lone whimlew @ Semakau North - 24Jan2016

It was a very windy day and there were 4 grey herons, a great-billed heron, one common sandpiper, two white-bellied sea eagles and a brahminy kite at the shore at Pulau Semakau facing Pulau Bukom. However, there was also another visitor...with a long downward curled bill. This was too long for a whimbrel or was it not?

lone whimlew @ Pulau Semakau - 24Jan2016 from SgBeachBum on Vimeo.

This bird seemed to have a longer bill than what a whimbrel would have. However, this BTO clip mentions that the bill length itself is not a good feature to base an ID on as the 'bill length in both species varies with sex and age'. 

It also looked bigger than a whimbrel although it was difficult to give the bird a proper sense of scale as there were no other whimbrels (or other birds) near it on the shore. Some parts of the clip show it to have a rather long neck....longer than what i think a whimbrel would normally have. Its head however had the dark crown stripes which Whimbrels have on top of their heads and also a dark eye stripe. These are more indicative that the bird was a Whimbrel.

Sadly, i was not able to listen to the calls made by this bird as it was quiet during the period of observation.

I'll just call it a "whimlew" until i can get a confirmation from a more experienced birder.

Update 1 : the weight of initial opinion was that this bird is an eurasian curlew.  However, some others have commented that this was a whimbrel. 

Update 2 : after more consideration, due to the prescence of the dark crown stripes on its head, this bird should be a whimbrel.

Here are some weblinks which try to distinguish between the two birds :
http://www.planetofbirds.com/the-slender-billed-curlew-last-seen-in-the-previous-century
http://www.bto.org/about-birds/bird-id/bto-bird-id-curlew-and-whimbrel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt8ZK8fI3W8
https://photographyandbirds.wordpress.com/identifying-waders/
http://hubpages.com/animals/whimbrelvscurlew
http://www.nemesisbird.com/birding/bird-sightings/whimbrel-and-long-billed-curlew-comparison-cibola-nwr-az/
http://singaporebirds.blogspot.sg/2012/06/sandpipers-and-allies.html
https://www.theguardian.com/science/punctuated-equilibrium/2011/sep/18/4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOXpHnZIq8o

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasian_curlew
http://www.oiseaux-birds.com/card-eurasian-curlew.html
http://eol.org/pages/1049389/details
http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/species/factsheet/22693190
http://www.birdfieldguide.co.uk/Curlew.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whimbrel
http://www.oiseaux-birds.com/card-whimbrel.html
http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/species/factsheet/22693178
http://www.birdfieldguide.co.uk/Whimbrel.html

And a recent earlier clip showing a eurasian curlew amongst a bunch of whimbrels at the SBWR :

http://sgbeachbum.blogspot.sg/2015/09/eurasian-curlew-swallows-stone-sbwr.html

More about SBWR :
https://www.nparks.gov.sg/sbwr
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sungei_Buloh_Wetland_Reserve

And Pulau Semakau :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulau_Semakau
http://www.wildsingapore.com/places/semakau.htm

driftnet fishing @ terumbu semakau 05June2011

Came across a driftnet (sometimes called a gill net as it usually catches fish by the gills) on Terumbu Semakau. There was an amazing variety of fish caught in the long net which was at least 100m long stretching across from one end of the reef to the other. The video clip shows a selection of fish (and one flower crab) seen over about a 35m stretch of the driftnet.

The fishermen and their boat were closeby and were quick to pick up the catch in a styrofoam box. They must have set up the net quite a few hours earlier before the tide went out. The outgoing tide would have caught fish trying to escape from being stranded on the reef as it got more exposed. The reef had patches of Enhalus seagrass which would have provided a good refuge for smaller fish to hide from larger predatory fish.

Unfortunately, the long net also caught on to coral and sponges as well. The swaying of the net in the water could cause serious damage to corals and sponges. Any hard pull could tear off parts from soft coral and sponges. The area is also well known for its wild dolphins and resident sea turtles. Recently also, there were signs of possible dugong feeding trails at the Semakau seagrass lagoon. These animals face the risk of getting caught in the long driftnets.

After collecting the catch on the terumbu, the fishermen boated over to Semakau itself to continue their collection from another long net placed along the seawall on the foreshore.

