The surveys are coming fast and furious this year, due to our late start. This is the third site for the year - only 6 more to go!

We’ve been very lucky so far - visibility was again, an amazing 4-5m, and there was little current at the site. With a team of 6 today, we managed to get the lines laid out and work started in short order. There was even time for a bit of exploring, and training of the two Reef Check trained volunteers from SMU in a bit of the LIT codes.

Saw some pretty amazing stuff - large seafans (at relatively shallow depths, I might add), and a few red featherstars (which seem to be all over the place the last couple of months).

Bright red-orange seafan along the transect.

The red featherstars that seem to be all over the place. Nice!

The good visibility also allowed the fish transect to be conducted smoothly … at the shallow transect, I was followed by a large school of rabbitfish (Siganus canalicaulatus), and we also encountered a very large puffer that trying its best to look like a rock.

School of rabbitfish .. this one’s for you Marco!!

Jun, harassing the puffer … note the ruler to the side, which Jun tried to use to gauge the puffer’s size in her photo

All in all, a very good day out.

Cheers, Jeff

Surveyed the reef on the western side of Hantu today. As with the previous Kusu survey, only 5 of us were on board for this trip, which meant a bit more work for me. While I am sorting through the data, Hui Bing has already posted some stuff on her blog.

The visibility was almost unbelievable at 5-6m, which made work really easy. Unfortunately I didn’t bring along my camera for this trip, so of course, all the nice stuff popped out to say “Hi!” .. two huge trevallies, two Ceratosomas, a few Red-breasted Maori wrasses (Cheilinus fasciatus), and two Six-barred Angelfish (Pomacanthus sexstriatus). Hopefully the others managed to get some nice shots of these things and will post them up soon.

In the meantime, I am mulling over how real life seems to have taken its toll among our surveyors, and most of our Scientific Officers. Many are overseas, or otherwise occupied. With the up coming departure of Marco and Ming Sheng, our situation will get more dire .. so this is sort of an appeal for volunteers to step up to the plate to be trained as surveyors, and eventually as Scientific Officers.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Cheers, Jeff
Reef Friends Team

Kusu was chosen to kick off this year’s round of reef surveys. Kusu has always been an under-rated site, ever since we started in 2003 - big waves, from passing mega-ships far out at sea, and exacerbated by winds, tested the stomach of surveyors on many occasions.

This time round, however, the waters were calm, and the surge, slight. Visibility was pretty good, at about 4m, which made the survey go really smoothly, even though we were short one pair of hands. We even had time (or at least I did) to check out the lower reef, where I encountered the largest seafans I have ever seen in Singapore.

(space here reserved for seafan picture)

Data processing is still on-going and I’ll post more on the results and other pictures when I get hold of them. In the meantime, you can check out Chay Hoon’s account of the trip.

Cheers, Jeff
Scientific Officer
Reef Friends Team

2nd reefwalk of 2008. Love this shot. One of our hunter-seekers (Marie?) checking out the intertidal.
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YJ showing a family the ever-popular common seastars. You look like a pro girl.
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Howard with his group of wide-eyed reefwalkers.
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XL doing her stuff.
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Hmm.. wonder what Abby’s showing with her fingers… perhaps she was showing how your booties can go through the venomous dorsal spines of a certain very grumpy looking fish. a fish that looks like this…?

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It’s MS’s fave bud.. Mr Stonefish.. again!

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“The venom hurts so much that some people who’ve been stung have wanted the limb amputated. It can cause shock, paralysis, tissue death, and even fatalities if not treated within a few hours. The stonefish has at least one beneficial use. It’s a very expensive sashimi called okoze in Japan.” - Environmental Graffiti

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Then I have to mention this waaay cute baby butterflyfish spotted by one of the TPJC students. It was about as big as a 10 cent coin! sharp-eyes! Good chance to mention the false eye-spot at the tail end and how its true eye is always within a coloured stripe. Also how butterflies are good reef health indicators as they are coral polyp eaters.

“For those species of butterflyfish which are obligate corallivores, a decline in the health of a reef, manifested by decreasing food quality of the stressed coral polyps, will result in a decrease in the abundance and diversity of these species and an increase in territory size, feeding rate and agonistic encounters as mated pairs attempt to maintain their nutritional intake by expanding their territories to include more coral colonies” - coral reef indicators website

Thanks to MS for the photos.

Till the next reefwalk. Cheers.