crabs at punggol point

today, at about 5.00 p.m. the tide was out. at punggol point, not far from the jetty - where trainees take the bum-boat to outward bound school - the low tide reveals a patch of rocky shoreline. saw a number of people, mainly children, looking for creatures among the rocks.

when i went nearer to the group of children, i found that they had a few small crabs, a small lobster and later, they added a starfish in their small plastic container. nearby, an uncle and his niece were also hunting for the same things. they had three small crabs in a smaller container.

there were lots of tiny crabs hidden under the rocks. all the hunters had to do was to move the rock and the tiny crabs would be scurrying all over the place. they used small scoops to handle the crabs. they left the babies alone and went for the slightly bigger ones, those that were at least 3cm long.

the crabs were neither fiddler crabs nor coral spider crabs. they look like a smaller version of the normal swamp crabs.

when i asked the children what they would be doing with the crabs, i did not get a response from them.

reminded me of the time when we were in england and came across these children catching crabs in a stream. asked what they would do to the crabs, they replied that they would release them back into the stream at the end of it all. they did it just for enjoyment.