The bird that launched a thousand socmed comments

It seems almost inevitable that whenever this bird makes an appearance, strong words appear in social media (and that's putting it mildly). I am of course refering to the Black-faced Spoonbill. I first heard of the presence of a large flock sometime late last year from WBPP President, Alain Pascua. But due to the usual pre-Christmas rush, I was not able to twitch it. Then the appearance of the rare Bicol Ground Warbler and a flock of Rufous Hornbills at Infanta, pushed the Spoonbills to the side until Romz Lopez posted awesome photos of the aforementioned Spoonbills. It turned out that he and Sean Melendres were at Taliptip River in Bulacan last January 8 (on the same day, Homer Pialda and I dipped on the Kalaws at Infanta. @#$%&). Eversince I saw a single Spoonbill up close in Tanza, Navotas in October 2020, I have dreamed of being able to get better photos and here was Romz with such close captures. Not wasting time, I was able to hook up with a sortie on January 13 with Capt Floyd Bermejo, Sean Melendres, and Cel Tungol.

We met up with Ericson Cruz at the Panasahan Fishport at 430am and as soon as the sky started to brighten, we were off. We reached the Mantilakan Salt Pans and and found a large flock of spoonbills (Cel counted 62). BUT they were on the other end of the pond, 75 to 100m away according to my camera's exif data. Ever the optimist, we waited (more like hoped) for the birds to come nearer but they never really did. A visit to two other locations yielded the same results. Still we had a great time. But I was ready to just chalk it up to another failed chance to get good photos of the spoonbills, until Jonet Carpio, posted even more awesome captures taken last January 15. Jonet's photos spurred comments, accusations, and counter accusations on social media. Because of this, Ed Santos, who had a scheduled sortie on Saturday, January 17, sought permission from SMC to be allowed to enter the offset area. Said permission was granted by Ms Cecille Ang, project head of SMC Infra which handles the Bulacan Airport construction, and a Director at both San Miguel and Ginebra and the PSE. We were assigned an official guide, Gerson Kim Penetrante, a field biologist and birder. Aside from Ed and myself, we were also joined by Prof Bert and Jun Madrigal. Jonet was supposed to be with us also but had to stay behind because it was the birthday of his mother.

We spent the morning at the SMC offset area where we found a large flock of spoonbills. (Gerson counted 148). We also saw other birds, including a Siberian Rubythroat. But our target for the day were the spoonbills which were a bit closer than my previous trip (approx 60m to 75m) and gave us plenty of BIF opportunities. Here are some of the images that I was able to create that morning.

Unli BIF of Black-faced Spoonbills

By 12nn, we were getting tired and hungry was was about to go back when I asked the group if they were interested to visit the salt pans where Capt Floyd was with Christopher Ferrer and Jopet Sy. Since we were already in the area, we motored to the site, and found hundreds of egrets feeding near the pilapil (dyke or embankment in english). Mixed among them were four or five Spoonbills. We wasted no time in setting up our gear and fired away. We stayed for about an hour shooting to our hearts content. The shooting distance to the spoonbills were an average of 30 meters, some of the egrets were even closer and not once did the birds get bothered by our presence. Some of the salt pan workers were even closer. Sharing some of the images from the Mantilakan salt pans.

Black-faced Spoonbill, Platalea minor. Classified as Endangered by IUCN.

After an hour of shooting, we decided to call it a day (we were all sporting ear to ear grins) and boarded our bancas for the forty minute trip back to Jonet's Malayah Art Cafe where we were treated to a sumptuos lunch washed down by superb coffee.

Ang mga busog na birders...

Maraming salamat Jonet and Ed for the opportunity!!! Maraming salamat Gerson for guiding us. Sa Madrigal brothers, salamat sa tawanan. And thank you to Ms. Cecille Ang of SMC Corporation for allowing us entry in your area. Above all, thank you Lord for creating beautiful birds for us to appreciate and photograph.

A final note: from our conversation with Gerson, we learned that SMC is investing a lot of effort and money into creating an area where the birds, which will be affected by the construction of the airport, can transfer to. The whole process is very scientific. It involves studying the soil (mud) that the birds frequent and feed from, and then duplicating said conditions somewhere else where the birds will not pose a danger to the airport and where planes will not harm the birds. May this effort be successful for the sake of both the birds and the humans.