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talfryn.net (9 unread)

• December 20, 2008
• 16:54

  Semakau… again!

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  Last week was all about the shores and seagrasses. This week was all about the birds, butterflies and bees(+wasps), with two groups - the NSS birders, and Butterfly Circle members down for their respective faunal surveys.

  What beautiful weather! Clear blue skies as we set off from the West Coast Pier on a 12-crew workboat.

  The breeze was strong, presenting a real challenge for macro photography, and the sun was dehydratingly hot. For the most part, I gave up on nature photography and just did mainly landscape shots.

  The butt experts got unexpectedly busy. They shot by the roadside, in the mangroves (with the swarms of mozzies), by the coast, and in the grasslands. Some of us took the opportunity to slack it out in the hut, enjoying cans of 100-plus whilst the more hardcore ones amongst us continued on their hunts through uncivilised territory. We spotted lots more butts today - tigers, pansies, lascars, yellows… and altogether the team tallied a list of 18 species, which is quite impressive considering the lack of butt sightings on previous trips by other groups to Semakau. These guys have trained eyes, patience, tolerance, and luck on their side. Also with us was John Lee, the hymenopteran expert behind this website whom I had only knew by name but not by face. Armed with his net and bottles of specimens, he’s a walking encyclopedia of all buzzing things that sport a sting.

  Links:

  • Butterflies and bees of Pulau Semakau
  • More mangroves of Semakau
• December 16, 2008
• 18:05

  Scuttling stinkbombs

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  They’re everywhere in the office. On the stairs, in the doorway, the bathroom (and the shower in the bathroom), the pantry, the library, under my desk, and behind my chair - a most unstrategic location for any creature to be hanging around in…

  … especially when it just so happens that I decide to stand up then. Now, standing up isn’t the problem. It’s the rolling back of my chair when I do so that brings disaster.

  Yesterday I was treated to a most repugnant odour (whiffs of a likely mixture of idehydes, phenol, quinones, iodine, hydrogen cyanide, and chlorine) that forced me to evacuate the room for a few minutes. I returned with a damp piece of toilet towel tissue and wiped the offending trail of juice and remnants of the millipede off the floor and wheels of my chair.

  I don’t know why these flat-backed or Polydesmid millipedes - many of us, oft mistakenly, refer to them as centipedes - keep coming. Might be the rain’s doing. But come indoors these ‘pedes do, to starve, get stepped on (accidentally, of course), die, and dry out, and get swept away. They live a miserable suicidal existence.

• December 14, 2008
• 10:23

  Semakau

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  The Semakau Landfill is Singapore’s only landfill for waste disposal. It covers a total area of 350 hectares and has a capacity of 63 million m³. To create the required landfill space, a 7-km perimeter rock bund was built to enclose a part of the sea off between Pulau Semakau and Pulau Sakeng [off the southern coasts of Singapore]… was commissioned in April 1999 [and is expected to last until 2040].

  - Signboard at Semakau NEA jetty

  As if the excitement of the previous day’s trip to Cyrene wasn’t enough for a week, this was my first time to Semakau too. I wouldn’t have known this was Semakau, or that it was a landfill site, if I hadn’t actually known. It had none of the unpleasantries associated with waste disposal and management… nothing like a typical landfill in the UK. It was clean, green… and flat.

  A 45-minute boat ride brought us from the Marina South Pier on the mainland to Pulau Semakau. Once there, we split off into our teams and together with our equipment were ferried in a small van along the rock bund to an opening in the mangrove forest that separated the landfill cells and the sandy shores. We trudged through the mangroves, and got out on the other side, the more unfortunate among us already itching and scratching from the mozzie assault.

  After some initial difficulties in getting the transect line taut and straightened and laid according to the given bearing, the seagrass survey went quite smoothly.

  The sky was overcast and it had rained a little earlier in the day, so we were grateful that not a drop was drizzled when we were out there. There was a beautiful sunset, too, its colours reflected in the pools of still water during the low tide.

