I went to Sungei Buloh Wetland nature reserve early this morning by myself, arrived at 7:30am. It happened that today's low tide in the morning occurred at 8:07am. So this visit to Sungei Buloh was quite different from our previous three visits to the reserve. It was a unique trip.
Sea Eagles
The first thing that drew my attention was the eagle nest on a big tree by the visitor center, and there was a eagle stood in it. A photographer with a big lens on his camera told me that it was a baby eagle waiting to be fed, the parents were out hunting. After a while I heard a quaking sounds, which were the calls made by the adult eagles - white bellied sea eagles. A eagle flew out of the trees toward the coast. I did not wait for its return and started my hike on the coastline trail.
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| a babe eagle stood in the nest waiting for its parents to feed it |
Later I saw eagles overhead many times. They soared over the Johor Strait, mostly solo, occasionally in tandem. One time I saw three eagles in the sky, with one chasing another - not sure if the being chased eagle was an invader.
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| White bellied sea eagle soaring over Johor Strait |
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| A pair of eagles |
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| Fighting for territory? |
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| Get ready to land or to catch a prey? |
Low tide
Low tide produced a different view of the coastline and wetland. In particular the Buloh Besar river that divides the reserve into two part became a wetland with Egrets, Heron, and Sandpipers wandering in the shallow water.
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| Buloh Besar River at low tide |
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| a Sandpiper |
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| Little Egret |
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| Caught a fish! |
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| Another strike |
Because of low tide, the water was really shallow, I saw fishes swimming near surface, and jumping out of water frequently.
The marine life in the mud were exposed due to the low tide - I saw mudskippers, and mud crabs. mudskippers look like frog, but they are actually fish! Mud crabs were hard to spot if they don't move, they look like a rock in the mud.
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| mud crabs |
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| mudskipper |
Crocodiles
At the start of my hike, near the Fantail pod, I noticed something in the water looked like the back of a crocodile. A photographer nearby confirmed it. The crocodile sank and swam away.
It was a lucky day for me as far as crocodile watching was concerned. On the migratory bird trail, I saw a big crocodile in the shallow Buloh Besar river, and facing away. I stayed there watching for ~ 15 minutes, and it turned around, and swam toward my direction! What confused me a little bit was that the tail side of the crocodile had a wide, raised section.
It then sank into water for a few minutes, and when it floated up again, it was right by the river bank. It did not climbing up in five minutes, I moved on.
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| Crocodile |
Walking less than 50 meters way, I spotted a baby crocodile in the swamp!
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| A baby crocodile |
Birds
In addition to egrets, herons, sandpipers, kingfisher is a common bird there. In fact there is a kingfisher pod on the coastline trail. I heard kingfishers' calls frequently and spotted them a couple times but did not caught them on camera until I was on the return hike.
I spotted Black-napped orioles a few times, sometimes a single bird, other times a pair, one following another.
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| A collared kingfisher |
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| Black napped oriole |
Hiking, watching, waiting, and chatting occasionally with other nature lovers, I spent five hours at the reserve, walking only 8 kms (5 miles). As I was leaving, the cloud broke up, the Sun shone, and the tide turned as well.
It was great morning in the outdoors.
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| Buloh Besar River near noon - high tide today was 2:46 pm |
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