Kids, Drawings and Chek Jawa

Here are the drawings done by the lovely bunch of kids who came to our Chek Jawa walk with their parents last Saturday. THEY ARE GOOD ARTISTS!

Do examine the pictures. They give you an insight to what the kids are thinking about after spending 2 hours with us exploring the mangroves.

Jabez (age: 9) was almost shouting when he wrote in block letters, "HELP THE SNAKES! or else!". You know what, he is right! Snakes have a place in our eco-systems too.

Joshua (age: 7) was inspired by the beautiful Oriental Whip Snake, Ahaetulla prasina, that we saw in the trees next to the toilets at Chek Jawa, so he too drew a snake.

Caleb (age: 10) saw the big picture. His drawing has mangrove trees, boardwalk, the English Cottage (also known as House Number 1), the sea, and hey, isn't that the Oriental Whip Snake hidden among the bushes?

Bryan (age:13) drew jellyfishes and a garfish (also known as a needlefish). As the tide was fairly high on Saturday, we were able to see lots of fishes swimming. The garfishes were sighted on the northern shore of Chek Jawa, while the 2 jellyfishes were sighted on the southern side of Chek Jawa not far from the Seashore Nutmeg Tree. Bryan's depiction of the jellyfishes were correct. I remember the jellyfishes were roundish and had short fat arms. Good observation, Bryan!

Elizabeth (age: 10) drew both plants and animals on her picture. She had a smiling mudskipper, 2 tree-climbing crabs on top of a mud lobster mound, a garfish with a long beak, and 2 mangrove trees. She remembered to draw the stilt roots and some pencil roots too. Good drawing, Elizabeth!

Sarah (age: 12) was the only kid to draw the Tailorbird. I'm glad you drew it because we did have some good views of the little tailorbird in the back mangroves. It is a vivacious bird and seem rather unafraid of us. Can you remember the clear tweeting sound that it made? I can. You can google more about the tailorbirds to find out how they 'sew' a pouch of green leaves to form a nest.

I like the way Samuel (age: 6) drew the mudskipper. It has spots! The mudskippers are among the few marine creatures that are able to exploit the muddy areas even when the tide goes down.

This is the cute drawing made by Ian Ray (age: 4).

And his older brother, Ian Kang (age: 10), drew 2 beautiful mudskippers flipping on a bed of seaweed. I like this picture a lot.

We are so happy that the children and their parents had a great outing with us at the Chek Jawa Boardwalk. Most of all, we are happy that Chek Jawa left a wonderful impression on all of us who have visited it. We hope Chek Jawa and its natural ecosystems continue to thrive for a long time to come.

For those of you who wish to visit Chek Jawa with the Naked Hermit Crabs, please join us at our free walk on 26 Dec 2009.

Date: 26 Dec 2009 (Boxing Day), Saturday

Time: 9 am

Meeting Place: Chek Jawa Information Kiosk

Registration is needed. Please write to nakedhermitcrabs@gmail.com. We welcome families and friend groups to join us. Please keep the group size small as we have limited number of volunteers.

Enjoy the rest of the school holidays. Bring your kids out to explore Singapore's wonderful wild places!