Sungei Buloh Guided Tour

Followed wildshores guide for a guided trip. As I need to keep up with the pace, so I did not take much photos. Saw the usual sea almond fruits and sea holly which has no relation with the christmas holly. Sometimes it does look like the christmas holly with its jagged edges. Other times, it looks plain.


Also saw the sea hibiscus. In mangroves, it indicates the high water mark and the boundary between the end of salt water penetration and the beginning of freshwater swamp.

This plant secretes a substance that attracts ants, not in its flowers but through its leaves. Each of three leaf veins on the under surface near the stalk have a small slit. It is from here that the substance exudes, and ants of all sizes can be seen drinking from them. Among these, are the fierce Weaver Ants (Oecophylla smaragdina), which may help keep off insect pests. Some insects that feed on the plant include the Cotton Stainer Bug (Dysdercus decussatus) that feeds on its seeds.
Sources: naturia


Guess who made these holes? The Asian longhorn beetles!

Unfortunately, these Asian longhorn beetle can cause a lot of damage to trees. Its larvae dig deep into trunks in order to feed on the vessels that provide the tree with water and food. The larvae may spend up to nine months living off of the tree as they grow into adult beetles. As the bugs mature they start to burrow back out of the tree leaving noticeable holes in the trees. At this stage, there is not a lot that can be done for the tree. The damage is done..
Source: Ask The Exterminator

Oh and it was only today that I knew only the male fiddler crab has a bigger pincer mainly for attraction. Female fiddler crab pincers are of equal sizes.

Take a look at wildshores photo on the Nipah palm (Nypa fruticans) or Attap Chee as it was blooming! The ball-shaped thing is the female inflorescence, while the yellow sausage-shaped ones are the male. Nearby is a brown developing fruit ball.

Caught sight of the dog faced water snake sleeping too!


On the way back, my friend brought me to walk out to the nearest bus stop (quite far though). On the way, we caught sight of bag worm.

Bagworms are a group of highly specialized lepidopterans belonging to the family Psychidae and exhibit extreme development of sexual dimorphism. Males are winged whereas females lack functional appendages. Larvae of both males and females, soon after hatching from the eggs climb up to the top of their host plants in order to have an access to the soft and palatable tips of the growing shoots. They construct a small but tough bag of silk of either cylindrical or conical shape and glue small fragments of plant tissues around their cases. Larvae always keep their body inside the cases. While moving about, their head and thorax are protruded out so that they move forward on their thoracic legs dragging the case behind them, which is gripped by hooks on the abdominal prolegs. When taking rest, the rims of the cases remain attached to a twig by means of silken thread so that the cases hang vertically with both their openings remaining closed.

Sources: Clubsnap uforest

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Sungei Buloh