Tourists Boats Operating Soon

Wishing everyone here well and healthy.

This post here brings joy especially to all of our boatmen. I was verbally informed by a boat operator from Kilim Jetty that all boating for visitors are expected to operate from 15th June 2020 onwards. Best is still check before booking.

My private excursion prices varies depending on the private group size, duration and logistics. Therefore, it is best to contact me directly so I can customize. Direct bookings with me will have a 20% discount.

Bat cave may not be opened yet (we are not sure) on the 15th June. Some floating restaurants are not open yet on the 15th June as the owners need to do preparations and cleaning.

My message to all visitors :
The much needed rest given to Nature is still considered as too short. It is tough to balance between economy and leaving minimum impact to the natural sites that we visit but each of us can make better changes. For almost three months, there is a break from wildlife feeding in the touristy areas. There will be some wildlife have left the feeding area to feed on their own. Please keep it that way. Take this break of feeding to end all wildlife feeding such as eagle and monkey feeding completely (my wishful thinking). If the animals don't show up, you will still have a beautiful landscape and tranquility to show on your social media. A simple step to start is by telling your boatman and operator that you don't want any feeding tour.

If it is not the time now to become responsible travellers, when will you become one?

Super Reward for True Nature-Lovers

We were drenched from the big rain at Kilim yesterday afternoon on our Langkawi mangrove boat tour. As the rain starting to subside, this family from Hong Kong decided to give it a go on the coastline and guess who showed up after the big heavy rain?

Indo-Pacific Humpbacked Dolphins Sousa chinensis , about a dozen of them!
Some selected images taken from the boat yesterday:

Even if you do not like to smile, this individual will definitely make you smile :)

This individual displaying its dorsal fin

One breaching! Thank you Jol Ern from Marecet for this terminology I have learned. But I failed to take a solid photo...
AAAaaaaaaaRRRrrrrrrrrrrGGGGGgggggggggHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

Just a BIG Splash!

We followed this pod for about fifteen minutes before they diverted into the bay of Gua Dedap. During that fifteen minutes, we had to wave to slow down the oncoming boats going at high speed travelling on the same path as this pod. 

This family enjoyed our tropical rain and they strictly adhere to no wildlife feeding during the tour. Being true-nature lovers, they were rewarded with this awesome encounter by our Langkawi's magical creatures that they will cherish. 

Moments like these brighten your dark days.

Langkawi Mangrove Tour: What's Popping In There?

There were many times when I was on the Langkawi mangrove tour especially at low tide, I always wonder what made the popping sound like opening a bottle of champagne. Someone told me that it was the result of the air bubble popped when a crab emerged out of the burrow. Or could it be another creature like this one here that emerged in front of us be the answer?

We were checking out a nest of sedentary tube worm (polychaete) when it suddenly emerged out of the mud! It was a real lucky day for us especially for me. I am not sure if my guests were excited about it but I was surely 999% excited to see it. It didn't stay out very long for us until it dug itself into the mud again. 

Snapping Shrimp was starting to dig into the mud

Digging in!

Do have a closer look and try to notice one of its claw that is very much larger than the other. This is possibly the mangrove snapping shrimp (Family Alpheidae). However, I am not sure exactly of which species this one is.

This mangrove snapping shrimp we saw was less than 10cm. How a little crustacean can make a sound so loud and powerful to stun a fish and be heard many hundreds of metres away? 

According to the book PRIVATE LIVES - An Expose of Singapore's Mangroves:

It is because of its large claw that is packed with muscles and has a uniquely structured tooth on the finger that fits into a socket on the opposite. The muscles pull the toothed finger back and hold so much elastic force that when it is released, it hammers into the socket at an incredible speed and force, causing a high speed jet of water to emerge. The high speed causes a sudden drop of pressure (Bernoulli's principle) resulting in the formation of a tiny vapour bubble - what physicists call a cavitation bubble. The bubble violently collapses under the pressure of the surrounding water in a small "underwater explosion" causing a loud sound. During the collapse, the temperature in the bubble reaches the surface temperature of the sun! Snapping shrimps make these "snaps" to fend off rivals, deter enemies and rivals, and probably also to communicate with one another.

