Blacktip Reef Sharks trapped dead in Drift Net @ Semakau on 29 May

We were back at Semakau today doing a survey at the other site. Between my group and july's group laid a gigantic drift net. I was looking forward to the survey as the marine life there is supposedly a lot richer than the usual site that we always survey. However, not long after we started the survey, we heard Ron calling out very loudly at the rocky shores that there were Blacktip Reef Sharks! Curious, we all stopped doing what we did and went over to have a look. 

But to our dismay, what we saw was carcass of a dead shark trapped in the drift net. It was my first time seeing a Blacktip Reef Shark. Although i've always wanted to see one, I didn't expect to see it like this. 

Seeing it trapped in the net made my heart wrench. 

Taking a closer look at the shark, there were cuts on its body. They're probably caused by the struggling of the shark when it was trapped in the net. Some of the wounds were still bleeding..

There was also another one trapped in the net not far away.

After taking a few shots of the shark, we went back to continue with our survey. After a while, Ron found the third one, trapped dead in the net too. My heart literally sank when i heard it. While we did our surveys, Ron, Ms Wang and Marcus rolled the drift net from the reefs to the rocky shore.


After we finished the survey, a lot of us helped to move the super huge and heavy drift net up the seawall and to the main road so that the NEA people could come and collect it to prevent the fishermen from using it again. It was not an easy job but with everyone's help, we still managed to do it! Didn't take any pictures after that as I was covered with sand and algae from moving and cutting the net.

The drift nets were probably laid there by the fishermen or workers living on the nearby islands. Although this may only seem free food to them, but they probably have no idea how much harm it will cause to the marine animals. In fact, possessing a drift net is illegal! But i guess people who laid the nets didn't care so much, and the law is not strongly enforced in Singapore.

This time, it trapped 3 sharks with a few other fishes, but what about the previous times and in the future? These nets can also trap animals like turtles and dolphins! We always see nets around when we visit the shores, but those people who laid the nets probably don't know how precious these marine animals are. A lot of my friends don't know that there're actually sharks etc in Singapore's waters. With these irresponsible people laying the nets and killing them, whether intentional or unintentional, these animals may eventually disappear completely from our waters and we may not even have a chance to see them anymore.

Hopefully this will be the first and the last time that we're going to witness this kind of situation. Really hope that the authorities will do something about it and not let these people to continue doing harm to the animals and even our reefs. I believe that none of us will want these animals going missing in the future, and it is really a nightmare that I don't wish for it to happen.

Changi on 3 Jan

This is a super overdue post because i was super busy since school started. LOL.

Anywayz, we went to Changi the day before school started! (: Our luck was good and we some super huge Luidias!

This is one of the 4 Eight-armed Luidia Sea Stars (Luidia maculata) that we saw. It was the first time that i ever seen such a huge sea star! We measured the diameter and each of them were about 50 cm wide. They usually burrow in soft sediments and feed on small buried animals and other smaller sea stars.

Someone spotted a Six-armed Luidia Sea Star (Luidia penangensis) too! Another Lifer! :D Two of the arms seemed to be shorter than the others. Hopefully they'll grow back soon! (:

My third lifer of the day - the Sea Apple (Pseudocolochirus axiologus). This is a rare sea cucumer in Singapore and it is highly toxic!

Other than the Sea Apple, we saw other sea cucumbers too. This is one of the very common ones that we saw, the Pink Thorny Sea Cucumber (Colochirus quadrangularis). It is extending its tentacles to feed on the planktons in the surrounding water.

This should be the Pink Warty Sea Cucumber (Cercodemas anceps). We saw many of them there too. 

This is the Smooth Sea Cucumber. We saw it at Chek Jawa the previous time too! (:

Here's another smaller one! This one looks super cute! :D It's only probably around 3 cm wide or even lesser!

We also saw a lot of Biscuit Sea Stars (Goniodiscaster scaber)!

There were also a few Cake Sea Stars (Anthenea aspera) around. Didn't see these creatures for quite some time already..

There were a lot of Hairy Sea Hares (Bursatella leachii) around too! They seemed to be in season. Another liferrr! (: It's a pity that i didn't get a good shot of them because they're really pretty creatures in water!

And here's another lifer too! This Leafy Sap-sucking Slug (Polybranchia orientalis) is probably named so because of the leaf-like structures on it's body. These structures are called the cerata, which acts as a defensive mechanism. These animals will cast off their cerata when disturbed and new cerata will be regrown in a few day's time.

And here's our Mr Octopus! It was posing really nicely for us to take pictures of it but the water was a bit murky ):

We also saw this Orange-stripped Hermit Crab (Clibanarius infraspinatus) that is quite big. 

A sea squirt (Polycarpa sp.). This is a solitary ascidian. 

There were also a few baby Swimming Anemones (Boloceroides mcmurrichi) around. Their tentacles have stinging cells which can sting. 

 We also saw a lot of peacock anemones on the shore. However, due to the low tide, many of them were a bit dried out ):

 When it is in water, it will extend its long beautiful tentacles. It lives in a tube made of sand and its mucus.

 We also saw some Horseshoe Crabs (Carcinoscorpius rotundicauda). Although they are named as crabs,  they are more closely related to scorpions and spiders! Some of the horseshoe crabs have barnacles growing on them, i wonder if they'll feel the weight hmm..

Ron found this dead Spotted Seahorse (Hippocampus kuda). When we first looked at it, we almost thought that it was a plastic one. Poor seahorse! ):

There were also a few dead groupers around...

Finally finished this post after almost half a year. It was always in my draft ._.

Saw a lot of Lifers this trip and learnt a lot too! Hopefully this area will not be affected by the oil spill that happened a few days ago. It is really saddening to see the little animals getting killed by the crude oil and the beautiful beach being polluted by it =/