Starting the work day with a smile! :D

Sometimes friends/acquaintances ask me why I can tahan working on an island (no, they are NOT referring to Singapore) and despite the extra travel time (and the occasional risk of being stranded), I can say that my work place is pretty special. Whilst literally living the island life (living in an island city state, working on a small island off the "mainland" ;p) I sometimes do lose track of the uniqueness of our workspace, and today we were pleasantly surprised as the boat berthed at St John's Island......

As usual, most of us were catching our 40 winks on the boat, and as the boat was coming alongside the jetty, someone exclaimed "Dolphins!" "Huh? Where?" The few of us who were awake quickly looked out the window to try and spot theses charismatic marine mammals, and sure enough, we saw a sleek grey body breaching the surface of the tranquil waters. And then it was gone again. And then it appeared, further away. Not much surface activity but at least we saw one or two of these strong swimmers as we arrived at work ^_^ Who else can boast of seeing WILD DOLPHINS greeting them near their workplace every once in a while? Unfortunately, they were a bit far for my C905 to be of any use so no photos from me. Will update if I come across any colleagues who managed to take any.
Have marked out on this Google Map the rough location of this sighting.

Click on my "dolphins" tag on the left to read about some of my previous sightings (or just click here)

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Terumbu Pempang Tengah - TPT

Yes, I am uber behind on my posts.... But since I did promise that my next entry would be on the visit to TPT, here goes nothing....
15 July 2010 - Was lucky enough to join a smallish team of 6 to explore one of our submerged patch reef. It has been a while since I last visited any of the patch reefs (while on a walk or whilst diving), and it was nice heading out with my cab-pool kaki since we also had a chance to do some catching up ;p

It was still dark when we arrived, but soon the skies brightened and we off we went! It was certainly quite an expanse of shore to cover but with all of us heading out in different directions, I think between the six of us, we managed to cover most of it ^_^ Here's some close-up of critters I came across. Can you figure out what they are? (p/s. click on the pics for the larger image and what it is)



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For more photos, feel free to check out my Flickr album.
Read more from Ria's posts on Darat and Tengah.

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Perspectives.....

My kayaking trip at Ubin has stirred up a series of personal reflections for me... No, the photo below has no relation to the topic XD It's just that I'm more trigger-happy than a camera whore and I don't really have candid shots of me.

Have never really been a sporty person but it seems that ever since undergraduate days, I have been becoming more and more of an outdoorsy person. It is through books that I slowly grew to learn about nature, and some of the biodiversity around us. And it is with that that I develop an interest in some outdoors activities. First there were the intertidal guiding, then came diving, then treeclimbing, cycling (yar, I didn't learn how to cycle until a year or two ago), powerboating and Sunday's kayaking. It really does seem serendipitous how things have been working out in my life so far, yet I can't help but feel that it was all planned out.

It's not only the wonder of how I've come to the role in which I have with regards to nature and biodiversity but also the actual miraculousness of nature that has gotten me thinking. And it seems that now I am starting to see and open doors to new areas and perspectives of experiencing and connecting with nature. How so?

I only went to take my OW and AOW diving certification so that I could have another angle on my FYP. One thing led to another, with me learning LIT methodology, and even helping to conduct ReefCheck training for others! I know that quite a few of my diver friends picked diving up as something unusual to do, caught the bug and have been scratching the itch to get underwater every once in a while. And depending on their instructors/diving kakis, they would gradually start appreciate the marine wildlife and its environment. Yet for me it's the opposite. So from day one I was more in awe of the different kind of milieu that I found whilst diving rather than the actual diving itself.

The same thing happened with tree climbing. This time, taking the course with a bunch of fellow intertidal enthusiasts, and again, it was the chance to be up close and personal with the trees that actually got me interested in the course. Still can't tell if I'm much of a convert to tree climbing though, but this is largely due to my sporadic fear of heights. ;p

And this brings me to kayaking. Decided to give it a try as one of those "Why not?" things to do. But the trip down the mangroves did show me yet another way for me to explore the great outdoors. Not in the adventure sense, but getting close to some of the trees without the usual sloshing walk, and with the chance to just drift and listen to all those different bird calls.

And it strikes me that all one has to do is to slow down for a moment, take a deep breath and just take it all in. Especially for those of us who are blessed to be in Singapore. Just look at the amount of urbanisation and development we have had here in land scarce Singapore. Yet we have managed to keep enough of our nature spots (i.e. Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve, Central Nature Reserve, etc.), as well as have park connectors (that act as green bridges between out fragmented forests on mainland). There is still much nature around us. Maybe more in the form of urban biodiversity than actual wildlife in forests. Every once in a while I lose sight of this fact, and yet I am reminded of it time and again. What better time to have this readjusting of perspective but in the middle of the International Year of Biodiversity, eh? So, the next time you find yourself outdoors, don't be so caught up in the activity you're doing but also take time to look around, take a deep breath, and spot critters in the vicinity.

Totally off topic but seems like next year is to be the International Year of Forests! Hmmm.... So what does a divejunkie do then? XD

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Kayaking @ Ubin

Whilst Ria and company were out at Sekudu in the wee hours in the morning yesterday, I went for my very first kayaking trip to some of the mangroves around Pulau Ubin.

