Monday, September 19, 2011

A night at Bukit Brown Cemetery

Last Friday Night, we were on a "mission" to try and find the sambar deers that have been previously sighted at and near Bukit Brown Cemetery. It is my second time visiting this cemetery. The first was during an unexpected Outdoor Activities Club night walk and overnight stay back in my JC days. The memories of that still lingers!

Though the location is a cemetery, there are more living creatures than dead creatures. We saw a number of fruit bats such as this one which is hanging on a branch.

We later also realize that many bats like to hang upside down from the base of the bird's nest ferns.

Here is another cute young bat hanging from a skinny branch.

This collar kingfisher is among some of the birds that we encountered on the trees of Bukit Brown.

Though we hear more of the calls of the scops owls than seeing them ourselves, it was nice to have a short moment having a look at this cute owl spotted by Ron.

This big fat bird is probably a female pink-necked green pigeon with a uniform green plumage. The males will have the pink necks.

Found among the tombstones and also on the ground are the numerous nightjars.

This nightjar was among the many that were found resting on the ground. We could see them from far based on their eye shines.

Ron's sharp eyes for colugos gave us a treat to have a quick glimpse of this mammal. Just that I didn't have chance to take a nicer photo.

There were several frogs around the cemetery.

I'm not too good with identifying them, so I'll just post the photos.

This is a closeup of the frog found in the previous photo.

This banded bullfrog is very cooperative as it stayed in its position in a rather motionless way thus allowing us to have several snapshots.

On the trunk of one of the trees we found several interesting critters such as this scorpion.

And also several tarantulas! I think it is my first time seeing them in the wild.

A special find by Ron will be this whip spider or Amblypygids.

It totally looked out of this world to me in this closeup photo.

Bukit Brown Cemetery is destined to be developed in 2013 to build a four lane road. Housing is also proposed for this area.

More photos of this trip here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/koksheng/archives/date-taken/2011/09/17/
at

4 comments:

  1. 阿明一派September 21, 2011 at 8:47 AM

    Nice blog you have!! is it OK to use flash to photograph all the nocturnal animals? They are so use to the dark environment and suddently so many flash straight to their eyes... wonder if they will be stun by the flash and lead them to easy target by their predators?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Kok ShengSeptember 22, 2011 at 9:35 PM

    Hi, you have raised a good point! Agree that some animals may be affected by flashes. My personal take is that we have to strike a balance between this and sharing these photos to the rest online so that people will be more aware of our natural heritage. Bukit Brown will soon be developed and the saddest thing will probably be that many still don't know its a place to find many rare creatures. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. 阿明一派September 23, 2011 at 11:33 AM

    thanks for bringing it up...perhaps try other approach?? I'm sure there are more than one way of taking photo (other than using flash).

    anyway, no difference since u think all this will be gone soon? :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Dione WangJanuary 30, 2012 at 9:46 AM

    Hello Koksheng,

    I chanced upon your blog when looking for information about Bukit Brown Cemetery. Thank you for your posts.

    This is rather out of the blue, but please may I ask you about your experience hiking through Bukit Brown Cemetery at night? Did you meet any wild dogs, or were there any other animals/things to beware of? I was there with a friend in the day yesterday and we're thinking of returning after dark to hike through the forested parts where there're no roads -- is it safe to? Also, we're hoping to be able to drive in -- will the gate be locked?

    Please don't let me bother you if you're busy, but I thank you in advance for your time. Will you drop me an email at wang[dot]dione[at]gmail.com?

    Dione

    ReplyDelete