Volunteers with the International Coastal Cleanup collect data about marine debris which is not only unsightly but also kills marine life. Plastic floats forever in our oceans, breaking up into smaller and smaller pieces that eventually get eaten and enter our seafood! Part of a long-term global effort, the Singapore data helps us better understand and hopefully resolve the ever growing issue of marine debris. More on the International Coastal Cleanup Singapore blog.

9. Chek Jawa volunteer guides

Volunteers have been involved on Chek Jawa since before reclamation was deferred in 2001 for 10 years. Since then, the volunteers continue to provide guided walks to the public to share this marvelous shore that was saved from reclamation.
Here are some of the many volunteers involved in Chek Jawa, toasting the launch of the boardwalk this year.

Deferment of reclamation 'expires' in a few more years. Come see Chek Jawa while you can. Better yet, join the volunteer programme so that there are more guides to bring more people to see Chek Jawa. More about Chek Jawa before deferment, today, and on the Ubin Volunteer Blog. As well as more blog entries about Chek Jawa.

Among the most recent volunteers for Chek Jawa are those working with Loh Kok Seng. Following the massive floods earlier this year, there were mass deaths of some animals on Chek Jawa. Kok Seng has started a painstaking study of the recovery of Chek Jawa and is supported by a small group of volunteers in this effort.
More on the Chek Jawa Mortality and Recruitment project blog.

10. Blue Water Volunteers

Volunteer guides from the Blue Water Volunteers introduce the amazing reefs of Kusu Island to families and kids. No need to swim, no need to dive, and just half an hour from the city centre!
The Blue Water Volunteers also conduct underwater reef surveys and guided dives of our very own wild reefs. More about them on the Blue Water Volunteer website. Here more blog entries about Kusu Island.

11. Hantu Bloggers

Led by Debby Ng, the hantu bloggers conduct regular dives of the marvelous reefs of Pulau Hantu! Check out their blog for all the adventures and sightings that you can enjoy on our own reefs. They're planning a dive on 18 Nov (Sun)! Join their mailing list to get updates of trips.Non-divers can also visit and enjoy Pulau Hantu. More about Pulau Hantu and other blog entries about Pulau Hantu.

12. Semakau volunteers
Volunteers with the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research bring visitors on intertidal walks at Pulau Semakau. Here, you can explore one of the largest seagrass meadows in Singapore, as well as living reefs, mangroves, sandy shores and more!

More about the Semakau intertidal walks, and blog entries about Pulau Semakau.

13. Naked Hermit Crabs

A group of volunteer shore guides have come together to provide guided walks at other shores that are at risk but are not covered by existing groups. The Naked Hermit Crabs provide a fun introduction for families and kids to our natural shores!
Join their upcoming walk at Sentosa on 27 Oct (Sat)! They also conduct guided walks on the Chek Jawa boardwalk. More on the Naked Hermit Crab blog.

14. Singapore Splendours: Life on the Edge

This magnificent book by Dr Chua Ee Kiam is packed with stunning photos of our shores, and graced by Dr Chua's stories of his explorations. Get a copy today!
More about the book on the simply green website


15. YOU can make a difference for our shores!

It's simple!
Just Explore, Express and Act!

Explore your shores! Just join any of the many guided activities on our shores, from walks to dives. Come for shore talks and other events. These are updated daily on the wildsingapore happenings blog. Get weekly updates by subscribing to the blog.

Express about your shores! Blog about your trip. Share your photos. Send me the links and I will post it up on wildsingapore for everyone to share.

Speak up about our shores. Enjoyed your trip? Tell the organisers, agencies managing the shore. You don't need to write only to complain. Written support of existing habitats will strengthen the case for preserving them. Don't wait until they are at risk!

Act for your shores! Join any of the many volunteer opportunities, more about these on on-going opportunities. Get updates emailed to you by subscribing to feeds from the wildsingapore daily news blog which features news, blog updates and volunteer opportunities.

MORE links
This has been a brief introduction to our shores. Here's links to more!
About our wild places how to get there, what to see and do, what to prepare.
Blog entries about our wildshores

Other wild blog entries for Blog Action Day

Changi again

Beachfleas were back at Changi last night, this time at a different portion of this very long shore. This part of Changi is very soft so it's a little challenging to explore, but it's very much alive!There were lots of little brittle stars among the seagrasses there. These looked different from the very large ones we saw the night before.

Many were lying about upside down. We don't really know why.
Some had swollen bulbous pink portions at their central disks (like the one on the left), while others didn't (see the one on the right). This is a mystery to me. Pink ones carrying eggs? Hmmm.

There were lots of little Biscuit sea stars (Goniodiscaster scabra) (photo on the right) among the seagrasses and seaweeds. But YC found a large Biscuit sea star as big as his hand. These sea stars do look like they were made out with a cookie cutter! On the sandier parts, there were lots of little Sand stars (Astropecten sp.).

There were a few carpet anemones too, although they were not very large.
I tried to ignore all the sea anemones we saw as we weren't out on a hunt. But I did see the usual ones. Ron and Marcus, however, found a very special sea anemone! Marcus wrote to Dr Daphne about it and Ron blogged about it on his tidechaser blog.

Among the seagrasses on this soft shore were tiny octopuses, little gobies and lots of other wriggly things.

This silty soft shore is next to a rocky portion. Here, there were lots of weird blobs.I promised Lily I would feature some of these blobs as she had been intrigued by them on her last visit. The yellow blobs and the brown slimy thing that looks like melted chocolate are both animals! Each is a colony of really tiny animals and these animals are called ascidians. They are quite commonly seen on many of our rocky shores.