Having missed out on the chance to try my hand at kayaking when I missed OBS in Secondary School, I never did understand the draw of kayaking..... Initially wasn't sure if I wanted to join in the trip but figured that there was no harm giving it a go since I'm generally a sea-person ;p

There was a quick briefing on how to maneuver the paddles, and off into the water we went. Newbies like me were paired up with our experienced friends (in my case, a WAY more experience friend, so I was in good hands... erm, paddles) while the rest went off in their one-man kayaks. And then there was a repeat briefing in when we were all safely adrift.

Then it was off to the mangroves!

At the parts of the river that were narrower, we had a bit of a kayak jam. Didn't count the exact number of kayaks but I think there were a good 20-odd people in total. Good thing that this trip was during the high tide, otherwise I couldn't imagine how we would be navigating through some bits!

Didn't take photos of the mangrove plants but did have fun pointing out the blooming sea hibiscus and various examples of vivipary on the mangrove plants. It was just such a novel experience looking at the mangrove life from a different perspective. And NOTHING can beat the sense of peace and tranquility there. And the surround sound bird calls were splendid! Just floating along..... And of course, taking photos at the wider portions of the river. Pity that with so many of us, we probably were intruding on the wildlife quite a bit....

After the sojourn into the mangroves, we cruised off to a rock at one corner of Ubin. Arms were busy, so no photos ;p Once I picked up the rhythm/groove of paddling, it was actually rather soothing to chat with our neighbouring kayak as we went along. Just that I can't really steer, so my seascouter friend behind was doing most of that!

As with all things, our little adventure in the sun and sea came to an end, and it was back to land to wash up.

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"World Atlas of Marine Fauna" - First Impressions

First thought that came to mind when I first saw it on Friday during ADEX. That is a HUGE whopper of a book! Next thought after getting a copy from Ivan to do a review... This is a freakingly heavy book!

According to Amazon, this book weighs 7 pounds (approx. 3.2kg)! For a single book! o.0 Definitely worked out my arms getting this volume home!
From the weight alone, it does give a "reference book" kinda feel, and the impression that it's no featherweight like those handy field guides that are more commonplace.

Opening the cover reveals a world map with red dots indicating selected photo locations used in the book. What's thrilling to me is that SINGAPORE has a red dot on it! Now I have to go through every 725 pages looking for the photos taken here XD

With the marine animals being organized by Phylum (and depending on the organism, sometimes Class/Order/Family), it does give the layman an insight to the taxonomic relationship between the animals. Nice systematic way of putting things. In spite of the book's title being "World Atlas of Marine Fauna", it's skewed towards the non-sessile aka mobile animal groups. The sessiles such as bryzoans, sponges, and cnidarians (refers to a large number of organisms such as soft and hard corals, jellyfish, anemones, hydroids, sea fans etc.) are covered VERY briefly in the introduction and not elaborated on. Do wish that there would be a separate volume on them too! Just like the companion volume "World Atlas of Marine Fishes." Being a single volume reference book targeted at non-experts/non-scientists, it does make sense to cover the more attractive (at least to the run-of-the-mill diver/snorkeler) marine animals.

Would probably only have the opportunity to do a more thorough reading of this World Atlas over the weekend....

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Good Friday on St John's Island

Sorry that this post is coming way late. The coral workshop is some what logistically challenging and there's not too much free time for me to do up this post. Least ways not after I have grabbed my photos and gotten some off other photographers. >.< Boy was the beach on St John's crowded on Good Friday! My Geography teacher from secondary school, Mrs Chua, contacted me about arranging for a guided nature walk for her friends and their family. Interestingly enough, Mrs Chua also facilitated my first ever visit to St John's Island for a geography fieldtrip. That trip stuck in our memories mainly due to the fact that after visiting the mangroves, we were caught in a rather heavy downpour at the rocky cliffs. At least this time around we had better luck with the weather.

Since I was in the middle of the SECORE workshop, and we made the arrangements in less than a week, it was a rather informal affair with Abby (who also happened to be on St John's for the workshop) kindly helping to guide half the group. It was nice sharing to a group of enthusiastic family group. Lots of questions asked, and a couple of them were also pointing out some of the raptors that were flying around the vegetation on the rocky cliff!

The group kept us pretty busy with their zeal for nature, and we were constantly talking and sharing stories with the group, so much so that I actually didn't take many shots of the organisms.

In fact, we stayed out until the tide was starting to look like it would cut off our route back! Some of the group was still heading further along the rocky shore at this point, and we had to quickly start ushering people back to the entry point.

But of course, spending Good Friday out at the shores would call for a group shot, and Abby was quickly loaded with an assortment of cameras to help with that. Really couldn't resist sneaking in a shot of her managing at least 5 cameras!!!!!

At the end of the walk, Mrs Chua and another geography teacher took over for the geography portion of their outing. The students in the group did a little exercise in beach profiling while Abby and I headed back to TMSI to check on the preparations for the first night of expected coral spawning before the group came up to TMSI.

Dr Michael Laterveer (Rotterdam Zoo) was kind enough to do a quick presentation for the group, introducing them corals, mass spawning, and the work that we hoped to get done during the ongoing SECORE workshop.

The visit was wrapped up with a quick peek at more marine life in the TMSI touchpool before the group headed back to the beach for a picnic lunch. ^_^

It's also heartening to read that the visit to St John's turned out pretty well in spite of the rushing here and there! Certainly hope the group would come back to St John's for another visit!

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