Researchers in the Acoustics Research Laboratory of the Tropical Marine Science Institute of the National University of Singapore have shown that in tropical waters, the snap density can range from 0.01 to 0.1 snap/second/square metre. Although this noise limits the performance of most traditional man made underwater acoustic systems, a novel technique known as "ambient noise imaging" uses this noise for underwater sensing.

Read about how the sound of the snapping shrimps interfere with the sonar detection in shallow seas and how a snapping shrimp rely on goby in Ria's WildfactSheets.

A HUGE THANK YOU to Iris Flock for taking the pictures of this snapping shrimp and kept your promise in sending them over to me. And also thank you to Ria for the confirmation. 

This is my first time seeing a real live snapping shrimp. Amazing! Hmm... I wonder if it tastes good...??

References: 

1) Private Lives - An Expose of Singapore's Mangroves

    Written by Peter K. L. Ng, Wang Luan Keng, Kelvin K. P. Lim

    Published by National University of Singapore

Links:

1) Wildsingapore.com Fact Sheets on Snapping Shrimps

2)  National Geographic on Snapping Shrimp Stun Prey with Flashy Bang

Excursion Report: A Packed Week of Birdwatching and Kayaking

Tour bookings have picked up for me after a very slow period of May, June and July. Even though my pocket was not happy, I must say that I am  quite thankful for that very slow period which has allowed me to have more time to explore, solo birdwatching, take moment of shots, work on my blogs and and plenty of time with my furkid for long walks. I finally got my business cards designed and printed! Woohoo! The designing part took me awhile as I had so many of my photos to pick!

Birds of Langkawi kayaking langkawi langkawi birds

In the first ten days of August, there have been kayaking in the mangrove for me, birdwatching tours and of course, fantastic moments with my guests and my camera lens! I have kayaked close to a total distance of 20km in the mangroves for that entire week and the joy of going against the current! And yet, my two-pack is still not close to transforming into a six-pack! HaHaHa...

Many thanks to the kind recommendation of Dr Louisa Ponnapalam and Vivian Kuit of Marecet for referring their contacts to me as my kayaking guests. 

It is an honour having two biologists on a different day doing the mangrove tour with me on a very low impact to its surrounding. We didn't use any boats at all. They preferred my recommendation of an early start to avoid the busy time in the mangroves. The only challenge they must face is the kayaking back to the jetty against the strong current. As the first week was in a spring tide, they have been advised on the strong current and they accepted the challenge. Most of the mangrove boat tours start from 10am onwards. 

Aniko and David were my first guests doing the kayaking and that day was on the new moon! 

Aniko giving hope to our mangrove by giving some hope to this propagule

"Treasures" collected from the mangroves with some help from Aniko/David. This is my way of paying rent for using the mangroves.

While Moon and Hwa came three days later and they were lucky that the current was more kind to us. And so was the kind weather! 

We were racing with the mighty rain cloud and nature wins, of course!

We pushed off with the kayaks as early as the tide can bring us in. The temperature was cool and the mud flat was exposed allowing us to admire the mudflat creatures. We had to kayak for about 1.5 hours before entering the narrow tributaries. By the time we got to the section of the narrow bits, we had enough water to explore further. 

The challenging part was after the fun exploring in the narrow tributaries, that was when Aniko/David and Moon/Hwa have no choice but to paddle back to the jetty against the current. The hot sun was with Aniko/David throughout the journey while Moon/Hwa were fortunate to receive showers of blessing on our way back. This was lucky for Moon/Hwa as the final lap of kayaking was not so tiring due to the cool and wet weather. I love it!

Risking my camera getting wet by snapping this "action" moment in the showers of blessing

The others were more of relaxing nature tours. Birdwatching, a boat cruise and relaxing kayaking. 

Welcoming  Sophie and Carole back to Langkawi! 

Both of them looking clean and fresh before the swamp tour!

Both of them had me for two days. Sophie and Carole are my return guests and a year ago, they did two days of nature tours with me. Both of them are birdwatchers, photographers and nature enthusiasts. For that week, I planned for them a one full day of birdwatching combined with a mangrove boat cruise and another day of kayaking to the salt water lake and mangroves.