Sponges are animals too!These purple branching sponges are growing very well on the Changi rocky shore. A sponge is not a colony but is a simple animal that has a body structure to suck in water to filter out the edible bits. Thus it is full of holes!

There are even some really tough hard corals on the rocky shore.This is a Zebra hard coral (Oulastrea sp.). Each hard coral is a colony of tiny animals called polyps. Each polyp builds a little hard skeleton. When exposed out of water, the polyp retracts into its skeleton. The polyps of this particular hard coral produces black-and-white skeletons, hence its common name.

Corals, sponges, ascidians are preyed upon by other animals. Like this pretty flatworm (Pseudobiceros gratus).
Nudibranchs also eat animals that don't move about. But we didn't see any nudibranchs yesterday.

This shore has special significance for YC and me. About 6 years ago, I received an email from YC about the spectacular finds he discovered on this shore. At that time, I was focused on Chek Jawa. His find encouraged me to have a look at Changi and later, our other shores too. So it was YC and his Changi find that started wildfilms, beachfleas and everything else that I'm doing today!

As YC and I were reminiscing about these events, I remarked that unfortunately, today, we won't see the seahorse that he saw years ago and was raving to me about in his first email.

Just as I said it, I came across...
Yes, a seahorse! It had a very distended tummy and at first I thought it was a pregnant male. But this one has an anal fin (the tiny flap under the belly) so it's probably a female.

Wow! Changi's shores are still very much alive despite the years and pressures on it.

Alas, as we were about to leave, we came across an abandoned driftnet.There were 3 large horseshoe crabs trapped in it, as well as four rather angry crabs. The team gently and carefully cut out the trapped animals with Chay Hoon's handy scissors. It took a long while but the animals were all eventually released.

The driftnet was brought all the way off the beach and thrown into the bin. This is the only way to permanently stop deaths caused by abandoned driftnets.

All along the beach we saw people fishing and at least one person using a cast net.

Links to more about the trip
Ron's tidechaser blog : strange and rare anemone, sea cucumbers, fan worms and more!

Changi is alive!

With the low spring tides now in the evening, a small group of beachfleas gathered on our favourite Changi shore for a leisurely after-work look. And wow! The shores are just seething with life. Sheltering next to a buried Fan shell and the white sea pen, are two Kite butterflyfishes (Parachaetodon ocellatus), a scorpionfish and a little rabbitfish!

Nick says the rabbitfish doesn't look like a rabbit. True, possibly the common name arose because it eats green stuff?

Chay Hoon found a really pretty dragonet (Callionymus schaapii) which has a downturned mouth to vacuum up edible titbits.This little sand-dwelling fish disappears instantly into the sand leaving only its beady eyes sticking out of the surface. Other fishes we saw included tiny filefishes and large soles and other flatfishes.

The shore was thick with green seaweeds and among them, all kinds of animals were hiding. We carefully avoided stepping on the seaweeds so that we wouldn't squash all the animals living there.

Octopus! Nick annouces. It was a marvellous one indeed. We only see this kind of octopus on the northern shores and it looks quite different from the ones we commonly see on the southern shores. All too soon, it slithered away to hide among the seaweeds.

Chay Hoon also spotted a tiny squid! It had its pair of tentacles extended.Squids (and cuttlefishes) have eight arms. These arms are short and stout, with suckers along their entire length. In addition to the eight arms, squids also have a pair of tentacles. These may be twice as long as the arms, are thinner and have spoon-shaped tips. Only the tips have suckers. A squid uses these two longer tentacles to grab prey. These tentacles shoot out and retract in an eye blink, bringing the prey within the grasp of the eight shorter arms which firmly grip the prey for the killing bite with its sharp beak.

Changi has some amazing molluscs including this beautiful Noble volute (Cymbiola nobilis) that Chay Hoon found for us. And among the many common moon snails ploughing the sand, Chay Hoon spotted this rarer Lined moon snail (Natica lineata).
What a stunning snail!

There were LOTS of armina nudibranchs on the shores! We don't know why.These slugs in pajamas have a colourful blue-and-yellow shovel shaped bit in front of the face. Chay Hoon also spotted some woolly slugs.

The green shores were dotted with large round white sea urchins (Salmacis sp.).As well as tiny sea urchins of different kinds.Like the pink pencil sea urchin (Prionocidaris sp.) and the black sea urchin (Temnopleurus sp.).

There were also strange sea cucumbers lurking among the seaweeds.Including the delightful pink Thorny sea cucumber (Colochirus quadrangularis) and this odd little white sea cucumber which might be a synaptid sea cucumber (Family Synaptidae).

We have been seeing this intriguing beige sea cucumber (on the left) on our northern shores lately. We don't know what it is.
And we're so glad to see the bigger Sandfish sea cucumber (Holothuria scabra) back on the shore. We also saw the smooth sea cucumber and ball sea cucumber (Phyllophorus sp.)

The sand stars (Astropecten sp.) were also plentiful!
The shores were also writhing with very large and active brittlestars!And we also saw sand dollars! So it appears the echinoderms on Changi are recovering very well.

Chay Hoon also showed us a lively mantis shrimp!
My find of the day was this awesome monster lurking among the seaweeds!Fortunately, it was tiny, about 2cm across. This fearsome bristleworm must strike terror into the shells of little animals that live on the shore.

We noticed someone on the shore walking around with a plastic bag while we were there. We couldn't get close enough to chat with him as he seemed to be avoiding us.

Let's hope he wasn't collecting these wonderful animals. In the past, we had encountered people collecting animals from Changi to eat.

This trip is also blogged by
Chay Hoon on her colourful clouds blog