Tagalong with Valli to the Philippines: First Trip to Apid and Mohaba, Home of the Mysterious Red Shrimp

October 3, 2012 A little back tracking

I made my first trip to our island barangay of Apid, made up of three islands, Mahaba, Apid and Digjo about twenty miles offshore and an hour boat ride or a half hour if we use two engines, ha.

Apid Isdland

Mahaba from Apid

Marine sanctuaries were established near each of the islands around 1996. They’re part of the Cuautro Island Protected Landscape and Seascape.

The people on this trip were my boss, Municipal Agriculturist Cito Asencion, one of my counterparts, Municipal Environmental and Natural Resource Officer (MENRO) Alfredo Galo, the Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Council (FARMC) Chairman, Charlemagn Polo, aka Lemin, who I’ve hired as a tutor in the Visayan language and Lina, head of the Municipal Planning Department Office (MPDO).

Cito

Lina

this is a meeting place

I was very lucky I'm told to have a pod of DOLPHINS welcome me to the islands. There were 20-30 of them surfacing and leaping as we passed through them. So very cool. I'm told there's sea turtles out there too. Rats about not getting a photo of that.

The purpose of the trip was to meet with the barangay captain and officers to discuss waste management and specifically the required segregation of waste they need to implement, like months ago.

About 600 people are living in 125 homes on Apid. I took a little walk and took a few photos.

Where is everybody? We're suppose to have a meeting.

Boatbuilding seems to be one livlihood on the island but there's a good chance
they're using illegally poached hardwoods from the mainland upland forests.

Barracuda catch

The island residents were living here when the sanctuaries were established and are allowed to stay. But no new people can move here. There's no fresh water source other than rain catchment and no electricity other than what's produced by two generators. I noticed they were running a generator for listening to music.

a captured bird on a tether, I don't know why?

these giant pots are used for rain catchment, the only source of fresh water on the islands

They have a school and of course a church. Health services are provided by nurses who occasionally make the boat trip from Inopacan. They boat in filtered drinking water from the mainland. This is truly remote rural living.

I love this place with it's traditional woven bamboo siding

Lunch was prepared for us, freshly caught fish and rice.

descaling the red snapper

They stay there “because they can catch fish to eat.”

One of the better looking dogs waiting for scraps

I'd hoped to go snorkeling but unfortunately wasn't able to THIS time.

The water is so clear!

Since Alfredo and Cito were busy looking for the people we were supose to be meeting with, Lemin and I went to see the romblon 'plantation'. Another source of livilihood on the island is growing romblon for weaving. It's a cactusy grass like plant. The day was very hot.I had two quarts of drinking water. The trail wound up through jungle over very uneven hard sharp ancient coral/limestone and all I had on my feet was thin flip flops.

I was sweltering with swimsuit on underneath, actually suffered minor dehydration/heat exhaustion later at home collapsed in bed and couldn't move.

the romblon

They harvest the romblon for processing, sele in bundles, or use in weaving various products such as sleeping mats, placemats and bags. They boat the products mainland market for selling. I took some pictures of the processing. No weaving was happing this day.

First step, removing the sharp spiny edges

second step, remove the spiny center rib splitting the piece in two

tools used for splitting into even strips, they have these in different widths for different projects

Drying romblon

When we were done with eating and the meeting we headed to Mahaba to see the red shrimp. Everyone has been making a big deal about these shrimp they say are found no where else and they need to be identified. I've told them I'm not a marine biologist but I want to see them.