Friday, May 29, 2009

Underwater Garden at Tuas

Yesterday, the RMBR Nature Guides were back at Tuas to check out the intertidal area.

Coral Garden
What I like best about Tuas was the many soft corals and zoanthids. They were everywhere, just like flowers in a garden!

soft Coral
Some of the soft corals look really cute, like little puff balls.

soft Coral
Others look like a bunch of little flowers.

Hard Coral
Apart from the softies, we have hard corals there too. The above was quite a huge colony - about 80m wide.

Sea Anemone
Many sea anemones, yet another kind flower-like animals, were spotted. The above unidentified sea anemone looks just like a glass flower! We saw several huge carpet anemones too.

Sea Pen
There were a few red sea pens too, adding more colours to the already very colourful "underwater garden".

Sea Fan
Just as brilliantly coloured were the sea fans, and Tuas has many of them.

Sea Fan
Some of the sea fan colonies were really huge - almost a metre wide and tall!

Sea Whip
The closely related sea whips we saw were not that colourful though.

Hydroids
These branch-like stuff were no sea fans but hydroids. They can give really painful stings, leaving scars that take a long time to heal.

Jellyfish
Another animal which gives painful stings is this jellyfish.

Shrimp
We noticed a shrimp scampering around it, even among its tentacles!

Ghost Shrimp
Another shrimp-like animal is this one. Looks like a ghost shrimp to me, though the colour is not as bright as the ones I have seen before.

Blue Shrimp
LK found this very pretty blue shrimp, my first time seeing it!

Laganum depressum Sand Dolalr
We found lots of these Laganum Sand Dollars (Laganum depressum), with many of them just below the sand surface.

Rock Star (Asterina coronata)
This Rock Star (Asterina coronata) was the only sea star we found.

Pink Thorny Sea Cucumber (Colochirus quadrangularis)
The Pink Thorny Sea Cucumber (Colochirus quadrangularis) can be found among the seaweed.

Glassy Bubble Shells (Haminoea sp.)
There were lots of Glassy Bubble Shells (Haminoea sp.) on the muddy-sandy substrate.

Tiger Moon Snail (Natica tigrina)
The Tiger Moon Snail (Natica tigrina) is supposed to be a fierce predator of other shells. Wonder if it feeds on bubble shell?

Sea Squirts (Polycarpa sp.)
There were lots of Sea Squirts (Polycarpa sp.) at Tuas too.

Special thanks to Sheryl and Helen from Schering Plough for helping with the coordination work :)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey, how do u get there? I was at Raffles Marina and the nearby area but the entire coast was fenced up. Do I require a special permit in order to get in? If so, how do I get it? Thanks so much for ur help.

Ron Yeo said...

Hi, we had to get permission to pass through the factory compound to get to the shore. They will only allow people to go through their compound there for research reasons.

Anonymous said...

I was planning to go there for an assignment for my module at NUS (Marine Biology). Does that count as a research reason? Haha..is there a specific protocol to follow? Documents required? Thanks again!