Which are the possibilities of visiting the Sulu Islands, Philippines? (1 Viewer)

[Papuan birder]

Sulu Islands, Philippines?

Hello,

Aim currently looking into the possibilities of visiting the Sulu Islands, South-west Philippines during my three month long visit to the Philippines in late August, which mainly will be a wildlife trip and with a goal to see as much as possibly not just birds, me and a bunch of friends plan to start on west Palawan (maybe some small Island west of Palawan if possibly) and do as many Islands that is possible during these three months, although we will spend about a week each on Palawan, Luzon, Negros and Mindanao.

But so far we have no idea where the trip will end (on which Island), currently it seems to be on Basilan but as we (especially me) would like to go to the Sulu Islands, for all those endemics which occur there, I have done some searching at the net, but despite a few bird surveys in the early and mid 1990s it don’t seems like many birders have been to these Islands, I have found a few recent photos from here (2001-2003) but I haven’t been able to obtain any info or report about these visits. Although by reading the birdlife fact sheets I have found a few localities which would be worth visiting.

And as the media describe these Islands as being unreadily unstable at present and those tourists should stay away from going to the region as the situation is today. But as media often describe things more worse than it really, I also kind of doubt that the situation is so dangerous that you cant get to this area without being killed or taken as a hostage (as described by newspapers).

But as I said I have pretty limited info about this region and as its generally a badly explored place I don’t expect to get much response, but I would like to know how the situation there really is, as bas as the media describe it, any way to get to these Islands without going by boat and last I wonder if anyone has been to this area the last years or knows of anyone which has, all kind of info is happily received. B


Thanks in advance PB

 

[lankhin]

Hey there

Bad that no one have given you any response, as you don’t need to visit the place to read about the current situation, so also quite strange that no one has provide any info what so ever.

So I will help you m8.

I visited Tawitawi (the main and largest Island) on a business trip in 1993, of course not much birding because of that but I managed (after some crawling and foot kissing) to get a day off. Because of the humid temperature during the day I didn’t have much time to bird anyway and to get to the best localities is both hard and frustrating. Although I manage to get to four localities during the day

But I will give you some of my notes and a bit generally info on some birds seen my me

Brown-dove: This one is way easier to find but still a tricky and extremely shy creature, Tarawakan was my locality for this one and the place where it remains as most common, I manage to get three of these brown things, and it took time to locate them.

Philippine cockatoo: This one took some time to locate for me, I visited three places (Tataan and Tarawakan) where it was suppose to be found, but not sign of it, at my short visit in Mt Binuang I manage to spot three birds, if you keep to the native, tall trees here you should find it quite “easy”.

Racquet-tail: The difficulty of finding this one is that most book sources describes it as being found in some numbers in three localities, but the fact is that it remains extremely rare in two of them and very few birds in the third, took some time and when I finally saw an adult bird flying over the forest canopy it was gone in 4 seconds, Tarawakan is the place to look after it.

Sulu hornbill: Shouldn’t be terrible hard to find as long as you search in the right places, I saw 3 birds at Mt Binuang, and as this is among the best and last localities this would be the best place, might being worth to search for it in 2-3 other places as well.

Total number: 56 species

One should never bring with locals as you birding as they will return to the locality later and try to catch any potential rarities.

About how dangerous it is, I would say that every Philippine that caries a weapon is dangerous 3

Now but seriously places like Manila and Mindanao is more dangerous, the Sulu people are mostly friendly but as every where else there is moorhens.

 

[Rob Hutchinson]

Hi Papuan Birder,

My personal advice would be to take the warnings fairly seriously in this case, you are correct that the media often exaggerate these situation but my conversations with researchers who have been to Tawi-Tawi and Jolo indicate that the dangers of kidnapping there are high particularly if you are wandering around in the forest.

This is the only area in the Philippines that I wouldn't feel comfortable visiting without good local contacts or someone willing to fork out a big ransom... I have seriously explored the idea since half my remaining endemics here could probably be seen fairly easily.

Am sure you will fill 3 months of birding very easily and still be seeing new birds even if you decide not to visit.

Rob

 

[GUNNYDB]

Its not that bad here.

If you are comming, contact the wild bird club of the philippines or visit wbcp on yahoo groups. Thy are the biggest birding community in the philippines or birdwatch.com all the same. they will be more than happy to help you out.