Stomping On Snakes
I entered "snake" in STOMP's search engine and realised that the site actually contained quite a number of snake sightings posted by the public: Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
I Killed A (Harmless) Snake
The last time I checked Singapore Seen (STOMP) at 23:00 h on 8 June 2007, a post titled "I killed a snake - in my 8th floor HDB flat" is top in the "Most Commented" category with 91 comments and is second best in the "Most Viewed" category with 5,766 views. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
More On Pythons In STOMP
I realised that STOMP contained a few more postings on snakes, which were not reflected in the result of my search for 'snakes' in the site. The following sightings appeared after I did a search on 'python': Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Dog-toothed Cat Snake (Boiga cynodon)
"We are looking at two dog-toothed cat snakes. You want to come down now?" Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Why It is Illegal To Keep Snakes In Singapore
The Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA, which I sometimes refer to "Animals & Vegetables Authority" Haha!) explained why it is illegal for people living in Singapore to keep exotic wildlife such as snakes: Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Article On Snake Venoms
This is an interesting article on snake venoms that was written more or less in Singapore context: Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Banded Krait Graced Launch Of Chek Jawa Wetlands
This Banded Krait (Bungarus fasciatus), photographed by Loh Kok Sheng and posted in his blog, made a pleasantly surprised appearance at the launch of the Chek Jawa Wetlands on the morning of 7 July 2007. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
This Snake Is Not So Elegant After All
We have been calling this beautiful snake the wrong name. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Fun With Snakes
A fun-filled activity, named 'Fun with Snakes', was organised by the NSS Education Group on 15 September 2007 to raise awareness on snakes, with emphasis on local species, among kids in the age group of 5-9 years old. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Pythons Skinned And Left To Die
There is an recent article in The Daily Mail that reported on the increasing use of snake skin in the fashion industry. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Four Whips In A Day!
During a late afternoon on 8 September 2007, Chan Kwok Wai found not one, not two, not three, but FOUR Oriental Whip Snakes (Ahaetulla prasina)!!!! One of the snakes was sighted at eye level, while the rest were encountered at the tree canopies. The green colour and long body length of this species, are perhaps adaptations for life at the canopy, since the former provides the snake with a good camouflage against aerial predators and the latter allows the snake to move from canopy to canopy. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
More Records Of House Wolf Snake
Lai Chien-Houng opened the door and a House Wolf Snake (Lycodon capucinus) fell onto the floor. This snake is THAT common (relative to other species) in buildings, probably because their food, geckos, are also abundant in this type of habitat. However, this species is still rarely encountered by people because of their secretive nature. Fortunately to us, it is neither venomous nor dangerous. This encounter, occurred in the TMSI (Tropical Marine Science Institute) compound at St. John's Island on 24 September 2007, made our day. We took some photographs and released it soon after that. The following photographs were taken by Lim Swee Cheng. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Cobra In Mangroves
Yang Shufen found this Equatorial Spitting Cobra (Black Spitting Cobra; Naja Sumatrana) near a mangrove at the southwest of Singapore Island on 13 September 2007. The following photographs were contributed by her. Read more...
SLOG, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 6:23pm
Jungle Myna - Cattle Egret association with water buffalo
An adult Jungle Myna (Acridotheresfuscus torquatus) and a non-breeding Cattle Egret (Bubulcus ibis coromandus) were seen with a juvenile water buffalo by Dato’ Dr Amar-Singh HSS on 29th December 2009 (above). The location was around the ex-mining pools in Gua Tempurung, Gopeng, Perak, Malaysia.
These birds followed the water buffalo as the latter moved through low [...] Read more...
Bird Ecology Study Group, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 11:02am
8 Oct (Thu): "Dugongs: Mysterious Mermaids or Meat?"
Prof Helene Marsh is giving a talk about dugongs later this week! Read more...
teamseagrass, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 10:25am
TeamSeagrass featured in the Semakau Book!
"Habitats in Harmony: The Semakau Landfill Story" was written to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Semakau Landfill. It was written by our very own TeamSeagrass member, Marcus Ng. Read more...
teamseagrass, Mon 8 Feb 2010, 10:25am
Encounter with Chinese and Little Egrets
“I had a brief encounter with what I suspect to be a Chinese Egret (Egretta eulophotes), listed as globally threatened and an uncommon winter visitor in Singapore. As I’m just a leisure photographer and seeing this species for the first time, would appreciate verification and confirmation from the experts.
“It was low tide last Sunday morning. [...] Read more...
Bird Ecology Study Group, Sun 7 Feb 2010, 11:03am
“I Polunin” Exhibition
Today I decided to make an impromptu trip down to Centre for the Arts Museum with SD to visit the exhibition of Dr Ivan Polunin’s treasured collections of film, photos and other documents. Read more...
Urban Forest, Sun 7 Feb 2010, 10:22am
Seagrass-Watch Magazine Issue 39 December 2009 now out!
The lead article of this issue features the important role of seagrasses in giving early warning of dangers to the shores. "Like the canaries that were used to detect deadly gases in the coal mines, seagrasses are our 'coastal canaries' detecting environmental degradation in coastal and reef ecosystems." The articles shares how intertidal seagrasses in the Great Barrier Reefs are monitored by Seagrass-Watch as part of the Reef Rescue Marine Monitoring Program to track trends in sediments, nutrients and other pollutants in the waters there. Read more...
teamseagrass, Sun 7 Feb 2010, 10:22am
Insects Identification
Insects are a major group of arthropods and the most diverse group of animals on the Earth, with over a million described species. Read more...
