In glorious weather, we explored the living shores just under the Berlayar Creek boardwalk
There is less seagrass compared to our trip in
Jan 2017. But the shores are still very much alive!
I remain perturbed that URA mispelled the name of the Creek. It should be Berlayar and not Berlayer. There is even a board sharing the story of Batu Berlayar at Labrador overlooking Sentosa.
This shore lies opposite Sentosa. The mangrove-lined Berlayar Creek flows out to rocky and sandy shores, with seagrass meadows.
The rocky shores are alive!
Kok Sheng and Marcus found many
Cryptic sea stars!
Oh no, the seagrasses that used to be here are now replaced by a broad sandy shore.
Sandy shores are still habitat and many of the creatures living in the sand come out when it gets dark!
There are still lush seagrass meadows towards Marina at Keppel Bay. All
Spoon seagrasses. I did not see the small patch of
Tape seagrass that we saw in
Jan 2017.
There were sprinkles of various seaweeds on the seagrass meadows. The rocky areas near the low water mark are already showing growths of Sargassum seaweed.
As usual, there are lots of interesting marine life among the seagrasses. I saw several young
Fan shells and a few sponges. The rest of the team saw fishes, crabs, mantis shrimps. And Kok Sheng pointed out this nudibranch to me.
There are still many
Haddon's carpet anemones, and a few
Giant carpet anemones. At the edge of the water, there are a few corals.
The team, as usual, find lots of interesting things that I totally missed.
Near the mangroves, there is a patch of odd lumpy things that appear to be a kind of sponge? I have not seen anything like that before. An introduced exotic animal?
Today, we found some golf balls, but the situation is far improved from what we saw in
Feb 2013.
Ronald Batchelor, Senior Horticulture Officer at Keppel Club recently shared with me that the Club had taken measures to stop the golf balls from entering into the Berlayer Creek mangroves and shores. The gratings had been already installed at a big drain outlet to prevent the golf balls from going into the mangroves from the driving range. More drain traps were placed to prevent more balls from being discharged into the Berlayer Creek. He also shared these photos Club workers have also been cleaning up golf balls from the Creek. So bravo to the Club!
Alas, as we head back, we came across a short line with many fish hooks tied across two poles, with a short length of fishing net. Yi Fei dismantled it very efficiently. But it was a relief not to see any large fishing nets.
Thanks to NParks for permission to survey the shore and special thanks to Yi Fei for being there to look after us!
Posts by others on this trip
Others on this trip: Nicholas Yap, Nivedha, Sirius Ng
