Ubin living rocky shores with some bleaching

There are living rocky shores next to Pulau Ubin jetty. We started at Thomson's rock and was rather disappointed that it was rather bare of sponges, and the sea fans around it were mostly half dead.

Could the huge fish farm located just off the shore (dark blob on the right) have something to do with this? Fortunately, sea fans were doing much better closer to the jetty. Sadly, we saw coral bleaching.

This rock is made famous by John Turnbull Thomson's 1850 painting: "Grooved stones on Pulo Ubin near Singapore."

Image from Pacific Rim Digital Library Alliance

Closer to the jetty, there is a sea fan garden! With a variety large healthy looking sea fans. On the way home, we noticed there were also lots of sea fan on the rocks near Ubin Jetty and even under Ubin Jetty itself! 

The rest of the team spot all the special animals! Chay Hoon as usual finds the colourful nudibranchs often seen on 'spongy' areas, as well as super tiny slugs. Tammy spots the Ovulid snails that eat sea fans. Richard finds brittlestars and more. A spicy orange cat joined us on the shore and harrassed us constantly for breakfast. As the tide turned, a squeaky bunch unseen otters scolded us from nearby.

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

Today, there were not a lot of sponges. There were still many clumps of Yellow bumpy sponge on the sandy bottom, but a smaller variety and fewer sponges on the rocks compared to what I saw in Jun 2021. Today, we also saw an unusually large number of Sponge synaptid sea cucumbers, which was also observed in Jun 2021.

Nevertheless, the rocks were alive with lots of large Sea slaters, the usual variety of snails, little crabs and even a sleeping mudskipper! Among the sponges there were cowries and small flatworms. In the water, a variety of swimming crabs and I saw a small Peacock sole. There were also some of the usual common sea cucumbers. I couldn't find any sea stars, but the team saw Crown sea stars on the rocks.

Our shores are currently also being impacted by mass coral bleaching. And it appears even Pulau Ubin is not spared. Zebra corals can be quite common on our Northern rocky shores. I saw a few small colonies and they seemed alright. I saw some bleaching Neat hexa coral. I saw many colonies of what seems to be Cave corals bleaching. At first, I thought they were zoanthids! If they were not bleaching, I probably wouldn't have noticed them.

From photos by the rest of the team, there were also some Flowery disk corals which looked quite stressed. There were a few small bleaching anemones, but other common anemones were alright. Love the photo of the lovely sea fan garden across from the bright lights of Changi.

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

Other cnidarians can also bleach. But those I saw seemed alright. There were many Haddon's carpet anemones that seemed alright, only one seemed a little yellowish. There were some large Pink flowery soft corals which seemed alright. I saw a small patch of corallimorphs and Button zoanthids, both were fine.

Other cnidarians common here include a wide variety of sea pens. I didn't see any that there bleaching. There was no smell or sign of oil on the entire shoreline that we surveyed.

Today I saw sprinkles of Spoon seagrass (with large leaves) all along the shoreline. The leaves were nice and green, most were free of epiphytes. The tide ended before sunrise so I couldn't tell if the seagrasses were as dense as what I saw in Jun 2021.

What is the fate of Pulau Ubin?

This shore, together with Chek Jawa and Pulau Sekudu is slated for reclamation in the Long-Term Plan Review. The plan includes a road link (black line) from the mainland jumping off at Punggol, crossing to Pulau Ubin through Chek Jawa to jump off to Pulau Tekong before circling back to the mainland on Changi East. Proposed reclamation (in yellow) will bury Pasir Ris shores, Pulau Sekudu and Chek Jawa as well as a large stretches of Changi Beach.

The Singapore Blue Plan 2018

Among the Proposed Areas for Immediate Conservation Priority, the Singapore Blue Plan 2018 proposes that the intertidal and subtidal marine areas of Pulau Ubin to be designated Marine Reserve.

The proposed area would include Tanjung Chek Jawa, the largest known intertidal area in northern Singapore. Considered one of the richest in Singapore, Chek Jawa comprises many adjacent ecosystems: coastal hill forest, mangrove areas, rocky shores, seagrass meadows, coral communities, and sandy areas. Chek Jawa remains an icon of celebration and hope for many Singaporeans since its reprieve from reclamation in 2001.

DOWNLOAD the Plan, SUPPORT the Plan! More on the Singapore Blue Plan 2018 site.

Photos by others on the survey

Tammy Lim


Richard Kuah


Chay Hoon


Loh Kok Sheng


Kelvin Yong



Others on this survey: Jonathan Tan.