August 18, 2020 
By Isabelle Athena: A few weeks ago, a friend and I were discussing the term ‘starfish’ and ‘sea stars’. The creature’s interchangeable name can cause confusion, with identifing sea stars as fish, rather than echinoderms – a group of animals related to sea urchins and sea cucumbers.
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Posted in Biology 
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August 4, 2020 
A large honeycomb ray (Himantura undulata) was caught off Bedok jetty last week. It was described as the 2nd largest catch from that fishing spot, and the largest haul by a “shorewrangler” this year. According to various blogposts, the ray had a wingspan that measured between 2-3 meters and weighed somewhere around 70-100 kg (I’m going with 80kg).
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March 22, 2020 Today, we celebrate how our local community has come together over 17 years to recognise the wonders of our little reef!
17 years ago, when our tiny team of volunteer guides were haphazardly trying to pull a volunteer organisation together, divers sneered and scoffed at how anyone could have a desire to dive in “pea soup”. We were asked, “What difference can you make?” while others recommended, “Wouldn’t it be better to get ang mohs (foreigners) to be vocal about Singapore reefs since the government seemed to care more about what foreigners wanted?”
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January 22, 2020 
Veteran diver, Toh Chay Hoon, has completed more than 800 dives in Singapore waters! “I stopped logging after my 300th dive, and that was many many years ago!” But on special, albeit low visibility days, she still gets enthralled by something new or unexpected. Above: A cool cuttlefish remains still even as our diver Chay Hoon moves within inches from it.
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December 1, 2019 What makes Pulau Hantu special? “It is an island with dive sites situated right next to a very busy city such as Singapore,” shares diver Veronica Alcantara, who did her first dive in Singapore at Pulau Hantu. “On 19 May 2018,” she remembers exactly. “I have dived at Pulau Hantu 63 times since. I haven’t dived anywhere else in Singapore except in the pool! I enjoy going to Hantu because of the wide variety of nudibranchs, and the convenience of going there. When I only have a weekend for rest and recreation, I don’t have to travel for hours to immerse myself in a beautiful sea.”
Meeting two Doto nudibranchs “kissing” was Veronica’s favourite moment from 2019.
Posted in Blog Log Comments Off on Favourite moments from 2019
November 2, 2019 
You’ve probably never heard of an ostracod. Why would you? It’s a tiny creature, about the size of a mustard seed, and nothing much more than a head. It is not exactly the thing that many divers go looking for when they are out on the reef. While ostracods are not popular, they truly are fascinating. Since one (above) was recently photographed on Pulau Hantu’s reef, we thought this would be the perfect opportunity to dedicate a post to this seemingly benign creature. Above photo: Toh Chay Hoon Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Biology Comments Off on Sea Snails, Ostracods, and the Oldest Penis on Earth
October 14, 2019 
In a recent blog post, I spoke to Hantu Blog volunteer Gina Tan about some lesser-known insights related to the shapes of coral. Samuel Chan is a PhD candidate at the National University of Singapore’s Reef Ecology Lab. After reading our post about coral shapes, he reached out to us to clarify some of the points we mentioned and shed more light on the fascinating traits of coral shapes! Photos by Nicholas Chew/Toh Chay Hoon/Debby Ng Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Biology Comments Off on Traits of Shapes
October 7, 2019 
You may have heard of boulder corals and soft corals, but did you know there were “runners”, “vines” and “trees” too?
Posted in Biology Comments Off on Shapes of Coral
July 29, 2019 
She looked down and saw “so many fishes!” Singapore’s relentless nudibranch hunter (armed only with a camera and a pair of superhuman eyes) spent a weekend with the reefs of Pulau Hantu and saw many creatures, great and small! Some where “pretending” to be something they are not, many were hiding, and others sat right out in the open because they were top predators! All photographs by Toh Chay Hoon. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Biology, Blog Log Comments Off on Cryptics, Mimics and Camouflage
July 9, 2019 
Hearing about our volunteer, Nicholas Chew’s, experience of a coral spawning dive reminded me of Jane Goodall’s story about watching a hen lay an egg. Photos by Nicholas Chew. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Blog Log Comments Off on Great Expectations
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