AFN: Learning about Ubin – a walk!

2nd Jul 20222nd Jul 2022 ~ sarah ~ Leave a comment

Hello there! Wow time has really flown by since we had our first virtual call introducing the BFF challenge. Three reflections later, here is my final one as part of my Act for Nature.

Some time back, I had volunteered to help out with Pesta Ubin which lined up nicely as I could use this experience as my Act for Nature! Pesta Ubin is an initiative by NParks and the Friends of Ubin Network (FUN). Through heartfelt, community-led activities, Pesta Ubin showcases our favourite cultural and environmental aspects of the island.

I volunteered to help out with a nature walk as I felt that it was important and meaningful for participants to not only learn and appreciate the different fauna and flora found on Ubin, but to also understand it’s land-use plans past, present and future. Even with the recent announcement of the Long Term Plan Review, land reclamation is still on the cards for Chek Jawa which poses a very real threat to the precious habitat. I hope that through this sharing people would come to love and want to protect Chek Jawa should the government announce development plans.

This would be my very first time guiding so I was pretty nervous! The walk was opened to the public so we had quite a nice diversity of attendees. We started off going to House No. 1 on Chek Jawa where we shared how civil society fought to conserve Chek Jawa. Currently the government’s stand is to defer development for as long as possible….which gives me the impression that it will eventually happen :(, just a matter of when.

We then made our way towards the boardwalk and the mangroves where we shared about the various habitats that can be found in this small island, from mangroves to seagrass meadows. In particular, Ubin is home to some fauna / flora species that can’t be found on mainland Singapore like the asian small clawed otters, greater mousedeer and lesser false vampire bats. Overall we had a positive response, and I do hope that the participants went home understanding land-use planning, and loving Ubin abit more.

The most interesting aspect of this activity was the guiding itself. I enjoyed sharing the knowledge I had learnt, studied, memorised as part of the walk (esp since this was my first time guiding), particularly when participants go “oooooo” or “so coool”! It was also my first time seeing seagrass meadows so that was very cool!!

Seagrass meadows! Couldn’t find any distinct dugong trails…or I noob hahah

My personal takeaway from this experience is that for people to want to fight for something, they first have to love it! Which is why physical nature walks are important. But I also do hope that people will come to love green spaces not just for aesthetic or recreational purposes but for the essential ecosystem services and the amazing biodiversity in Singapore.

Our group! Guiding is always more fun with friends 🙂

Woohoo! Thanks for reading!!

Small but very important critters

13th Jun 202214th Jun 2022 ~ sarah ~ Leave a comment

The entomology walk was one I had my eye on since our very first BFF launch call so you could say I was very excited for the walk.

We started of with a special breakfast treat…the insect kind. A couple of packets of insects were passed around, different varieties different flavours. While I had eaten insects before (it was grinded into powder form and made into a cake) this was going to be whole. pieces. I picked up for myself a barbecue flavoured cricket……it was okay…. Haha 🙂

We were then introduced to the many guides accompanying us, each an expert in different fields! And off we went.

Some background, insects while tiny play a humongous role in our ecosystem. They help pollinate plants (which in turn feeds other fauna), nutrient-recycling, and are an important food source for many other species.

Below is a list of some of the takeaways I thought were very cool:

FLIES

First, we met with what i thought was a bee but nooooo it was a sort of fly!! Each insect performs a particular function / niche and different flies have adapted to actually perform similar functions that cover most insects.

Hover fly > pollinate like bees
Assassin fly > able to snatch prey in mid-air like dragonflies
(There were other functions but this is what I remember)

WASPS

While wasps have a negative reputation and prejudice against them they actually play an important role in pest control pollination. There are some plants that when “attacked” by caterpillars will release chemicals to attract wasps to come and eat the caterpillars.

Our wasps, bees, butterflies and flies are all important pollinators in our ecosystem! Did you know in Singapore, we have over 100 native bees, but only 4 species are honey bees.

