Today, a small team returns to survey the amazing coral reef that has settled naturally on the seawalls of Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal.
This shore was impacted by
mass coral bleaching last year, and also the 400tonne
Pasir Panjang oil spill on 14 Jun 2024. Although we didn't see any bleaching corals, I sense many corals didn't make it.
This is what we saw during mass coral bleaching in
Jul 2024, when we estimated about 30% of corals were bleaching outright.
Today, the tide wasn't as low. We didn't see any bleaching corals, and corals not so obvious when they are not white.
At the Ferry Terminal, there were still large healthy colonies of a variety of corals. But I sense that there are fewer corals. Many of the coral colonies on the high shore were dead.
Many corals have also settled on the seawall that forms the lagoon next to the Ferry Terminal. Most are boulder shaped species, but there were also many branch and plate-forming species. Today, I had a brief look and many boulder Pore corals were pale brown, other kinds of corals seemed alright. But I also saw many patches of bleaching Zebra coral. In
Jul 2024, there was some bleaching corals in this lagoon, but not as many as at the Ferry Terminal. This shore was also impacted of the 400tonne
Pasir Panjang oil spill on 14 Jun 2024. Today, in the lagoon, we noticed sheen on the water, and some signs of oil seeping out of the sand.
Today, the seagrass situation in the lagoon is somewhat similar to our last survey
Jul 2024. The
Tape seagrass I saw varied from very short cropped leaves to long ones (30-50cm). One had female flowers. There were still many clumps well distributed throughout the shore. The big patch of
Smooth ribbon seagrass is still huge. There remains some patches of
Sickle seagrass. I failed to see any
Spoon seagrass, which in the past was the most abundant species, growing almost throughout the shore.
As usual, the rest of the team make all the special finds. Two 'Nemos' or clown anemonefishes, which we have started to see on this shore recently. Also a Fire anemone and Snaky anemone. There was only one Spider conch, previously many were seen. Also Top shell snails and Reef murex. The corals that have settled naturally on the seawall is just stunning!
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Collage of photos by the rest of team.
Links to their albums at the end of the post. |
The generally sandy shore of the lagoon was teeming with sand dollars. There were also Acorn worms and on the high shore signs of crab burrows. Throughout, there were large old Fan shell clams.
Where did all these corals come from?The babies of these corals are from Singapore reefs! This chart shared in the
Long-Term Plan Review shows coral larvae (babies) dispersal in our waters from mass coral spawning. This highlights the importance of protecting our 'mother reefs' so that they can continue to produce babies that settle all along our shoreline.
What is the fate of this shore?Massive reclamation is planned near the area we surveyed today as outlined recently in the
Long-Term Plan Review.
We restarted surveying this shore again in
Jun 2022 after a break of nearly ten years. This shore is now strictly off limits without a permit. We surveyed with permission from agencies kindly arranged by NParks and support from the Ferry Terminal.
Photos by others on the surveyKelvin YongRachael GohChe Cheng NeoTammy LimOthers on the survey: Jonathan Tan, Muhd Nasry, Nicholas Yap, Ian Mun.
