On our last survey in
Jun 2018, I thought I saw some slight improvement at Beting Bronok. Today, I sense the situation has deteriorated. It seems more similar to the situation in
Jun 2017. There are still some colourful sponges, and some sea fans on the small richest corner of Beting Bronok. But not as many as I had seen a year ago.
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.
There are still patches densely covered in sponges. But most of the area was covered with scummy growths.
The most abundant sponge were
Yellow bumpy sponges, which seemed to dominate this shore since our survey in
Aug 2015. Today, they really took over a large area near our landing point. The
Barrel sponges appear to be doing well too, with one particularly large specimen. There were a variety of other sponges in small clumps.
With so many sponges and things to eat, it's not surprising to see many nudibranchs. It was nice to see several of the
Ceratosoma gracillimum nudibranch that we had been seeing in recent years. I also saw a large
Atagema spongiosa which resembles a sponge, the pretty
Cuthona sibogae and a
Bornella stillifer. The rest of the team saw other kinds of nudibranchs including
Blue dragons,
and some nudis we have not seen before.
Another animal that eats immobile creatures is the flatworm. Today, we saw lots of
Spangled flatworms as usual. The rest of the team saw other kinds of flatworms.
I saw some hard corals, but much fewer than on our last survey in
Jun 2018. I saw some
Boulder pore corals and
Branching pore corals and a small patch of
Neat hexa corals. I did not come across the colonies of
Anemone coral which I saw in Jun 2018. The rest of the team saw some other species of corals.
I saw many small
Spiky flowery soft corals and a few small
Pink flowery soft corals. I saw a
False cowrie in one - this snail looks like the soft coral and eats it. But I did not see any
Ball flowery soft corals.
There were some sea fans in a small corner, the most common being
Candelabra sea fans and
Gnarled sea fans, as in the past. I also saw one small
Asparagus sea fan, and a bright purple sea fan and orange sea fan that I can't identify. I saw one
Winged oyster that lives in sea fans. There were a lot of large
Stinging hydroids as well as many other branching cnidarians.
Button zoanthids still cover large areas of the flat, very densely in some parts. I did not see any
Sea mat zoanthids.
I saw fewer echinoderms compared to our survey in
Jun 2018. I saw only one large
Biscuit sea star and the rest of the team saw only a few
Knobbly sea stars (we saw 15 last year). I saw one
Blue feather star and a few
Orange sea cucumbers. The rest of the team saw
Ball sea cucumbers and some large Basket stars! I only saw one
Haddon's carpet anemone, unlike the many that I saw in Jun 2018. I saw one
Swimming anemone and a few
cerianthids. I saw some
Flowery sea pens and one
sea pencil, but did not see any
Spiky sea pens. The rest of the team saw a
Haekel's anemone,
Snaky anemone, and
Glass anemone.
I saw many fishes today. Filefishes were abundant in the pools, and I saw one
Copperband butterflyfish, two
Peacock soles, one Pink eared emperor and one small
Blue spotted fantail ray. The rest of the team saw a baby shark, moray eel and a
seahorse! There were lots of small
Swimming crabs everywhere, many Stone crabs and I saw one
Red egg crab.
The rest of the team saw tiny
octopuses, white and pale, stranded at low tide. I saw one small
Noble volutes and one
Onyx cowrie.
I saw sprinkles of
Spoon seagrasses that were heavily covered in epiphytes, similar to our survey in
Jun 2017. Last year in
Jun 2018, I saw more seagrass covering a larger area and their leaf blades were quite free of epiphytes.
Unlike our survey in
Jun 2018, we didn't come across any fish traps today. But throughout the predawn survey, there was the sound of heavy machinery at Tekong. At sunrise, we could see huge piles of sand piled up behind the seawall. On the way home, we observed a lot of reclamation activity on Tekong.
Beting Bronok remains a pale shadow of itself. This is what the shore looked like in years past...
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| Not very lively today, Jul 2019. |
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| A bit more marine life in 2017. |
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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. |
Here's more
old photos of marine life at Beting Bronok. Lost forever probably are the wonderful
Sunflower mushroom corals and other corals that we used to see here.
Thanks to Chay Hoon for organising the trip.
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.
To me, Beting Bronok 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. Development of
Pengerang Johor for a petrochemical complex that was rejected in Taiwan for environmental and health reasons can also impact Beting Bronok.
Now, with massive reclamation at Tekong, we can only hope for the best for this wonderful reef on our Northern shore.
Posts by others on this trip
Loh Kok Sheng
Jianlin Liu
Vincent Choo
Richard Kuah
Abel Yeo
Chay Hoon
Marcus Ng
Choo Yi Feng
Kelvin Yong
