I am always hesitant about visiting Beting Bronok, because I've seen a slow decline over the years and it's painful because I've seen it in its full glory.
Today, I was glad to see good growths of sponges and other reef life. Although there were also signs of mass coral bleaching.
Beting Bronok used to be full of amazing echinoderms. And today, the team saw four
Bordered sea stars today! So far, we commonly see this star only on Beting Bronok.
I saw many large
Biscuit stars, a few small
Cake sea stars, one
Spiny sea star and one
Scaly sea star. The rest of the team saw one
Knobbly sea star. We saw five on our last survey in
Aug 2015.
I didn't see many sea cucumbers on the shore today. Only one
Smooth sea cucumber, one
Ball sea cucumber and one
Thorny sea cucumber.
I saw several large
Thorny sea urchins, and one
blue feather star.
There were many
octopuses on the shore, the one I saw was at its burrow. The rest of the team found two
seahorses! I saw some gobies, a toadfish, filefish and rabbitfish. There were also some
Swimming crabs.
I saw several
Noble volutes laying eggs, and several small ones. There were also many
Swimming anemones. I only saw one live
Onyx cowrie, unlike on our last survey when we saw a lot. None of us saw the
Baler snail. I didn't come across any living
Fan shell clams.
There were a good variety of sponges. I feel the sponge situation is a lot better than during our last survey in
Aug 2015.
From the
NOAA's coral reef watch satellite monitoring shows that Singapore is in the Watch zone. Where we should be prepared for mass coral bleaching.
Unfortunately, we did see some signs of bleaching at Beting Bronok today.
In a small area, there were many bleaching
Spiky flowery soft corals.
There were also many small colonies of
Pink flowery soft corals and they were all not bleaching. Most were pink, some had paler body columns but bright red polyps. There were also many clumps of
Knobbly soft corals. There were also many small clumps of various hydroids including
Fern hydroids and the nasty
Stinging hydroids. Also many
Candy hydroids although most of them were heavily covered in epiphytes.
I only saw a few
Ball flowery soft corals, one had
White soft coral snapping shrimps. The colonies were mostly alright, although some were slightly pale.
I saw a few small colonies of
Neat hexagonal coral that were alright. And two colonies of
Big ring merulinid corals that were full on bleaching. I did not see any other Merulinid corals.
There were many small colonies of
Branching pore corals. Most of them were brown, some were covered with a bluish slime, and one had a small bleaching patch.
About 30% of the
Boulder pore corals were fully bleaching, 30% were pale or had bleaching patches. But 40% were still brown. The corals at
Beting Bronok suffered badly from mass bleaching in 2010.
I saw several
Candelabra sea fans, one small
Tree sea fan and several
Gnarled sea fans. Similar to the situation during our last survey. But I couldn't find any commensals on the sea fans.
I only saw two
Flowery sea pens and one
Slender sea pen and two
cerianthids. They were not bleaching. I did not see any
Spiky sea pens.
I saw several
Haddon's anemones. Some were very small, others were alright. Only one looked a little bleachy. I didn't see any anemoneshrimps. Nick saw several
Haekel's anemones, and a
Glass anemone.
Button zoanthids cover vast areas of the reef. I also saw a small patch of
Sea mat zoanthids. I did not see any that were bleaching. I saw a sprinkling of
Spoon seagrass while the rest of team saw larger patches.
Every year we visit Benting Bronok, we see less and less marine life. But today, the shore seems a lot better than during our last survey in
Aug 2015. This is what the shore looked like today.
Below are photos of what the shore looked like in years past.
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| Mostly zoanthids only on the shore, Aug 2015 |
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| Marine life on at Beting Bronok in 2014 |
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| Marine life on Beting Bronok in 2013. |
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| Colourful marine life at Beting Bronok in 2012. |
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| Beting Bronok in 2012. |
Here's what Beting Bronok looked like ten years ago in 2003.
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| Beting Bronok in 2003. |
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| Beting Bronok in 2003. |
There used to be a wondrous variety of
sea fans.
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| Sea fans on Beting Bronok in 2004. |
Hopefully they will return as sea fans are common even on Changi shores. But lost forever probably are the wonderful
Sunflower mushroom corals and other corals that we used to see here.
Where is Beting Bronok? What is it's status and future?
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| Click on image for larger view. |
When the
2030 landuse plan by the Ministry of National Developmentwas announced, it was also announced that Beting Bronok and Pulau Unum have been
granted 'Nature Area' status. As I understand it, this status means the area "will be kept for as long as possible until required for development". Here's
an earlier about 'Nature Area' status seem to mean.
It was good to see that Beting Bronok remains alive and full of fascinating creatures. But to me, it seems to be in steady decline since the reclamation started at nearby Pulau Tekong . It has since also been affected by the flooding that led to
mass deaths at Chek Jawa in 2007, and the
coral bleaching in 2010 and a
ferry ran aground on Beting Bronok in Jul 2011. Here's some
old photos of marine life at Beting Bronok. We can only hope for the best for this wonderful reef on our Northern shore.
There are plans that may affect Beting Bronok a in the not too distant future. These include
plans to locate at Pengerang Johor, a petrochemical complex that was rejected in Taiwan for environmental and health reasons.
Today, we didn't see any fish traps. We almost always see signs of fishing pressure on this reef on every survey. This suggests that even the fishermen don't find it productive to harvest on Beting Bronok. Here we are leaving the reef as the tide turned.
Thanks to Chay Hoon for organising the trip. Our annual trips to Beting Bronok are bitter-sweet. Like visiting our favourite grandma and watching her painfully, slowly fade away. I feel privileged to have seen her at her best.
Posts by others on this trip
Others on this trip: Toh Chay Hoon, Ivan Kwan, Nick Yap, Tang Yong Jen.
