Sudarban: Biodiversity and its conservation

The area experiences a subtropical monsoonal climate with an annual rainfall of 1,600–1,800 mm and severe cyclonic storms. Enormous amounts of sediments carried by the rivers contribute to its expansion and dynamics.
The biodiversity includes about 350 species of vascular plants, 250 fishes and 300 birds, besides numerous species of phytoplankton, fungi, bacteria, zooplankton, benthic invertebrates, molluscs, reptiles, amphibians and mammals.

Sundarban is classified as tropical moist forest. The average actual minimum and maximum temperatures vary between30 amd 21 degree Celcius.

The typical mangrove species dominate the central part of the forest.
Sundarbans mangrove is the home of a number of endangered and globally threatened species. The Bengal Tiger and the fishing cat are getting effective protection here. The creeks of Sundarbans form the home of Estuarine Crocodile, Salvator Lizard (Water Monitor), River Terrapin and Horse Shoe or King Crab. This area serves as the nesting ground for endangered marine turtles like Olive Ridley, Green Turtle and Hawk's Bill Turtles. The aquatic endangered mammals like Genetic Dolphins thrive within mangrove creeks close to sea. Number of heronries form here during monsoon as well as during winter. It is home for Trans-Himalayan migratory birds.


-Sudarat

Credits: http://projecttiger.nic.in/sundarbans.htm ,
http://www.mediabangladesh.net/sundarban_mangrove.php ,
http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/798

Mangrove Forest in Sundarban

Sundarban is the biggest mangrove forest in the world. Sundarban is in South West part of Bangladesh, in the district of greater Khulna. India shares a bit of the forest with Bangladesh. The total area is about 38,000 square kilo meters. Sundarban is a large block of littoral forests. The beauty lies in its unique natural surrounding. The Sundarbans are a part of the world's largest delta formed by the rivers Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna. Thousands of meandering streams, creeks, rivers and estuaries have enhanced its charm. For miles and miles, the lofty treetops form an unbroken canopy, while nearer the ground, works of high and ebb-tide marked on the soil and tree trunks and the many varieties of the natural mangrove forest have much to offer to an inquisitive visitor.

Credits:
http://www.sundarbanbiosphere.org/html_files/sunderban_biosphere_reserve.htm
http://media.photobucket.com/image/sundarban%20forest/bangladeshi3/8.jpg

Visit to Mangrove Sites in Singapore

1st stop: SUNGEI BULOH WETLAND RESERVE.

we went to sungei buloh wetland reserve(sbwr)
and took some photos of the mangroves there.
so, here they are:

prop roots.

more prop roots.

look at the pencil roots!

more pencil roots.

knee-like roots.

These are some of the pictures that we have taken at sungei buloh wetland reserve. Hope you have get a better understanding on the mangrove vegetation in S'pore.

Nextup-Visits to other mangrove vegetations in S'pore (part two)! More pictures coming up! :)

Natural vegetation in Singapore

Singapore used to be covered with dense lowland tropical rainforests, with mangrove forest along the muddy coasts and tidal creeks. As settlement increased in the 1840's, forest made way for cultivating of crops like nutmeg, garnlier,clove pepper and cocoa. as a result of deforestation, many plant species, including 60 species of mangrove inhabitant orchids disappeared.

At the start of the century, forest reserves were set up. at present National Parks Board(NParks) takes care of about 3000 hectares of natural reserves, the Bukit Timah Natural Reserve, the Central Catchment Natural Reserve, the Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve and the Laborador Nature Reserve.

Primary Vegetation

The 164 hectare Bukit Timah Nature Reserve and some part or the Central Catchment Nature Reserve have primary forest in Singapore. They account for the last remaining traces of primary rainforest in Singapore. the main vegetation is the tropical hardwoods of the Dipterocarp, which in some cases, grow up to 40 metres.

On the coastal sides, one can find the mangrove forest in places like Kranji, Sungei Loyang and Sungei Tampines near Pasir Ris. The beaches in Singapore have a variety of vegetation ranging from grasses,sedges,creepers and trees. Red seaweeds,green seaweeds and brown seaweeds can also be found along the coastal areas.

credits to: www.tradechakra.com/economy/singapore/flora-and-fauna-in-singapore-97.php

Adaptations of mangroves

Photo credits: http://www.sms.si.edu/IRLspec/Mangroves.htm

In this post,
we are going to talk about
the adaptations of mangroves
to their environment over the years.

