Pulau Tekukor doing well

The team checks out Pulau Tekukor on the last evening low tide for this cycle.

Just minutes from Sentosa, Pulau Tekukor's western shore is part of the Sisters' Islands Marine Park. Today, the corals and seagrasses seem to be doing well. We are glad to spot 2 Giant clams and colourful marine life.

The 30cm Fluted giant clam is still there. Richard found a really large one that we hadn't seen before. There is not a wide variety of animals on Pulau Tekukor, but a lot of a few kinds of animals. Zoanthids remain the most abundant animals on the shore. Thick Sea Mat zoanthids and carpets of tinier Button zoanthids continue to cover large stretches of the eastern rocky areas. Also abundant are Long black sea cucumbers, plus small ones which are only commonly seen here. Also, many Land hermit crabs, Giant carpet anemones, Frilly anemones, Giant top shell snails.

Here's the Giant clam that Richard found. All of us missed it.

The rest of the team found lots of colourful slugs and other marine life. Kelvin got a video of the small sharks that started swimming in when the tide turned and once again found large chitons. We also noticed monkeys on this shore for the first time.

Collage of photos by the team.
Links to their albums below.

I have never seen a lot of hard corals here. But there are a few large ones and they seems alright today.

I saw the usual sprinkling of small colonies of the boulder-shaped common hard corals, some quite well-formed. I didn't see any that were bleaching.

I also saw a few small to medium sized leathery soft corals of various kinds. I didn't see any that were bleaching.

The western shore of Pulau Tekukor is part of the Sisters Islands Marine Park. There are good growths of seagrasses on the shore that faces the Sisters Islands.

Sickle seagrass covers a large part of the middle of this shore, with fresh green leaf blades.

There were also patches of Spoon seagrass with small leaf blades. The patch of Tape seagrass had male flower bracts (I didn't see any male flowers) and leaves were longish (about 20-30cm). Overall, the seagrass situation is very similar to what I saw in Mar 2023.

Pulau Tekukor's undeveloped eastern half has some of the last natural cliffs cloaked in natural coastal forests in Singapore. They seem to be doing well.

I am relieved to see that the trash on the high shore remains highly reduced, first noticed in our last survey in Mar 2023. In previous years, there is usually a lot of plastic trash here. I hope whatever changed the situation continues to keep trash off the shore.

Let's hope this special shore stays safe until we can return next year.


Photos by others on this survey

Chay Hoon


Kelvin Yong


Jianlin Liu


Rachael Goh


Che Cheng Neo


Richard Kuah



Lam Jiajun


Marcus Ng


Vincent Choo