Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve

This weekend N and I visited the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve, it's way up in the north of Singapore, go past the Kranji Racecourse, the industrial units and timber merchants and stop just before you meet the Straits of Johor.
   The area has been a nature reserve since 2002 and comprises over 200ha of mangroves, mudflats, ponds and secondary forest. It's home to many plants and animals and the wintering ground for many migratory birds.

 Almost as soon as we stepped out of the very informative visitor centre we met wildlife, a skink, a damsel fly and my favourite a huge water monitor lizard

 

We followed signs to the newly opened coastal trail, with Malaysia coming into view as we walked along the boardwalk

 We saw a family staring at something just below the boardwalk,  they pointed out a snake-the dog-faced snake. This water snake is apparently the commonest snake found at the reserve.

Looking down through the mangroves we saw loads of tree climbing crabs, who climb up the trees as the water rises then when the level drops return to the muddy shore to feed

Nypa Fruticans, the plant has many uses-the leaves and stalks are used for roof thatching, hats, umbrellas and fuel, while sugar, wine and vinegar can be made by processing the sweet sap from flowering stalks. Atap-chee, a sweetmeat is made from young seeds and served in the local dessert-Ice Kaching

As well as the crabs were mud skippers, some were about 6-8 inches long

Mangroves (Rhizophora) on the watery side.... bamboos on the dry side of the walkway

   

                                                                    Nipah Palm

3 warning signs- watch out for crocodiles, a warning not to catch the fish and the third to seek shelter during lightening and thunder storms. I'm definitely most worried about the risk of lightening after hearing how many people are hit by lightening in Singapore- the country that has more lightening than any other in the world!

Further on was the "mud experience' a rope bridge over the mud flats but due to the high tide it was largely submerged and it wasn't possible to follow it. We turned back and walked to the Buloh Tidal ponds and on the way met another large monitor who looked like he might have just eaten seeing his swollen belly 

Crossing the bridge to the wetland area another warning about crocodiles, I sort of hoped we would see one at a distance of course

Reaching the mud flats we started to see lots of birds; herons, plovers and other wading birds from the tall hide

                                                         

then a flock of egrets, we think they were either the Little Egret or the Chinese Egret but couldn't really tell even with the help of the identification chart on the hide wall.
We saw several flashes of blue-Kingfishers but they were just too fast to capture on film, lovely to see though

    these looked like giant clam shells

and two storks-possibly Milky Storks

Leaving the hide I glanced down and saw movement out of the corner of my eye, it was another dog snake with something in its mouth

       
                                                                                           as it slithered back into the water another snake appeared and seemed to try and snatch the prey from the first snake-so exciting to watch    

 Looking out over one of the ponds we spotted a huge monitor lizard hunting and sure enough he soon caught a fish and brought it ashore to eat

                                                           happy, fat and full.

                                   In the water there were lots of fish

       

Needle Fish

The Archer fish which can spit out a bubble of water to shoot down its prey but sadly none of them obliged whilst we watched

hearing a rustle above our heads we were surprised to see yet another monitor lizard just lounging around in the tree-looks like he had a very comfy perch

We headed home, I stopped to visit the ladies and when I came back N told me that he had seen an Oriental Pied Hornbill but of course it had now flown off -shame I would love to have seen it.  This was my second trip to the wetlands, last time I had been lucky enough to see, and hear the squeaking of, a family of 4 or 5 otters swimming through the mangroves, this time they were no where to be seen and sadly nor were the crocodiles, next time I hope to see them.

We had had a great time and had seen lots of wildlife, the weather had been pleasantly warm not too hot which was a bonus but we were famished so stopped at the first place we could find- Kopitiam at Kranji MRT station where we had this Indian snack, a sort of crepe with Nutella, grated fresh coconut, nuts and bright orange sherbet!