This small and well camouflaged slug looks just like the pink encrustations found on the long Tape seagrasses on Sentosa! It has two pairs of 'tentacles' so it's probably a Seagrass seahare.
While the
Seagrass seahares (
Phyllaplysia sp.) I've seen so far have stripes, this one has pink patches!
The natural shores of Sentosa were bleak and quiet today. The explosion of blooming
Hairy green seaweed (
Bryopsis sp.) that I saw
on our trip last month is over. The shore is now rather bare of seaweeds. There were few animals too, and the water seemed murkier than usual.
But without distractions, I was forced to take a really close look at common things. A cluster of pretty
Polished nerites (
Nerita polita) ! They come in a wide variety of shell patterns! There are many different kinds of nerites and snails on the rocky shore.
Like these
Neomeris sp. seaweeds. Each green-white 'sausage' is actually made up of fine spirals emerging from a central stalk, much like a compact bottle brush. I didn't realise the central stalk is transparent!
A cluster of very tiny seaweeds in the shape of daisies! I think these are
Parvocaulis parvulus and I often see them growing among Neomeris.
The seagrasses on the shore were doing alright. With nice carpets of fresh green
Spoon seagrass (
Halophila ovalis) and many clumps of
Tape seagrass (
Enhalus acoroides) , their leaf blades still long and unbroken.
But I saw many clumps of
Feathery seaweeds (
Caulerpa taxifolia) that were losing their green colour. I'm not sure what is happening here.
I saw a few
Frilly anemones (
Phymanthus sp.) . Russel saw a
Giant carpet anemone (
Stichodactyla gigantea).
There were still many different kinds of colourful
sponges on the shore. Although the sponges were generally small and well dispersed on the shore.
These
Chocolate sponges (
Spheciospongia cf.
vagabunda) are, as usual, homes to
tiny brittle stars. But the sponges were much smaller than usual.
This shore was suffering quite badly from coral bleaching when we
visited in June. Today, I saw some hard corals including several big colonies. They were unbleached and very brown. In fact, it was only looking closely at their corallites that I realised that they were different kinds. From left to right:
Pore hard coral (Porites sp.),
Cyphastrea sp. with tiny ring-shaped corallites, and probably another kind of
Favid coral (Family Faviidae) with hexagonal corallites.
And here, a Favid coral with a maze-like pattern, and two
Goniopora corals (
Goniopora sp.) with small corallites. I feel that I saw very much fewer hard corals today. I also saw a few small colonies. Hopefully this means the shore is recovering?
There were several clumps of this
feathery soft coral, but in all of the colonies, the polyps were retracted. Oh dear. I wonder why. Sadly, I didn't see any
leathery soft corals (Family Alcyoniidae) large or small. But Rene saw some!
I saw many small
swimming crabs (Family Portunidae) zooming around. But I only saw one
Red egg crab (
Atergatis integerrimus) and I didn't see any
Hairy crabs (Family Pilumnidae). On the high shore, there were also fewer
Land hermit crabs (
Coenobita sp.).
As night fell, I managed to attempt a shaky clip of a little octopus foraging!
On our way to the main reef, I noticed several bunches of
Sargassum seaweed washed ashore, each with hard coral (often still living) attached to the end of the seaweed. Oh dear.
There are several interesting plants growing on the natural cliffs. Among them, the Critically Endangered
Nyireh mangrove trees (
Xylocarpus rhumphii) on the shore are looking well! The leaves are all green and fresh. But no signs of flowering or fruiting. On my previous trip here, I was rather alarmed to see the leaves had turned orange. But Dr John Yong assured me this was a normal seasonal happening for this kind of tree.
The Critically Endangered Critically Endangered
Delek air (
Memecylon edule) on the shore was fruiting! This tree is famous on Chek Jawa.
There are nice low bunches of the very handsome Raffles' pitcher plant (
Nepenthes rafflesiana) here. The pitchers are modified leaves and contain a substance that can dissolve hapless insects that slip and fall into the pitcher.
The pitcher plants were blooming and fruiting!
During our trip, a small group of students were also exploring the shore. It's great to see people learning more about our marine life!
This evening, some photographers made the trek to the shore with all their gear, apparently to take sunset shots. How nice!
The sunset is dramatic and apocalyptic especially over the massive refineries on Pulau Bukom which is just opposite Sentosa.
The natural shores of Sentosa have suffered not only from
coral bleaching in 2010, but are also close to the
massive reclamation project at Pasir Panjang Container Terminal. Other ongoing works nearby include
dredging near Cyrene Reef, building of the
boardwalk at Berlayar Creek.
And now, there's going to be a
Crane Dance show at Resorts World Sentosa which will spew pyrotechnics into the water every night.
Let's hope this last natural shore on Sentosa can survive and recover.
More about this trip by
- Russel on facebook with gorgeous photos and on his blog
- Rene on facebook with crabs, leathery soft coral and more!