Photo credits: http://www.aims.gov.au/pages/research/mangroves/images2/Mangroves-480.gif

1. Salt resistance
Mangrove plants have evolved to adapt to salt water as they are normally found along the coastal area where freshwater is scarce. This may involve cytoplasmic tolerance of high solute concentrations, and many of the common species have in-leaves sodium and chloride ion levels that each exceed about half that of sea water. In addition, the most salt-resistant species also tend to show avoidance to salt stress. Avoidance can be achieved by excretion of crystalline salt from glands or hairs of leaves. Examples of salt excretion are Avicennia, Aegialitis annulata (family Plumbaginaceae). Another mechanism to avoid toxic levels of ions is to produce succulence, i.e., dilution of salts via having watery tissues. Salt dilution is said to be the reason for having large hypodermal cells on the upper (adaxial) side of leaves, covering the photosynthetic tissues, e.g., in Avicennia and Rhizophora, or large, vacuolate cells in the middle tissue in Sonneratia and Laguncularia.

2. Dispersal of seeds
Germination of seeds while still attached to the mother plant is called vivipary. Vivipary is exceedingly rare among plants, but these are found in many early colonizing, pioneer species of mangroves, including Avicennia, Rhizophora and all other Rhizophoraceae, Aegiceras, Pelliciera, Aegialitis, and the aggressive estuarine species Nypa fruticans. The classic example of vivipary is Rhizophora mangle, which is able to traverse broad ocean regions by producing large seedlings that float horizontally, undamaged by salinity. These seedlings can be washed up on sand or mud flats, where they settle to establish new populations. In this case, the hypocotyl develops as a long, stiff axis, sometimes exceeding a foot in length. By germinating while on the mother plant, and thereby drawing nutrients under lower salt stress, the young plant can increase its salt resistance before falling into the seawater environment where it remains dormant until it finds the soil and is able to put out roots.

3. Roots
A distinctive feature of mangroves is their far-reaching, exposed roots. These roots might come in many different shapes and sizes, however they all serve the same purpose – structural support in the soft soils. Some species of mangroves have pneumataphores, which are above-ground roots. These are filled with spongy tissue and peppered with small holes that offer structural support and allow oxygen to be transferred to the roots trapped below ground in the anaerobic (low oxygen) soils. There are mainly 4 types of roots – buttress, knee-like, pencil-like and prop roots. The roots of many mangrove species are also adapted to stop the intake of a lot of the salt from the water before it reaches the plant.

a real life mangrove sketch:

sketch 1:
Photo credits: http://www.wettropics.gov.au/pa/pa_images/roots.gif
Credits:
http://www.botgard.ucla.edu/html/botanytextbooks/worldvegetation/marinewetlands/mangal/generalcharacteristics.html
http://www.redland.qld.gov.au/Environment/Mangroves/Pages/MangroveAdaptations.aspx

Introduction to mangroves

Our group will be doing on the topic of natural vegetation for the geography project and we are investigating on the characteristics of one type of natural vegetation found in Singapore, which is mangrove vegetation.

1. What are mangroves?

• Mangroves are trees and shrubs that grow in saline coastal habitats in the tropics and subtropics – mainly between latitudes 25° N and 25° S.
• There are many species of trees and shrubs adapted to saline conditions.
• Mangroves form a characteristic saline woodland or shrubland habitat, called mangrove swamp, mangrove forest, mangrove or mangal.
• Mangals are found in depositional coastal environments where fine sediments (often with high organic content) collect in areas protected from high energy wave action. They occur both in esaries and along open coastlines.
• Mangroves dominate three quarters of tropical coastlines.

2. Importance of mangrove

• Mangroves are the first line indicators on the well being of our coastlines, a thriving community of mangroves usually indicated good water quality.
• They slow down soil erosion and some species of mangroves actually help in reclaiming land with their complex root systems.
• Their prop roots offer protection to many species of insects and fish especially two species of commercially important fish, the Sea Bass and Mangrove Jack Its also home to unusual fish like the Archer fish that captures its prey by “spitting” water at it.
• The rich insect and bug life in the mangroves attract a great number of aquatic and other birds to hunt and nest there.
• Experts also now say that if the mangroves had not been cut down (to make way for sea front bungalows) there would have been many less causalities during the last tsunami in 2004.

3. Mangroves in Singapore

• In the 19th century, mangroves were extensively found along the coastline of mainland Singapore, especially in the northern and western coasts.
• Growing along intertidal river mouths and along sheltered shores, it covered approximately 13 per cent of the land.
• Today, however, only 0.5 per cent remains, growing mainly in the northern part of the island, on some offshore islands such as Pulau Tekong and Pulau Ubin, and nature reserves at Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve and Pasir Ris Park.
• Reclaimed land from mangroves were used for other purposes in nation-building such as industry and housing. A classic example is the reclamation of large tracts of mangrove at Jurong, into what is known today as the Jurong Industrial Estate.

This is some of the research that our group have done.

Credits: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mangrove , http://infopedia.nl.sg/articles/SIP_412_2005-01-03.html , http://thegreenvolunteers.blogspot.com/2009/04/importance-of-mangroves.html

Hope you have learnt more about the mangrove vegetation!

Look forward to our next post-Visit to a mangrove vegetation in S'pore! :)