Although it lies in the middle of
an industrial triangle and major shipping lanes, Cyrene has some of Singapore's best shores.
Today, I surveyed the reefier edge of Cyrene that is closer to Jurong Island. There are still some corals there and most seemed alright. Only a few were bleaching. I saw dugong feeding trails!
We arrived at first light!
Here's a quick video of some of the special views on Cyrene.
I last surveyed this reefier part of the shore in
Aug 2018. As usual, today, the corals I saw were mostly
Pore corals and
Merulinid corals of various kinds.Today, some of the
Boulder pore corals were less dark, or were pink or very pale, though not yet full on bleaching.
Most of the
Merulinid corals were alright, but some were pale or had pale patches, and a few
Trumpet corals were really pale.
I saw some
Small goniopora corals, one had a bleaching portion, another was oddly coloured, but the rest were alright. I saw a few
Anemone corals that were alright.
I saw some
Flowery disk corals and most were pale or oddly coloured, but none were outright bleaching.
I saw a few colonies of
Branching montipora corals that were bright green, and some brown ones with white patches.
I saw a few
Cauliflower corals and they were alright. In one, I spotted the tiny
Red coral crab that lives in these corals and help protect it while getting shelter in return.
There were a lot of
Leathery soft corals. Most were small colonies.
I saw a few Leathery soft corals that were very pale or looking ill. Most of the Asparagus flowery soft corals I saw were alright, although a few were rather oddly pastel coloured.
I saw one
Leathery sea fan that had lots most of the flesh on the tips of its branches.
I saw some zoanthids with pale patches, and a rather pale Frilly anemone. But corallimorphs and other sea anemones I saw seemed alright.
I'm not really good at spotting critters and only saw common ones like the Ornate leaf slug, Cheesecake nudibranch and a large Red egg crab. Jahson saw a large Fluted giant clam!
I didn't really get a chance to look very closely at the seagrasses. But there were still many
dugong feeding trails.
The big cluster of many
Knobbly sea stars were no longer near our landing point. We only saw a handful today. But Richard saw many of them closer to the beacon.
The western side of Cyrene seems to have become sandier. In Jan 2019, I had already had suspicions that the
ongoing reclamation at Jurong Island might be affecting Cyrene.
A large area on Jurong Island (Ayer Merbau Basin) near Cyrene is being reclaimed - area outlined in red in this map on the MPA website.
From Port Marine Notice
109 of 2018, these reclamation works have been going on since Jan 2018 and expected to be completed in May 2019. I had noticed the reclamation during our
Apr 2018 survey.
I also noticed a hole near the reef edge which might have been caused by a boat accidentally striking the reef at higher tide. Fortunately, today we didn't come across any fishing nets or traps on Cyrene.