FIG TREES

Fig trees are a keystone species (aka disproportionate importance in the ecosystem). They sprout all year round and are an important source of food for all kinds of animals.

The flowers are hidden inside the fig and are pollinated by fig wasps. As the wasps enters, she will break her wings and lay her eggs that will feed on the fig itself.

Figs are pollinated by a specific species of fig wasps, hence if the fig wasps go extinct so will the fig tree. There is a particular fig wasps species in haiwaii that has gone extinct, hence the fig trees now require human intervention in the form of hand pollination.

*Pic of what it looks like inside the figs and the flowers that get pollinated*

GENDER ROLES…in the insect kingdom

In the insect kingdom each gender has a specific role. The purpose of females are meant to reproduce as much as possible, thus they are less attractive (less obvious to predators) and can live much longer hence, reproduce more.

Comparatively, the higher priority of males is to mate with as many females as possible. Hence they are “prettier” to attract mates but are more obvious to predators.

For example, for bagworm moths when turning from caterpillar to moth, the females remain in a caterpillar like state and does not leave the bag. Instead, she remains inside waiting for the male moth to locate the waiting female.

After mating, she produces the eggs within her body and dies. fin ~

Other cool pics

*Ant-mimicking spider – Usually animals would mimic to hide from predators, but in this case the spider mimics to be among ants to eat them, kinda like wolf in sheep’s clothing.* (Pic by James our guide, my iPhone could never do insect photography justice)

*Using flash reflects this glowing thingy on the dragonflies wings*

*Same dragonfly – but taken with a proper camera! (Pic by James)*

This ends my third reflection with BFF! It has been a very fun journey learning about biodiversity, from horseshoe crabs, to night walks at Bukit Batok and now learning about etymology. Looking forward to sharing more about my act for nature.

Bukit Batok After Dark

2nd May 20222nd May 2022 ~ sarah ~ 2 Comments

I’ve never been to Bukit Batok Nature Park before (let alone at night), safe to say I was really excited for this walk! As more participants streamed in we chatted for abit before our guide for the night, Uncle Tony, arrived in his truck. Now I’ve met Uncle Tony at various virtual engagements before, but this was my first time meeting him in person, I was thrilled to be given the opportunity to learn from someone so knowledgeable about our biodiversity.

Off we went! As we walked through the park, Uncle Tony explained how large rain trees are often home to climbers or ferns that in turn provide homes for many fauna species – ranging from birds to insects and even bats. They create microhabitats that play an important role in supporting our biodiversity.

*Uncle Tony looking under the ferns located on a rain tree (Pic by Stefanie)*

When it comes to conservation, we often focus on conservation significance species (i.e. labelled endangered etc). Uncle Tony shared about the important role our common plants play in the ecosystem, in providing food and shelter to a myriad of fauna species. Even for the tiniest of creatures, who form the foundation of our ecosystem!

*Pic of one of the common plants (I have forgotten its name :p someone please remind me haha)*

Uncle Tony also shared about the Banyan Tree! As it grows and spreads its branches out horizontally, it grows aerial roots that mature into thick, woody trunks to support its branches. How smart!!

*Banyan Tree roots that has thickened over time, offering support!*

My last flora fun fact before we move on to our fauna haul – Uncle Tony pointed out that there were a couple of Sea Apple trees, a coastal species native to Singapore. Bukit Batok is not exactly near the coast so what is this tree doing here? Well it was used as a firebreak! In the past, large forests were cleared for plantations that would move from land to land, eventually resulting in lots of lalang abandoned fields that were highly flammable. The Sea Apple does not burn easily and was planted extensively as firebreaks.

Now moving on to the fauna section of this post, we actually spotted two colugos!! One of them a larger brown coloured one that was spotted by a keen-eyed participant actually glided right in front of us – it was super exciting as I had never seen one glide before.

*The brown colugo spotted by another participant. The other one we spotted was slightly smaller in size with a grey-ish colour.*

*Our flashlights were disturbing it, hence you can see how it has angled its body to decide where it would be gliding to!*

We also spotted some insects along the way – including my first ever praying mantis!!

