Bukit Timah Walk on 28 August 2009

Today, we conducted a guided walk at Bukit Timah Nature Reserve for a group of staff from the Ministry of Health. They were a really pleasant bunch of people to guided - very interested in nature, and asked a number of good questions. As it had rained earlier, we did not see many animals since most were probably hiding. But still, the group remained very enthusiastic till the end of the trip.

Somehow for terrestrial guided walks, I tend to take less photos, so here are some of the few animals that we managed to see.


We can usually find a few Tyriobapta torrida dragonflies near the visitor centre. They can usually be found resting on the tree trunk. The above is a male.


This is the female. This dragonfly is a forest species that we can't find in the more open areas.


I was really glad that we managed to see a female Malayan Colugo (Cynocephalus variegatus) with her baby near the visitor centre. They were so high up on a palm tree, that the photo turned out rather blurred.


We saw this little bird that looked like a white-eye, but has a yellow breast instead of a whitish one. Is it a juvenile or something different altogether?


As we were heading out of the reserve, we saw a troupe of Long-tailed Macaques (Macaca fascicularis). This one was eating an apple. Not sure where it got the apple from though. Did someone fed it, or did it dig it out from the rubbish bin, or did it steal from the nearby residents ? Hmm... We certainly do not encourage people feeding the monkeys, as they already have enough food in the forest, and by feeding them, they will be conditioned to get food from human in future, and eventually may even attack human for food!

Well, this was just a short one-and-a-half hour trip, but glad that we still managed to see a number of interesting stuff :)