life on the southern side.

hi all! to take all your minds off blocks prep for the time being, i shall post some nice pictures of my fieldtrip to pulau hantu! haha, it's pretty suicidal to go for a fieldtrip 5 days before the blocks, but heck, it's worth the experience. you probably can't go to the island for 1. free, 2. the chance to go there with qualified experts on biodiversity (not just the professors, the ibo representatives too)!

the four of us at keppel marina! we were waiting for the bumboat to come and fetch us... nice weather with grey clouds!









hmmm. do you know where this place is? looks like a nice chalet at loyang, right? it's actually shell corp's staff apartments! omg...









these are corals (if i remember correctly)! never imagined that singapore still has such stuff, right? try to spot the crab :)









see the blue creatures over there? they are called sea squirts! they are invertebrates that squirt water (duh) ... but they are classified with the other chordates, cos they are more closely related to them, compared to other invertebrates... see how crappy h2 bio is? :P





a barnacle!











topshell! it's supposed to be edible, but you don't wanna try it... after all, it's near pulau bukom and those islands with refineries :/











more corals (that's what the others say, i'm not very sure la... i prefer using a microscope to see)









limpets! they are like abalone... btw did you know that abalone are molluscs too? the thing that you are eating is the foot and part of its visceral mass (the cholesterol-laden bit)... yum... imagine snails :)







more corals! beautiful balls... :x











this is the result of being too gey-kiang... the coral larvae move too high up the shore and colonise the rocks... temperature rises and the algae that were symbionts of the coral leave. and viola, bleaching occurs...







sponges! some of them have interesting interactions... for example...










these brittle stars (not starfish; they belong to the same phylum but different classes) hide in the sponges for refuge!









pink snail! it went back into its shell when i pressed the shutter. bleh...










well, that's it! enjoy the pix and treasure life (and appreciate biology, lol)!