A Myriad of People on Shore...

After Kok Sheng and James made some headway with exploration at Punggol, I decided to drop by the shore myself... With the objectives to find some black collector's urchins and seagrass, I made my way down to the place... To my bewilderment, there were many people carrying bags and buckets!

Oh no, don't be mistaken that they are doing corrective work order or beach cleanup, they are indeed 'cleaning up the beach' of its inhabitants. From the picture above, you may be able to see them holding metal poles and scrapers with huge bags...

Inside their bags, held numerous numbers of this animal, Perna viridis (Green mussels) that are commonly sold in wet markets.

They were families and foreign workers that happily digging and collecting, while I went around checking the kind of damages. Here shows a clean shaved patched of green mussels... In the process of scrapping, they also affect the surrounding organisms such as barnacles, and grazers such as the poor onchs covered with sand!

Green mussels adhere themselves strongly onto the substrates through their own byssal threads and the multitude of byssal threads create a strong holdfast for the aggregate of them. Unfortunately, most of them are probably forcefully removed and those that remain after this ordeal may die if not collected. Some remnants of broken shells and gills.

Another victim of collection - the plain rock oysters and a numerous number of white plates could be observed on the shoreline... And then! I found one person harvesting and observed how it was done...

Equipped with a hammer and chisel, she first knocks it off the rocks. This is followed by chiseling the oyster open and collect the flesh inside... As a result....

This is what is left of the oyster. :(

Fishing is a common sight and I spotted a boat putting out fish traps... I wonder if during lower tides, could we find more abandoned traps... I observed further down the shore that such fish traps could catch swimming crabs and a number of filefishes!

A huge quantity of thrash swept onto the shoreline... Should be a good place for a mini clean up...

Abandoned fish trap...! But no trapped animals were seen inside - Phew...

Despite the numerous number of people collecting animals (and I even met a collector who captures these poor animals home to rear!), the shore is teeming with an unusual set of animals... Although located somewhat in the north-east of Singapore, this shore is undoubtedly different from those in Changi and Tanah Merah.

A variety of sponges could be found! On the many rocks, scattering climber crabs were making their way into the crevices, while the thunder crabs wedged themselves into the rocks...



This is probably ascidians...

Candy cane hydroids?? They look stubby...

Onchs grazing the algae! Look closely and you will be able to spot mini green mussels flourishing!

I only saw one nerite... Gasp! (Collected??)

Limpet lazing...

Later in the evening, a hoofshield limpet (Scutus sp.)

Despite looking high and low for them, I only saw one black urchin... :(

The shore is filled with bottlebrush brittlestars!


and a rock star.

Lots of Anthozoa types...



Encrusting snails as suggested by Kok Sheng...

This is interesting as this worm has long feeding tentacles that is now out of water and splayed right in front of its mouth parts... Can you see it?? I think this may be the body of a type of burrowing worm??

Bristle worm...

Best find - the tiny chiton!

The tides came in too fast and I hope to go back soon to check out more of its inhabitants...