Windy at Chek Jawa

It has been real windy over this whole week of low spring tide trips since last Thursday.

I was at Chek Jawa on Wednesday for research and it was scenic especially during sunset.


At the northern seagrass lagoon, it was heartening to see many of these Sickle seagrass (Thalassia hemprichii) coming back and doing well.

Chek Jawa is probably the best location to find several of these carpet anemones (Stichodactyla haddoni) in all sorts of sizes. Some can even be really big and probably much older than you do

It was real windy so photographs were taken with ripples caused by wind.

I was relieved to see many of the beautiful peacock anemones (Order Ceriantharia) extending their tentacles in the tidal pools as the sun sets.


They come in different colours and I do fancy them in neon colours because it really looks attractive.

This hairy looking mass is actually an animal and it is a hairy sea hare (Bursatella leachii). Perhaps this is the start of the hairy sea hare season as we usually see them at the start of the year.

The Sea pencil are usually found half embedded in the substrate with part of it sticking out. If in the water, you can see the individual polyps extending out.


The Spiky sea pen (probably Scytalium sp.) is related to the sea pencil but please do not touch them because they have spikes at the sides.

Did you see something special in this photo?


Sharp eyes you have if you spotted it. Yes there is a pretty and yet tiny Painted porcelain crab (Porcellanella picta) that usually can be found residing in the spiky sea pen.

There are many snail-ey encounters at Chek Jawa as well, especially with moon snails.


What snail is this prowling on the sand flat?

Oh, this is a Ball moon snail (Polinices didyma).

More moon snails coming up, this one has orange lines and thus called Lined moon snail (Natica lineata).

This is yet another moon snail called the Tiger moon snail (Natica tigrina). I caught this fellow in action while eating a Razor clam (Family Solenidae).

Snails can also be huge and pretty like this Noble volute (Cymbiola nobilis).

Of course Chek Jawa is rich in echinoderms, which is my most favourite Phylum.


There are many Garlic bread sea cucumbers (Holothuria scabra) that started appearing after dusk. These are the species that are eaten during the Chinese New Year which is also upcoming. But it requires professional processing before it becomes edible.

Another sea cucumber that one can find in Chek Jawa will be this Smooth sea cucumber that is usually sighted in our northern shores.

Like Tanah Merah, the northern sandbar of Chek Jawa is crowded with really lots of Cake sand dollars (Arachnoides placenta).

Night time means you can see twinking stars in the sky and also sea stars on the shores like our sand stars (Astropecten sp.)

Last but not the least, we are glad that the common sea stars (Archaster typicus) are back in Chek Jawa. They went missing for eleven months in 2007 after the mass death.

Soft sediment creatures of Pasir Ris

Pasir Ris Park is well known for being a manicured recreation spot for people to rest, relax or even exercise. Usually during high tides or not-so-low tides, shore-goers usually just see the whiter sandy part of the shore. But if you take effort to take a look during a good low spring tide, you will realize that there are portions that look muddy and uninviting.

In fact Pasir Ris shore is a good example of a soft sediment shore that houses many different types of marine creatures, some of which I am going to share with you below.


This alien looking creature is actually a hairy sea hare (Bursatella leachii). They are are usually well camouflaged and blend in perfectly with among seaweeds and seagrasses. However, please do not try to disturb this sea hare because it produces a purple ink when stressed up.


Later on, I saw this slug-looking creature which we have no idea what it was. The blue spots on its body look like the above sea hare and probably it is a dead one that has lost its hairy projections.


On a narrow portion of the shore, we found several empty shells that probably belong to Phalium glaucum of the Family Cassidae (Helmet shell snails). More about these snails on Ria's wildshore blog.

If you think that floating leaves on the seashore are boring stuffs, you are wrong. The underside of these seeming floating leaves are actually moved by leaf porter crabs.

Like Chek Jawa, there are many tubeworms teeming the sandy part of the shore.


Other than the tubeworms, there were large mats of Asian date mussels (Musculista senhousia). The interesting thing is that they were only sighted right in front of the freshwater discharge area. This suggests that either they favour low salinity, or that competition for niche is less on such fresher parts of the shore.

On soft sediments, sometimes you might encounter worms surfacing.

This is another worm that is orange in colour. Though it appears pretty, identification can be quite a headache!

This striped bead anemone is usually encountered on our northern shores.

The brown body column of this striped bead anemone has pinkish bumps.


Peering harder into what is seemingly lifeless sediments, I saw this tiny weeny anemone that I don't know what it is exactly.

