Date: 12 February 2009
Time: 12pm (:
Weather: Sunny & Warm !
When we heard about Chek Jawa, we thought it could be a place in Indonesia or Malaysia. But we were surprised to know that it is right here in Singapore. We had the opportunity to go on a Virtual Tour to know about Chek Jawa. We were surprised. You could call Chek Jawa a “forestal hub”. It is a beautiful place filled with marine wild life, coastal forest, rocky shore and coral rubble.
Chek Jawa is located at the eastern tip of Pulau Ubin, Singapore. The virtual tour was indeed an eye opener for us on the beauty of nature. The mangrove animals and plants, coastal forest and the different types of Rocky shore just pushed us to know and learn more about Chek Jawa.
Our first touch was with the Rocky Shore. It looked abit rocky with full of small and medium rocks. The rocky shore is scenic at sunrise but when the tide is out, it could be really hot. Any creatures that live in the rocky shore will have to tolerate such weather conditions. Another interesting finding was the Volcano Barnacle. It is definitely not a Volcano as it sound, but a small living animal. It is covered with a shell which has a segmented body with six pairs of segmented legs modified into feathery appendages. At high tide, the animal waves its legs outside the shell to filter, feed and breathe as the legs also contain the gills. There are also mussels, Mating Nerite shells, and little shells known as periwinkles and many more to look and get amazed.
Plants also add an additional touch to Chek Jawa. There are many mangrove plants. The mudflats are strewn with seaweed beautifying the mangrove settings. There are boya flowers, huge pandan-like plants called Mengkuang. We managed to catch the most interesting plant. It is called Blind-your-Eye Mangrove tree. The plant can cause temporary blindness because of its milky sap. The breath taking view on our tour was the carpet anemones. This can only be viewed during low tide. The sand is littered with some round colourful looking objects more like a candy. It is indeed a rare side on the tour. Coral rubble with colourful sponges are also a must look attraction in Chek Jawa. Colour does really add a beauty to this coral rubble.
Lastly, the virtual tour on Chek Jawa has exposed us to love nature. We wish to make Chek Jawa an important place to visit during our next school vacation. It is understood that we can only visit Chek Jawa during low tides. This virtual tour has also given us a better idea on the surroundings about Chek Jawa.
Monday, February 16, 2009
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