  
  
  Photos:

  • Semakau on Zoto

  Links:

  • The day’s trip on the Team Seagrass blog
  • More of the same on the Wildshores blog
  • Wiki article on Semakau
  • NEA Master Plan for Semakau
  • Project Semakau website
• December 13, 2008
• 7:23

  Cyrene

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  It struck me as weird, unfamiliar, that I was using my D200 to shoot intertidal scenes. Then I realised - that had never happened before. My last intertidal trip, to Changi, was more than two years ago… before I had acquired the D200. I was going through my old intertidal photos and the bulk of them were taken with the CoolPix 4500, including those from my favourite location and where I was first introduced to our wonderful shorelife - Pulau Sekudu, and that was in June 2003.

  On Friday I finally had the opportunity to experience Cyrene, the infamous amphibious landing and all. It was the virgin trip for my D200, my new G10, and myself. I was excited, for Cyrene’s kicked up much fuss and much hype among the nature/marine community in Singapore. I’ve been wanting dearly to go on an intertidal, and Cyrene in particular, only that I kept missing my chances.

  Cyrene Reef is an elusive nymph in our seas. A mysterious submerged reef in Singapore that is visible only at the lowest tides of the year. It doesn’t have a jetty and accessibility is rare. But it is also one of the biggest patch reef with magnificent and rare sea creatures found only at Cyrene!

  - so says on the Facebook page dedicated to Cyrene.

  Admittedly, I am very much a terrestrial animal. Not used to seaward travels, my perception of the world was still somewhat wobbly hours after I disembarked the boat. I feel rather directionless when I’m out there on the shores, not knowing where to look, or not knowing what I’m looking at is, or if there is indeed something out at my feet but I’m just not looking hard enough. The general taxonomic group I’d recognise - ie. holothurians/sea cucumbers, nudibranchs/sea slugs, etc., but that’s just as good as saying ‘coleoptera/beetle’, or ‘leipidoptera/butterfly’, which is hardly satisfying. I do try to read up, but there’s a lot to take in, and nothing beats experience in the field. Most of my then-existing knowledge of reef ecology from high school and undergrad days has been displaced. Next time, I’d know to tag along more closely with the sharp-eyed vets, whose photos I’d see when I’m back at home and go, “Oh, there was that there?!”

  Despite my shore-going noobness, it’s not difficult to appreciate the beauty and fragility of it all. Located between Pulau Bukom and Jurong Island, the reef patch is surrounded on almost all sides by industrial islands, dredging works, shipping lanes… Any visitor to the reef would be amazed at the fact that there is anything there at all. Every single knobbly seastar I come across on Cyrene brings with it a consoling message: that there is still hope, that all is not lost even in seas of despair.

  
  
  Photos:

  • Cyrene on Zoto

  Links:

  • More about this trip on the Wildshores blog
  • More about this trip on the Team Seagrass blog
  • Blog posts on Cyrene on monkey’s blog
  • Blog posts on Cyrene on budak’s blog here, here and here
  • More posts on Cyrene via the Wildsingapore feeds
• December 11, 2008
• 3:54

  CP4500 decommissioned

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  My 6-year-old Nikon Coolpix 4500 was a more-than-decent camera in its days. It packed a powerful macro function, and that it offered full manual control over exposure settings and flash output meant that in some ways, it is still a superior machine to many of the point-and-shoots out there in the market today. At least, I would still prefer it to my mom’s Canon compact.

  But with an LCD screen size of 2.5×3cm (it’s teeny), and at 4 megapix, it’s hardly adequate anymore. Not wanting to lug my D200 between home and the office every day, I kept my Coolpix in the office and a few times in the previous weeks I had an opportunity to use it. I also took it out to Buloh once recently to see if it was still capable of performance. On all occasions I was dismayed to find that I was far from happy with the results (although it still managed to get me this). It was clear that it was time to get a new digital compact.

  So I did.

  And… *gasp* don’t flip…

  I got a Canon PowerShot G10 - the current flagship of Canon’s advanced compact cams. I was contemplating the Nikon P6000, but reviews and advice from friends convinced me that Nikon was, unfortunately, a bit of a let-downer in the P&S field.

• December 08, 2008
• 8:46

  SBWR 15th birthday

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  
  The GoH: SM Goh

  
  Unveiling the SBWR Master Plan

  Link :: CNA article on SBWR’s 15th anniversary

  Photos :: SBWR 15th anniversary

• 8:46

  You can try, but you won’t stop me

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  Having done street or events photography for a while, negotiating your way through officials attempting to discourage you from taking photographs comes easily.