Read also the Wildshores blogpost about the net :
http://wildshores.blogspot.com/2011/06/long-driftnet-traps-many-colourful.html

fish net cleanup @ semakau 28May2011

A sprightly group of 8 volunteers made their way to Pulau Semakau's intertidal mudflats with a mission to rid one of the mangrove trees on the intertidal  of some carelessly discarded fish nets which had become wrapped around it and which was threatening its survival.

See http://sgbeachbum.blogspot.com/2011/05/abandoned-fish-nets-semakau-21may2011.html for an earlier post when the nets were first discovered.

Leaving such nets without removing them can result in quite a few undesirable consequences. Due to the influence of the tides and incessant wave action, the nets may damage the tree by breaking its branches, 'suffocating' the trees by 'strangling' the trunk, branches and roots preventing the tree from growing normally. Further, such nets can cover prime mudflats available for seedlings to lodge and sprout. Singapore's already limited mangrove habitats are thereby even more limited by such 'litter'. The nets may also continue to trap intertidal animals, such as shore crabs, horseshoe crabs, fish, shore birds, monitor lizards etc.

It took quite a bit of work to remove the net from entanglement with the tree. Then we had to pile it up into a manageable bundle to move it to the extraction point some 200m away. At that point we thought that the entire bundle was made up of a few nets entangled together as there were three distinct hole sizes. We decided to move the bundle as it was to a more open part of the mudflats and the best way to do that was to float the bundle across the shallows. This involved a 150m trek on the mudflats through the shallows tugging the nets. All throughout the watery trek, we were mindful of having personal encounters with Mr Stone Fish. Semakau's shores are known to have stonefish. Indeed, one of the volunteers did have such an encounter on a submerged reef across from Semakau during an intertidal reefwalk about 1.5 years ago. He was evacuated, had a week's stay in the hospital and took some time after that to fully recover from the 'sting'. Luckily, we did not encounter any stonefish ... but we did encounter a black-tip reef shark. (See this link for more info).

On stretching the nets out, we realised that there were 3 nets all joined together to form one huge mega-net. It is very likely that the mega-net was used in a fish-farm type setting. Incidentally, there is a large floating commercial fish farm located a little further south along the Semakau coast.

We cut up the nets into smaller sections for easier portage. Later we had to carry these another about 500m through the Semakau forest trail to the access road for disposal.

The huge nets covering the still live tree.

Checking out the size of the nets.

The different coloured threading shows where nets have been joined to form a much larger net. 

The blue threading here joins nets with larger holes.

Stretching out one part of the mega-net on the mudflat

This is a huge net! Not the kind fishermen would use but the heavy duty kind used on fishfarms for their pens.

The 8 bags of nets all wrapped up ready for disposal. It took 8 volunteers about 2 hours to clear the nets  from Semakau's foreshore.

[Many thanks to NEA for facilitating the volunteer effort and for arranging the removal of the cleared nets!]

Read more about the effort at the Project Driftnet Blog.

abandoned fish nets @ semakau 21May2011

res ipsa loquitor

Where could this bundle of heavy duty fish nets have come from?
The pile, made up of two or three large heavy duty nets, was freshly washed up ... probably within the day as it was relatively easy to extricate parts of it from the tree they were wrapped around. Given that the bundle had stayed together in a small tight bundle, it is probable that the bundle had not travelled far at all before coming to rest around the mangrove tree on the Semakau foreshore.

there was at least one crab stuck in the netting. 

leaves and branches of the tree caught in one of the nets

Close-up showing the heavy-duty nets. The red 'thread' joins two parts together.

banded file snake @ Semakau 01Feb2011

Came across this banded file snake on the sand flats before the seagrass lagoon at about 7pm.

banded file snake - 01Feb2011 from SgBeachBum on Vimeo.

It was in the final stages of moulting having shed most of its skin in a pantyhose-like tube. This old skin was banded too and really did feel like hosiery.

The hosiery was cast off with a little help from some human fingers and the snake went about looking for food amongst the many holes in the sand flats which was just beginning to receive the flow from the rising tide.

Touching the snake revealed why they are called 'file' snakes.... probably because they felt like workshop files... rough to the touch. ..like sandpaper.

Read more about it here :
http://www.wildsingapore.com/wildfacts/vertebrates/snakes/granulatus.htm
http://singaporesnakes.blogspot.com/search/label/Banded%20File%20Snake
http://mangrove.nus.edu.sg/guidebooks/text/2112.htm
http://www.wildsingapore.per.sg/discovery/factsheet/snakefile.htm