Soft sediments support several types of anemones and this is a tiger anemone.


Though not as common as in Changi, there were still a couple of Haddon's carpet anemone (Stichodactyla haddoni).


Of course, peacock anemones are colourful additions to the shore and they come in all sorts of colours.


Sometimes if you look closer at the Sea lettuce (Ulva sp.), you might also spot creatures that reside in or underneath it like this tiny juvenile peacock anemone.

Ria found this tiny flatworm with her amazing eyesight. I don't think I would have seen it given that the colour is similar to the sand.

What is interesting of this flatworm is the presence of two tentacles! Read more about this weird flatworm at Ria's wildshores blog.

I was surprised when I saw this See-through sea cucumber (Paracaudina australis) sticking out of the sea lettuce meadow. At first I thought it was a peanut worm.

However, this sea cucumber has short feeding tentacles but they are still cute isn't it?

As dusk fell, the stars started to twinkle the beach. :-) Like this brittlestar.

And plenty of my favourite sand star (Astropecten sp.)...

and this juvenile cake sea star (Anthenea aspera).

Sometimes, we need to know that these marine creatures are present before we can appreciate them. So don't dismiss any shores, or even reclaimed shores, as lifeless. Soft sediments are great substrates for creatures to crawl around.

Sea cucumbers and echinoderms of Changi

On Monday, I was with a group of friends at Changi and I noticed some weird-looking sea cucumbers.


Like this white and purple sea cucumber.


While I was trying to think of what it was, I found yet another similar looking sea cucumber that is more purplish. It now seems to look like the purple sea cucumber (Family Cucumariidae).


Finally I found the third similar looking purple sea cucumber that has the most purplish pigments. Does the loss of purpe pigments indicate stress?

If that is so, this completely white sea cucumber that I have no idea also should also be very stressed. It feels smooth to the touch and it might probably be the smooth sea cucumber (Class Holothuroidea) that we usually we at Changi.

It is quite worrying to see distressed echinoderms on Changi which is quite heavily impacted by pollution, dredging, trampling and poaching.


We also saw this Orange sea cucumber (Family Cucumariidae) that we do not know of its species identification.

Another of the unidentified sea cucumber will be this Beige sea cucumber (Class Holothuroidea).

There is yet so much that we don't know about our very own marine biodiversity! And that's not all.


I saw several of these small ball looking creatures which I believe are also sea cucumbers. They come in yellow and orange.

A closer at this unknown creature. I've never seen them before but yesterday they were gathering at the seagrass area.

Alas, there were still sea cucumbers that we have some idea what they were. :-)


Like this ball sea cucumber (Phyllophorus sp.). A traditional Malay tonic called ‘Air Gamat’ is made from their body fluids which are collected and left to stand for several weeks. The tonic is a popular local remedy for faster healing of wounds and as a post-natal treatment.

And it is possible that there are many natural uses from these creatures. But if we destroy their habitats and these creatures, we will never be able to discover these uses.


I always love to see these red pretty Thorny sea cucumber (Colochirus quadrangularis) on our shores. Especially with their feeding tentacles out.

That's quite a lot of different types of sea cucumber that were found in just one trip.

Changi is well known to be rich in echinoderms and we found many of the other types of echinoderms.


Like this Black sea urchin (probably Temnopleurus toreumaticus).


The underside of this tiny sea urchin.

On the seagrass areas, there were several charismatic sea stars like this Biscuit sea star (Goniodiscaster scaber).

It was nice to find the Spiny sea star (Gymnanthenea laevis) again at Changi.

What was unique of this spiny sea star is that it has a very tiny yet pretty brittlestar on its surface. Can you see it. The brittlestar has white and yellow bands!

Juvenile Biscuit sea stars (Goniodiscaster scaber) were also found. I never get bored looking at these amazing sea stars that come in different shades of patterns and colours.

I like this tiny sea star the most. It is really tiny as compared to the blade of the spoon seagrass. But it has very beautiful colour pigments and patterns.

A look at its underside suggests it might be a Cake sea star (Anthenea aspera) with their large bivalved pedicellariae.

Indeed the trip could be a happy one with the echinoderm sightings except for the "bleaching" cucumbers.

The ending was quite a sad one as I spotted this dried sea star on the high shores where the park is. Most probably some people might have took this sea star away from the intertidal area and throw it here, without realizing that marine creatures are called marine for a reason. They are not terrestrials and please do not remove any of them from their natural homes.