For the Future of Our Forest, Sat 6 Feb 2010, 5:19pm
Oriental Pied Hornbill eating guava and rambutan
An earlier report by Johnny Wee describes the Oriental Pied Hornbill (Anthracoceros albirostris) eating guava fruits (Psidium guajava) by picking pieces off the attached fruits and swallowing them. On the other hand, Tan Teo Seng observed the hornbill in his farm in Johor, Malaysia, picking ripe guave fruits, mandibulating them before swallowing. These are [...] Read more...
Bird Ecology Study Group, Sat 6 Feb 2010, 11:06am
TeamSeagrass featured in the Singapore National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP)
Wow, the Team's work is featured as one of the actions taken in protecting Singapore's biodiversity! Read more...
teamseagrass, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 10:24pm
Three Moths
Running out of creative juices now so pardon me for the title. Anyway, during a recent frogging trip with D at BTNR, we found a few beautiful moths as shown below. A commonly sighted species of Owl Moth, Erebus ephesperis Read more...
Urban Forest, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 10:24pm
Green Magpie taken at Fraser's Hill, Malaysia, 2 May 08
For the Future of Our Forest, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 5:21pm
Pulau Semakau 7th Feb
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Nature Spies, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 5:21pm
shorcu shorcu everywhere...
We begin a new weekly series to keep our blog happily active, featuring none other than our big trees! Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Tree-fool
Some researchers, with the Centre for Tropical Forest Science (CTFS), are now working on the big trees at Bukit Timah Nature Reserve (BTNR). Within one year (hopefully!), all trees with diameter at breast height (dbh) of 30cm and above in the 164 hectare Reserve are to be identified, measured, tagged and mapped. Working for 3-4 days a week in the forest, these people (basically just two) are walking across almost every inch of BTNR (and of course, bashing through many irritating rattan-laden patches and some relatively untouched slopes/valleys!). They are here to share with you what they have learnt about the big trees that form the main structure of the forest on Bukit Timah and also some interesting flora and fauna they encountered along the way! Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
tick-away
What a name to restart this blog in 2008. My time is really ticking - no manuscript (yet) after almost one year of the completion of Big Tree survey - everything has been just ticking along slowly (ticking over). I need to find the very thing that makes me tick and be productive. The eleventh hour gets a tick for that but it is also unhealthy. Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Big Trees alive!
Finally, I'm reviving this blog after almost two years. Mainly because the basic fieldwork of the Big Trees Survey has been completed, and I should start the momentum of writing (besides my regular botany/reading/analyses/software-learning). Also because I really want to say something about our last remaining primary forest to the masses out there. Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
We are not alone!
This blog is too empty, I thought. What to do? The trees are just too many for Plywind and Bluebird.. Sigh.. We hope we can have 48 hours a day.. or a helicopter to help us accessing the canopy! Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Rains of Flowers
It has all in all, been a fruitful field week, and we have been blessed with showers... not of the water sort... but of flowers! Especially now that SHORCU, the most abundant Shorea is also flowering, ed, bluebird and plywind are quickly adorned with nature's pretties, once they step into the forest. Yet for those of you familiar with SHORCU's flowers, you will soon notice that it is conspicuously missing from the picture above. as the tiny flowers are not for amateur photographer like ply. Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Horny-bill
Finally.. we saw the elusive Rhinoceros Hornbill, Buceros rhinoceros, near Fern Valley! First feeding happily on some climbing figs (may be Ficus aurantiacea), then got chased away by some Greater Racquet-tailed Drongo.. Haha.. Despite the constant pestering by drongos, it seems quite happy living in the Fern Valley - may be due to the abundance of food :) Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Calling all residents of Tampines!
Our tree this week should be familiar with many residents of the East of Singapore. It is the Tempinis tree, after which the estate Tampines was named. The scientific name for the Tempinis is Streblus elongatus. In Latin, Streblus means crooked while elongatus means elongated or lengthened - possibly refering to the flowers arranged in catkins (spikelike, often pendulous, inflorescence of petal-less unisexual flowers, see below). Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Hear ye, hear ye!
So this tree introduction thing was supposed to be a weekly series.. but looks like we're a weeee bit too busy, what with 4/5ths of BTNR still waiting for us. But we'll still try our very best to keep posting! In fact, here's our very next tree. Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Slow Poke
Some fresh, recently fallen Keruing (Dipterocarpus caudatus ssp. penangianus) fruits were seen along Tiup-tiup path - almost two months after the 'end' of the mass fruting season. Well.. the determination of the timing is really quite ambiguous - nobody did actually scan through all twigs to see if there are any 'leftover'. Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
How big can a forest tick grow?
According to Wikipedia, ticks undergo a lifecycle of several stages. Those we encountered (and got bitten most of the time) are the nymphs (ca. 1-2mm) and some perhaps larvae. So, just how big can a forest tick grow? I was quite intrigued by this question as I never got bitten by an adult one before. Actually, I'd never want to be bitten by one as I can't imagine something as big as the adult dog ticks (ca. 5-8mm) I used to remove from my dogs crawling over and penetrate my skin - unthinkable! Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
Ah.. I love my babies!
The long flowering and fruting season (since March) is so exausting.. But now I'm so proud and happy to see many of my babies spining gracefully down the canopy.. lying on the ground and patiently wait... Read more...
The Big Trees, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm
26th 27th Oct
Preparation work for Saturday's launch of Ubin-HSBC volunteers' hub Read more...
Ubin Volunteers, Fri 5 Feb 2010, 1:24pm