  “It’s not for commercial purposes.” is the first thing I say to them. “It’s purely for personal use”, or “The people and places in my photos will not be brought into contempt” and other tried and tested phrases usually work.

  On Friday night at the Singapore Arts Museum, however, I was further asked if I would be putting my photos online. I was truthful and told the lady that I may blog about it to help promote the Japan Media Arts Festival; but she was still hesitant but she was too polite about it to successfully forbid me from taking photos.

  Then at the next zone of the exhibition, I was approached by another staff member, clad in black, and he asked me to refrain from photography. I did the usual rhetoric, and that I was not going to use flash. He was adamant, and said that it was a ‘museum policy’. So I pointed out the absence of ‘No Photography’ signs about the gallery, and that if they were really against the public taking photos, they should really put signs up. “That would make your job easier too,” I added. I passed him my namecard, and told him that I can be contacted if they wished to take this matter further, but I was going to continue snapping shots. “How many, and which ones?” He asked. I replied that I couldn’t say for sure - it would depend on the lighting of the exhibit, and whether or not I’d be able to frame any good shots. He wanted to call for his manager, and asked if I had any photo ID to indicate that I was a bona fide photographer. Well… I lacked the Singapore equivalent of a BAJ Press Pass and so gave him my PSS membership card instead. He seemed happy enough. So his manager came; we talked - she tried to do what her staff failed to, and I questioned her about their ‘policy’ and asked her for the rationale. She wasn’t too sure about it herself, only that the ‘directives came from the top’. I explained that if this was an exhibition with artifacts, then I’d understand. But the JMAF was all contemporary objects and there was nothing too sensitive about it. In the end, she relented.

  I’ll be blasted if I am forced to follow some non-formally-enforced rule which I cannot make sense of. This reminds me of the No U-Turn syndrome: ‘In Singapore, drivers are not allowed to make a U-turn unless a sign specifically allows them to do so, while in some other countries drivers may make U-turns freely so long as the ‘No U-turn’ sign is not present’. I bet photography in Singapore is almost like that: ‘photographers are not allowed to take any photos unless a sign specifically allows them to do so, while in other countries photographers may take photographs freely so long as a ‘No Photography’ sign is not present.’

  For all that fuss…

  Photos :: SAM JMAF 08

• December 04, 2008
• 4:58

  Book-browsing behaviour

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  When in bookstores, besides looking at books, I also look at people looking at books. It’s interesting to observe the various sorts of book-browsing behaviour. Some like to pick up a book, look at its back, put it back down. Some like to flip through the pages. Some read a book there and then, starting from the beginning, or somewhere in the middle. Some sit on the floor, a pile of books by their side. Some never seem to ever pick up a book, but merely grant their covers cursory glances. But what I notice is that people seldom flip to the first few pages of a book, where its publication details, copyright info and other boring information can be found. I suppose you’ll mainly find that type of people in the Science section.

  For me, it’s almost automatic: once I’ve checked out the book backcover (what’s it about?), I’ll sniff out the author background (what sort of exposure, biases, if any?). Then I’ll get a feel of its pages (what’s it like inside? paper texture, typefonts, font size?) and the writing style (first person? third?). For non-fiction books, I’ll also consider its year of publication (how up-to-date?), contents page (how structured and comprehensive?), and sometimes, the index. Book selection is almost a science.

• December 02, 2008
• 4:57

  ‘Realpolitik’

   » ‎ talfryn.net
  
  

  One must acknowledge Singapore’s uniqueness and intellectual interest… does not seem to obey the basic rules of political science… is the only affluent nation in the world that is not a genuine liberal democracy. It has had a one-party rule and a semi-authoritarian regime for forty years, but has maintained long-term economic growth… the government was led for forty years by a charismatic leader… but a personality cult seems non-existent. The bureaucracy has direct power over key financial and other resources, but the level of corruption is negligible. Thus, one can ask: is there something very right or very wrong about the city-state?

  ~ Maria Francesch-Huidobro, Governance, Politics and the Environment: A Singapore Study (2008)