Naked Hermit Crab preview at Chek Jawa

This morning was a cooling and cloudy one as "naked" fellow guides from Naked Hermit Crabs gathered at Ubin for our second recce to prepare for the upcoming walks starting September.


Upon reaching the information kiosk, we had a quick briefing by Ron, the top-"naked" one. We promised not to blabber more than 5 minutes on one station and after a quick introduction, we set up, this time starting from the coastal side.


Along the dirt track leading to the boardwalk, we stopped to talk about this plant called the sea lettuce. Who eats this plant? Very large atlas moths do. The little fan-shaped white flowers will eventually develop into a round fruit of diameter around 1cm. They have large and waxy leaves. The waxy layer is to prevent water loss from the leaves, especially on a hot day.


November, a promising geographer, then shared with us on the story behind Pulau Sekudu, or frog island. To know more about the tales behind how Pulau Sekudu and Ubin came about, join us soon on guided walks with the Naked Hermit Crabs.


As we walked along the newly-built boardwalk, Pei Hao shared that this 1.1km boardwalk took 18 months to complete, and the brown part which looks like wood is actually fibreglass-reinforced concrete. Why must a boardwalk be built? So that everyone can convenient visit Chek Jawa anytime, without being there to kill and stomp all the marine life to death.


Do you know that Chek Jawa has a rear beacon other than the front beacon? Apparently, they just set a solar panel above the triangular plate. Can you see?


When the tide comes in, so do the birds, like this majestic great-billed heron.


JOKE of the day (not find of the day): Is this five-armed BISCUIT star, originally made from factories, now found in Chek Jawa's boardwalk apparently.

There are people who treats the boardwalk as a wonderful picnic ground, no problems. Please bring back all your litters though. What is the point of letting the public accessible to one of the last wild places, yet we litter the place to death.


On the back of a sea hibisicus heart-shaped leaf, we can see the cotton-stainer bugs and these guys feed on the seeds of the sea hibisicus and these bugs can be very colourful with a cross on their back.


Interestingly, we can still be reminded of Chek Jawa's history as a village with a little jetty. Can you see the jetty remains of the foundations?


What are the big claws of these fiddler crabs for? For fighting? eating? or what? Learn more about them, join us yeah.

Very soon, a downpour arrived at the end of the coastal route and we were in no time found at house no. 1.


The rescue tank has new additions of fishes,


including this too.


We had a very productive debrief and much has been settled together with the lunch treat by Ria. And we are looking forward to share the wonders of Chek Jawa with you.


On our way out, we paid the green house of the Green Volunteers Network a visit and I was pleasantly enjoying all the exhibits and stuffs they have in there! Incredibly, this house runs without any electricity, good!


Lovely goodbye by the shriek wannabe ape.