Fat & Flat At Pulau Hantu.....

Was out diving with The Hantu Bloggers at Pulau Hantu today again.

It was a good dive with good vis of about 4m. The first dive was at the western fringing reefs and the second at the North jetty.

Okay,okay.....You must be wondering why Fat and Flat right? Here's why.....that's because the Nudibranch that we saw looked fat and juicy and the Flatworms were out and about. :op

So here's the Nudibranch that we have seen;


The white one with black rings/dots is a Polka-dot nudibranch(Jorunna funebris) and the orange one is a Bornella sp.


Then, we have a pair of Black-margined Nudibranch(Glossodoris atromarginata). And the bottom one was laying egg masses! Here's the close-up.


We also spotted quite a number of Gymnodoris rubropapulosa. Looks like they are in season now. And I particularly like this one. It has a smiley face! Don't you think so?


So there you are, all the fat and juicy looking Nudibranch!

Here come the Flat stuff. The Flatworm galore!


Besides the Flatworms and Nudibranch, we also have these;

My volunteer dive guide and buddy, HB, pointed out to me this tiny Acropora crab(Tetralia nigrolineata) hiding among the branching Stag Horn coral(Acropora sp.).


It has been known that this tiny crab protects the coral against the coral-eating Crown-of-Thorns Seastar(Acanthaster planci) by pinching the seastar to the point that it ended up leaving the acropora alone. Amazing! And guess what? There's even a Acropora Goby hiding in this coral! However, it was hiding pretty deep in the branches and moving about quite fast that I cannot get a pic of it.

I think I have came across the pregnant Papa Tigertail Seahorse that I saw last month again! As I found it at the exact same spot. It looks like his pouch had gotten bigger. And I guessed that the babies will be dued soon as male Seahorse carries them for 10-45 days in the pouch.


When diving at the North jetty, we will always try to look out for commensals on the Sea Fans and Sea Whips. And today, we saw some.

Here's a Allied Cowrie(the white elongated thingy) on a Sea Fan.


A delicate-looking Shrimp(Hamodactylus sp.) on a Sea Whip.


And here's my second time sighting of the Gorgonian/Sawtooth Shrimp(Tozeuma armatum) on a Sea Whip!


Thanks HB and other volunteer guides(Ivy and MS) for the findings! Well, that's all for today. Now I shall go and revise my hand signal for Seahorse so that I will not be misunderstood to have spotted a tiny Mola mola at Pulau Hantu next time.:oP

Rainy Day At Sungei Buloh.....

But I enjoyed it! :O)

Decided to take a breather at Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve this morning after a busy week. It was crowded as there were ICCS going on and groups of student having field trip.

While waiting for the Marine fish guided tour to start, I was surprised to have a gentleman asking me if I recognised him. I was like.....hmmmm....where did I see that face before? Ha.....It turns out that I was the guide for him and his students when they joined the guided walk at Chek Jawa Two years ago. Wow! So happy that someone can still remember me two years after the guided walk. :O)

Anyway, after the Marine fish tour, I headed for the Mangrove Boardwalk. It was quiet as most crowds were over at the Main Bridge.


Just minutes into the boardwalk, raindrops fall. But since it's a drizzle and there's no lighting, I continued (with poncho on of course).

Knowing that most creatures will hide but then I still kept a lookout for them. Found this spider hiding from rain under a piece of leaf.


Thanks to my waterproof camera, managed to capture some wet wet scenery shots.


Then when the rain stopped, creatures started to show up.

You can see lots of Tree-climbing crabs on this trunk. It was high tide. So the crabs climbed up the tree to avoid predators in the water. They also stand very still in order to avoid predators like birds too.


Found another spider!


Spent sometimes just looking at this snail moving from one point to another. :O)




Liked the feeling of walking in the rain today. Somehow, it feels like the stressful week had been washed away.

Feeling Blue.....

Maybe it's coming from the audit. :o/

Hmmm.....shall go to Sungei Buloh on this Saturday to de-stress then!

Welcome To This World.....

Welcome to this world, little Enqi. :o)

(Thanks Papa Alan for the pic on her blog, Enqi Chronicles! And Aunty CH can't wait to meet this little cutie!)

CONGRATULATION to Alan and Grace on their First Born! :o)

Testing, Testing @ St John's Island.....

I was out at St John's Island for the evening low tide today. Brought along my new waterproof camera to test it out. And here are some of the stuffs that we saw.


I just can't resist taking the beautiful blue sky with big fluffy clouds while on the way to the island.

My first spotting was this flatworm.


I was searching high and low for nudibranchs. But this was the only one that I managed to find. It's a Gymnodoris sp.


There's always Octopus on the this reef. This guy was hunting for its dinner when I spotted it.


And of course, who can forget about the fishes?

Here's a big Toadfish among the rubble.


Also came across this poor Wrasse which got chomped off by something.


Towards the end of the tide, we got this hairy Seahorse.



A nice trip and I am very happy with the camera.