All in all, it was a really fun trip and my favourite takeaways were spotting the colugos and learning about plants especially since I don’t have much experience with plants. I do hope to have more opportunities to learn more about them and the vital role they play in our ecosystems.

My next walk is going to be the entomology one – so excited!!

A morning with horseshoe crabs!

10th Apr 202212th Apr 2022 ~ sarah ~ 2 Comments

I got out of bed eager for an early morning adventure and made my way to our meeting point, somewhere deep inside Kranji. While waiting for the rest of the team to arrive, I was eating my breakfast….without realising I was becoming breakfast for the commander-level mosquitos!! At one point, I had 5 of them on me 😵. Alas, our insect repellants were not able to completely repel these little buggers, with me topping the charts with 30 over bites. We later learned that the mosquito situation worsened due to neighbouring constructions and an abandoned building…(which led me to think does that mean our migrant workers face such bites on a daily basis?)

Moving on to the main highlight of our trip – horseshoe crabs! After our safety briefing our guide from NSS, Lester, brought us down to the mudflats. At first, it was tough trying to adapt to walking across sinking mud, but soon we got the hang of it.

Horseshoe Crabs

Lester introduced us to the various marine creatures living amongst our mudflats including flower crabs, cone snails etc. We then formed a line and gingerly looked through the mud and under the algae for the star of the show. There are four species of horseshoe crabs, and Singapore is home to two of them, the costal horseshoe crab and the mangrove horseshoe crab.

Once we found a large enough horseshoe crab Lester started to share all about them:

To differentiate between male and female, the front two legs for males are bulkier (almost bicep-looking). They moult to grow bigger, and you can only tell their sex once they reach sexual maturity. Jimmy’s post has a great picture showing these bicep looking legs, check it out.

We learnt about the anatomy of the horseshoe crab, including how to safely pick them up. What stood out for me was learning that their mouths are at the end of their legs, so technically whenever they are walking they are feeding too!

Horseshoe crabs are often bled for their blue blood that is used to test for the presence of bacteria in human medication (Previously pharma used rabbits). They are bled up to 75% of their blood before being released, Lester notes that survival rates after release are unknown. A synthetic alternative was innovated by National University of Singapore’s Department of Zoology, and is slowly getting adopted in the EU but for (ahem) particular reasons the US is not on board. (Random thought, where do SG pharma companies stand with this?)

*The first horseshoe crab I found! You can tell it’s a female because of it’s legs*

*Another juvenile horseshoe crab – we saw many that day! v smolvcute*

NSS’s Role in Horseshoe Crab Conservation

Lester shared that this initiative has been running for 11 years and pre-covid/ in the early days horseshoe crabs were collected safely by the buckets to be measured and gender-identified before releasing them back. Through the data collected, NSS submits them to IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) as the current record is “data deficient” and the Singapore Red Data Book (Where the mangrove horseshoe crab is listed as vulnerable, and costal horseshoe crab is listed as endangered.). That day, unfortunately we saw mostly juveniles. It seems like the population has definitely deteriorated 😔.

Panic! At Kranji Mudflats – The invasion of mussels

The invasion of the American Mussel hit headlines in 2018 – This blogpost by WildSingapore nicely captures the various articles by news outlets.

*Beautiful but deadly! Common name: American Mussel ; Scientific name: Mytella strigata.*

Found in dense mats of up to 10,000 individuals, the American Mussel was displacing the Asian Green Mussel native to Singapore, and making it difficult for horseshoe crabs to burrow in the sand. They even attached themselves to horseshoe crabs (see vid below).

Towards the end, we had to get out of the mudflats asap as it was about to rain. To sum it all up, I enjoyed myself and learnt a lot about horseshoe crabs on this trip, and I do hope that the government would offer this incredible species some protection!

Thanks for reading till the end, signing off with a video of a very sm0l horseshoe crab 🥰 (Link)