BUGUEY WETLANDS

Let’s talk about Buguey Wetlands. But first, what is a wetland? A wetland is a land area that is saturated with water, it is either permanently or seasonally, such that it takes on the characteristics of a distinct ecosystem. Primarily, the factor that distinguishes wetlands from other land forms or water bodies is the characteristic vegetation that is adapted to its unique soil conditions: Wetlands consist primarily of hydric soil, which supports the aquatic plants. Waters that are found in wetlands can be saltwater, freshwater, or brackish. Mostly main wetland types include swamps, marshes, bogs and fens. Sub-types include mangrove, carr, pocosin, and varzea.

Wetlands play a number of roles in the environment, principally water purification, flood control, and shoreline stability. Wetlands are also considered the most biologically diverse of all ecosystems, serving as home to a wide range of plant and animal life.

Wetlands are habitats that fall somewhere on the environmental spectrum between land and water. Since wetlands lie at the interface of terrestrial and aquatic habitats, they possess a unique mixture of species, conditions, and interactions. As a result, wetlands are among our planet's most diverse and varied habitats pf different species.

In the Philippines there are a lot of considered wetlands, one of which is the Buguey Wetlands.

Buguey Wetlands are on the north coast of Luzon, south shore of the Babuyan Channel and east of the mouth of the Cagayan River, and covers about 80% of Buguey Municipality. Buguey Wetlands are a complex of coastal lagoons, freshwater marshes, brackish and saline marshes, mangrove swamps and intertidal mudflats, with some fish ponds and shrimp ponds and a very large area of rice paddies.

Buguey Wetland's climatic condition is humid tropical climate with an average annual rainfall of about 2,200 mm more or less evenly distributed throughout the year.

The principal vegetation in these wetlands includes Nypa fruticans, mangrove species and Ipomoea reptans. 

                                                                                                                                                                      

Plant communities in adjacent areas include Pandanus sp and plantations of coconuts. 

                                      Pandanus SP                                         Coconuts
The lands in the area are mostly used for Aquaculture and rice cultivation in parts of the wetland, and illegal hunting throughout. Also in these wetlands of Buguey there are some disturbances and threats of which the destruction of mangroves for the creation of shrimp and fish ponds has greatly reduced the extent of the mangroves, and this destruction continues. Waterfowl hunting, although illegal, is widespread, and there is extensive use of pesticides by the rice farmers. Ducks and egrets frequently feed in the rice paddies, and there have been incidents of birds dying from poisoning.

There have been reports that in Buguey Wetlands, there had been an important staging and wintering area for migratory waterfowl, notably ducks and shorebirds. About 3,000-5,000 ducks have been recorded in November, and they are mostly Dendrocygna sp and Anas luzonica. About up to 3,000 other waterfowl have been also observed, the commoner species including Ixobrychus sinensis, I. eurhythmus, I. cinnamomeus, Bubulcus ibis, Egretta garzetta. E. intermedia, E. alba, Gallicrex cinerea and Sterna albifrons were observed and recorded. There were over 940 shorebirds recorded in April-May of 1986 including the others:

32 Rostrazula benghalensis	138 Pluvialis dominica
276 Charadrius dubius	65 C. mongolus
112 Numenius phaeopus	70 Xenus cinereus
57 Heteroscelus brevipes	10 Limnodromus semipalmatus

Up to the present, Alonzo-Pasicolan and National Water Resources Council are keeping these wetlands in Buguey observed. It is said that these wetlands are important areas for rice and fisheries production. Buguey Wetlands is just one of the many more wetlands found here in the Philippines.

Sulfur Cycle

First, what is sulfur? Sulfur is the 10th most abundant element in the environment. It is a bright yellow crystalline solid in its normal state, with most of it stored underground in rocks and minerals and in ocean floor deposits. Mostly, sulfur is used for fertilizers, gunpowder, matches, and in insecticides and fungicides. It is a part of vitamins, proteins and hormones that are considered critical to climate and health of various ecosystems.

In the sulfur cycle...

