Sisters Island Walk on 30 May 2010

We finally conducted our very first public intertidal walk on Big Sister Island! Compared to the other walks that we have conducted, we have much fewer participants for this walk - only 30! This is because the Big Sister Island is much smaller than the other islands that we have conducted intertidal walks so far, and hence we had a smaller group that is more manageable to minimise impact to the environment.


We started off at the rocky shore, and at the edge of the shore, we found several feather stars (Class Crinoidea). These animals use their feather-like tentacles to collect plankton to feed on.


There were a number of Leaf Slugs (Elysia ornata) too. These slugs feed on the sap of algae, and are able to retain the chloroplast in the sap for photosynthesis to provide them with additional nutrients.


We soon reached a nice fringing reef with lots of hard corals and other reef organisms.


A few Striped Ribbon Worms (Baseodiscus quinquelineatus) were stranded on the rocks.


I noticed a few partially bleach coral colonies, but the situation was certainly not as bad as what we saw at Semakau.


There were a few Fireband Murex (Chicoreus torrefactus) among the corals. According to sources I found from the Web, the bright orange colour comes from a layer of skin (called the periostracum) which covers the shell.


There was also an Adhesive Sea Anemone (Cryptodendrum adhaesivum). Unlike most other sea anemones, this one has very short tentacles which it uses to sting its prey.


When we reached the small sandy lagoon, we saw many Moon Snails (Polinices mammilla) moving around just below the sand.


When we reached the big lagoon, I found a White-spotted Reef Hermit Crab (Dardanus megistos)! This hermit crab is seldom spotted on our shores. It was very shy though, and refused to come out for a nice photo :P


In the big lagoon, we also found a few Spider Conches (Lambis lambis). They were really well-camouflaged and it was quite hard to spot them when they were in the right environment.


A few nudibranchs were also spotted, including this Bohol's Nudibranch (Discodoris boholiensis).

Towards the end of the walk, the sky turned dark rather suddenly, but it fortunately did not rain and the participants managed to have a little picnic before we board the boat.


The boat ride back was mostly a rather peaceful one, until we reached Marina South Pier. One of the smaller boat accidentally crashed into our boat, and the impact smashed one of the windows! Fortunately, no one was hurt in this accident.

Oil Spill Rescue Operation Does More Harm than Good

The Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (ACRES), an animal welfare group in Singapore, conducted a rescue and release operation for animals affected by the recent oil spill in Singapore waters. These animals from the affected shores and released them at Sembawang Park, ironically, on Vesak Day.

Traditionally, Vesak Day has been a festival which Buddhists practise the releasing animals into the wild, otherwise known in or known in Mandarin as 'fang sheng'. They believed that this is an act of compassion to the animals, but unfortunately, many of these animals do not survive due to various reasons.

Usually, animals are released into the wrong habitat and die as they cannot adapt fast enough to the different challenges present in the new habitat. Many of them are weak and in a state of shock when they were caught, and are caught by predators easily. These animals may also introduce new diseases to the wild animals in the new location, and if they survive, compete with the original residents.

Previously, ACRES had been encouraging Buddhists to refrain from releasing animals during this festival. This recent development thus came as a surprise to many nature lovers.

The society apparently failed to see the similarity between their rescue operation and the traditionaly "fang sheng". Firstly, affected areas such as Changi beach and Tanah Merah were sandy shore habitats. While Sembawang also has a sandy beach, the deeper areas were mostly mudflats. The water will also be different, since Sembawang is sheltered in the Strait of Johor, while the other areas are fed by the South China Sea. Genetically, the organisms found in various areas may also be different, since they would have been adapted to the unique conditions in the area.

In addition, the animals in the affected areas could have ingested the oil, and it would be impossible to remove the oil and its effect from the internal organs, even if the volunteers ensure that they clean the animals externally very thoroughly. As such, when these animals are introduced to the new habitat, they may not survive. And if these animals are eaten by the original resident animals, the latter could be affected as well. As such, more harm than good will be done.

According to eye-witnesses, the volunteers even dug up soldier crabs in their burrow, and ran the risk of crushing and killing these crabs and other burrowing organisms in the process.

More importantly, this incident could be transmitting the wrong message to animals lovers in Singapore. They may be led to think that it is fine to catch and release animals from one location to another within Singapore, if they perceive the animal to be in danger. And we need to understand that everyone uses a different yardstick to determine whether an animal is in danger or not. They can just catch the animal, and go to the authorities to seek permission to release the animal at another location. They can claim that they bought the animals from a poacher, or pick it up some where in the urban areas. It will be hard for the authorities to penalise them. If the authorities do not want to give the permission, they will have to confiscate the animals. And as far as the animal-lover is concern, the authorities will do something about the rescued animal, and their objective is met.

This could also encourage poachers to poach local animals and sell them to devotees who wish to release animals. News articles related to this incident could in fact start appearing in the marketing folders of animal traders.

It is unfortunate that ACRES decided to conduct such an operation. It is possible that the advice of ecologists were not consulted before the society decided to do this. This incident thus again highlights the importance of balancing emotions with logic (in this case, science) in conservation work.

Update: Heard that there is actually a marine biologist advising them on this. How can a marine biologist allow them to do this? What's happening to the marine biologists in Singapore???!!???

Update 2: Read on the ACRES website that the marine biologist advising them is a certain Grace. Who on earth is this Grace?