Happy New Year from Sisters Islands

The wildfilms crew and intrepid beachfleas celebrate the new year with a trip to Big Sisters Island. Both Big and Little Sisters Islands have some of the best reefs that an ordinary person can visit at low tide.

Treading carefully to avoid damaging corals, and also Mr Stonefish, we check out the reefs...

Hard corals are animals! In fact, a colony of countless tiny animals called polyps. The polyps produce a hard skeleton. Hard corals grow slowly as these tiny animals multiply and add tiny skeletons to the colony. Here's a look some forms of our hard corals...

Clockwise from left: This lovely pastel Pavona coral has a typical arrangement of delicate stripey lines with short tentacles. A baby blue Hydnophora coral has little cones surrounded by their short tentacles. The yellow Pocillopora coral seems furry with its little blue flower-shaped polyps over a yellow base; while this bright green Galaxea has polyps that make star-shaped skeletons.


Big Sisters is a great place to see Mushroom corals (Family Fungidae). Unlike most other hard corals, a Mushroom coral is typically one giant polyp! They start out as tiny disks attached to a hard surface (like the row of cute tiny mushroom corals on the left photo), but as they grow bigger, they become 'free-living'. These guys can move around! Siti was telling me that an experiment showed mushroom corals can really kick ass and bully other hard corals that are literally stuck to a rock.


Enormous Mertens' carpet anemones (Stichodactyla mertensii) are common on Sisters Island. Ron saw a few with 'Nemos' (False clown anemonefishes), but I couldn't find any.


Among the feathery soft corals, a hairy crab is almost overlooked. The lagoons and reefs of Big Sisters are just crawling with life!


Siti and I remember our TeamSeagrass responsibilities and dutifully check out the island for seagrasses. There was a patch of Tape seagrass (Enhalus acoroides) and it was blooming! And it JUST blossomed. The three frilly white petals only last one day. What a treat! There was also teeny tiny Spoon seagrass (Halophila ovalis) which intrigued Siti very much.


Ron found a beautiful Spider conch (Lambi lambis)! It was very shy and peeped nervously out of its pretty pink shell.


The conches (Family Strombidae) have big eyes on long stalks that can peep out of the shell. The Black-lipped conch (Strombus urceus) is another conch. These snails are listed among the threatened animals of Singapore due to habitat loss and overcollection.

A sea snake and other marvels were encountered by the duck and leafmonkey.

Ron also found a flathead (a fish) and saw a stingray!

Joseph Lai, meanwhile did a survey of the coastal plants and discovered rare trees and plants! "Sisters' Island's impressive tree-population has no comparison in Singapore, except perhaps, Pulau Jong" Joseph says of his findings, which are posted on his eart-h.com website.


Alvin and Chay Hoon are hard at work...here stalking the Acropora goby that live in branching Acropora coral. This is the first time we are using Princess Ursula (as we respectfully address the tempramental underwater housing), since she got a hole drilled into her for some additional controls. She swam through with flying colours and didn't spring a leak. In fact, Alvin feels the hole in her head seemed to have improved her temper.


As the sun sets and the tide turns, we raise a toast to this beautiful little island. With heartfelt wishes that it will remain unspoilt. And always be there for all Singaporeans to appreciate and enjoy.

More about Sisters Islands and our unique City Reefs