Night Walk At Lorong Halus (07 Feb 2014)

For this trip I decided to go to the Lorong Halus Wetland as I have not been to the place at night before. At the same time, I also wanted to try out the twin flash that I bought on-line recently.  After having tried out the extension tube with my Tamron AF70-300 mm lens previously, I decided to put everything together and test all of them out together. Although this works well together, the weight of the entire set up is a little heavy to my liking.

The weather was dry as it has not rained for almost a month. Plants and grass were turning brown and can been seen in many parts of Singapore. At Lorong Halus, what used to be lush green bushes and plants were now brown and dying, with many brown dead leaves lined the path. Thankfully while I am writing this blog, the sky darkened and started to rain heavily. Hopefully this heavy rain will bring back the lush greenery that we have taken for granted in what we called ourselves as City in a Garden, Singapore.

The place was bone dry even though it is just next to the Punggol-Serangoon Reservoir. This gave me a bad feeling that the trip will not be a fruitful one. The first beetle that greeted me was a 3 mm Fungus Beetle.

Near to the Fungus Beetle was a lone Darkling Beetle which turned out to be a first-time-encountered beetle. This beetle is different from the commonly encountered Darkling Beetle in that it has a much longer body (elytra).

Moving to a small mud puddle (which I remembered it to be a large pool of water when I last visited the place), several of this first-time-encountered Water Beetle were seen swimming in their fast dwindling watery home.

The next beetle was a tiny Fungus Beetle that is less than 2 mm in size.

The highlight of the trip was finding several of this 10 mm first-time-encountered Firefly Beetle (Pteroptyx valida). This is an easy beetle to locate in the dark due to its blinking greenish-yellow at its abdomen.

Nearing the end of the trail, several of this commonly encountered Chafer Beetle (Apogonia expeditionis) were seen on the Water Sensitive Plant (Neptunia natans). Notice the chew marks on the leaf?

On a tree were several pupae which looked like the earlier Fungus Beetle.

Just before I exit the trail, this Soldier Beetle (Crudosilis ruficollis) was seen resting on a blade of grass. It was a welcomed sight as the number of beetles encountered during this trip was really very low.

This trip was not very fruitful given the number of beetles encountered, but having three first-time-encountered beetles make the trip worth the while. 

Morning Walk At Lorong Halus (26 Oct 2013)

Recently a friend shared with me some macro photographs he took at Lorong Halus and it arose my curiosity on what beetles I would find at the place. The weather was fine and so I headed for Lorong Halus.

The first beetle that came into view was a Leaf Beetle (Aulacophora indica) that was caught in a spider's web.

Nearby were a number of the Aulacophora indica Leaf Beetle.

Moving down the path, a Leaf Beetle (Hoplasoma unicolor) was found resting on a fern leaf.

After walking for a while without finding any beetles, this tiny (~1 mm) beetle was a welcomed find. This is a first-time-encounter beetle.

Near by to the tiny beetle was this beetle larvae. This is an interesting larvae as it remained very still the entire time when I am photographing it. I guessed that it was enjoying its drink of "sky juice".

Further down the path, I found this Fungus Beetle on a tree trunk. It is interesting that it is still pretty active in the morning since this is an nocturnal beetle.

Moving to a patch of low bushes, several of this Leaf Beetle (Lema diversa) were found sunning themselves.

On the same patch of low bush was this small metallic blue Leaf Beetle (Lema cyanella).

A surprise was awaiting me when I looked at a tree along the path. A large number of the small (~2 mm) Fungus Beetle were gathered under the few "shelter" on the tree trunk. There were many other beetles gathered in the same manner on the tree trunk.

Coming to a patch of low grass, I found this first-time-encounter Spiny Leaf Beetle resting on a blade of grass. This looked like the Dicladispa armigera Spiny Leaf Beetle except that its body very much broader. I always find photographing the Spiny Leaf Beetles a challenge in getting the right Depth-Of-Field for a better photograph.

A stone's throw away was this first-time-encounter Net-winged Beetle. This looked like the Taphes brevicollis Net-winged Beetle except that its color is brownish-orange instead of red. This is the first time I came across a Net-winged Beetle feeding on flowers. This is an interesting find.

The time was about 10am but the heat from the sun was like noon time. It was getting very hot and it reminded me of the same experience when I was at the Sengkang Riverside Park.  Despite the hot weather, I persevered on and found this Ladybird Beetle (Henosepilachna cucurbitae) - albeit that it was breakfast for this yellow Assassin Bug.

The last encounter for the trip was this spiky beetle larvae. By now the weather was too hot for me to bear and I decided to end the trip.

Although this was a rather short trip with not many beetle encounters , I am glad that I can still find 3 first-time-encounter beetles.