Sophie and I with the mangrove background

A candid shot by Sophie. Geezz...why did I look so serious there? Birding is a serious business.

Sophie can't seem to stop smiling...I wonder why?

...and Sophie was still smiling after twenty minutes! OMG! 

Completely awesome and exciting to have these two ladies back on the island to explore more!

This was Carole's secret wishlist ... Buffaloes in the wallow. This is why I so love Langkawi's scene, her lay back "kampung-style"

To sum up my packed week, these are my nature kodak-moments for the first two weeks of August:

Magical mangroves of Langkawi

What a poser! Thank you :)

A happy Brown-Winged Kingfisher with its breakfast

This crab seems to be waving..."buzz off flies!"

A large fiddler crab Uca genus

A fiddler crab closing its hole to the burrow at rising tide. We were fortunate to capture this moment (with Moon/Hwa) as we had more time on our kayaks next to the mudflat. I managed to video the closing of the fiddler's hole and I need more time to do the editing. 

An exhausting week and yet a very satisfying one indeed! Thank you all :)

Additional note of appreciation: Sophie Wellstood has kindly given me a review. Sophie's review can be viewed here

MY LANGKAWI TODAY: My Job

LANGKAWI TODAY: This is one of the reasons why my job as a nature guide can be interesting and fun. Whether it is rain or shine, one has to get down and get dirty when caught in a tricky situation!

Langkawi Mangrove Boat Cruise: ABM Members

"ABM". That was the answer from Vivien when I asked her for the names in her group. ABM stands for Association Backpackers of Malaysia. Vivien, Tan and myself met on hiking trips more than a decade ago under the umbrella of ABM. We lost contact for a long time until Facebook reconnected us.

Vivien, Tan and their three sons came to Langkawi on the school holiday in the first week of December 2015. This was their second tour with me on the mangroves boat cruise and their first one was in 2013. Vivien and family enjoyed their first experience in Kilim mangroves and the Bat Cave that they brought the Hoo family along. All of us were also the members of ABM.

Adventurous and sporting family

Vivien's boys remembered their exciting moment on their first tour with an alpha male of a Long-tailed macaque. They have learned not to place any food containers on the boat. This alpha male leaped from a leaning tree onto the roof of our boat because he spotted a can of Pringles left on the seat. With the speed of a lightning, he descended and then followed by screams on the boat. He took what he was eyeing for and then dived into the water. Oh dear...there goes a rubbish.. oh well, I will pick up more trash when I go kayaking next. I said this in my heart with guilt as I watched the macaque happily inspecting the can. The boys told us that the can was empty. Poor macaque then. We were caught off guard and a lesson learned for us including myself. It was also their first time having to see a macaque swims.

All of us as members of ABM are nature lovers. Vivien and Tan are always encouraging their boys to be connected with nature as much as possible by being in the outdoors.

Interpretation tour with the Tan and Hoo family on the mangroves boat cruise

They were shown the mudflat creatures like the fiddler crabs and mudskippers and were lucky to see a Brown-winged Kingfisher. In Malaysia, Brown-winged kingfishers are only found in the mangroves of Langkawi.

This is how beautiful a Brown-winged kingfisher looks like. This picture taken a few months ago.

The tour took them into the heart of Tanjung Rhu mangroves before arriving at the Bat Cave in Kilim. The call of empty stomachs made us stopped at a floating restaurant for a simple lunch. Thankfully the floating restaurant was not packed with people and they didn't need to wait long for their meals.

I really love this picture! Is classic. The surrounding of the mangroves is so tranquil, peaceful and together with the gentle rock of the slow moving boat is definitely relaxing. I would do the same too if I am not on the job!

The final moment all of them especially the kids have been waiting for...... a swim at a beach! Tan demonstrated how to jump off from the boat into the water and all of them went crazy! The kids did countless rounds of jumping off the boat!

It was fun having them back on the same tour again. Thank you Vivien and family for your support and enthusiasm. Looking forward to see all of you next time. How about kayaking the next time?

Please click here to view Vivien's review

The Tan family went site seeing on their own. I like this picture so much that I post it here. The kids posing on the Eagle Square in Kuah town