• The cycle begins with the weathering of rocks, which releases stored sulfur.
• Sulfur comes into contact with the air, converting it to sulfate (SO4).
• Sulfate is taken up by plants and microorganisms and is changed to organic form.
• Sulfur moves up the food chain.
• When organisms die, some of the sulfur is released back to sulfate and enter microorganisms.
• Natural sources emit sulfur into the air. 
• Sulfur eventually settles back to the Earth or comes through rainfall, with some also going to the ocean. 
• Sulfur is also drained to rivers and lakes, eventually to the oceans. 
• Some of the sulfur from oceans go back to the atmosphere through the sea spray. 
• Remaining sulfur go to ocean floor and form ferrous sulfide, which is responsible for the black color of most marine sediments.

*In this cycle it all goes back to the atmosphere where it all began, and the same cycle happens again.

Within the nature there are effect of sulfur cycle to it such that; sulfur is one of the processes that allows natural weathering and other natural processes. Sulfur Cycle does not allow acid rains because it regulates the amount of sulfur present in the atmosphere, hydrosphere, and lithosphere. And sulfuric acids forms sulfuric acid smog when it mixes with water vapor.

Not only does the sulfur cycle have effect with nature, but it also has effects with the human progress. In the human activities since the start of the Industrial Revolution contributed to most of the sulfur that enters the atmosphere. One-third of all sulfur that reaches the atmosphere comes from human activities, such as from the economic wastes and industries. The emissions coming from human activities react to produce sulfate salts that creates acid rain.

Eco Footprint Analysis

Based on the excel file that we had to fill up for us to compute or calculate the energy consumed by our house/home/family. It depends on all the things we consume, the factors of how huge our house is and more.

To compute for your own footprint, download the file from the link below:

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B68X0NLCeZQzVWl0eFBhd2R6SGc/edit?usp=sharing


If you have a big family, your household will probably consume a lot. just like mine. But in order to lessen the consumption, we must observe and just consume what is needed. We should lessen eating at fast food chains , we should also be observant of what food we take. We should avoid consumption of too much fossil fuels. We should also lessen our wastes, especially on food left overs, having pets will help reduce the waste, since they can eat the left overs. It is not just the food that we should be observant of, there are also those electrical consumption we have. we should use appliances that doesn't consume a lot of energy, also if the appliances are not in use, we have to unplug them to save energy consumption.

The lesser computed household footprint, the better. It just means that we have less consumption which is a good thing.

Articles, news and other more information about climate change has recently increased and is being spread world wide. Every people, every nation and all living beings are as well being affected by it. OUR world, OUR home is little by little being destroyed, WE should all be aware of our home and act together to save it.

image from "http://kidlat.pagasa.dost.gov.ph/cab/climate_change/images/Climate-Change.jpg"

Lately, there had been huge change in our climate. Have you experienced that summer feeling during a winter season? Or experience rain during the peak of summer season? Isn't it a bit weird? It could be natural in a way since we could not predict the weather accurately, but at some point it could also probably be due to the gradual change of climate. What could have caused this? There are some factors that would help and leads us to the root of the problem. Pollution is one factor affecting climate change. How so? Well as you can tell, there are a lot of kinds of pollution, namely there's air pollution, water pollution, waste pollution and more. And all these pollution when combined and continuously stays active, it will be a big problem to our mother earth.  The air we breathe, the water we drink, the land we live in, everything will come to an end sooner or later if nothing is done. Yes, we do have some resources, but if we don't take good care of our remaining resources, then wouldn't it be the end for us human beings as well? We humans have caused those pollution. We throw garbage, toxic wastes and such wastes into the sea water. Randomly throwing our waste trash around us instead of disposing it off properly. Smokes, car smokes, hair sprays, spray paints, burning coals and more are affecting the air we breathe. All the things we do or use in this world, either necessity or luxury, these affects our environment. If we people are disciplined enough, it wouldn't be hard for us to change the world, we can help save our planet if we set ourselves to achieve that goal. Impossible? It may seem so, but if every human being living in this world would would do the same to help out, then it wouldn't be impossible. We should think as ONE for the benefit of everybody and not just for oneself.

11th Hour

             The 11th Hour is a documentary movie that shows us of how our world is of as now. It is a look at the state of the global environment including a visionary and practical solutions that we may do for us to restore our ecosystem.

          And in this documentary, there are those thoughts that has practically caught my attention. Every thought was right






"Extinction is a natural part of life." - Kenny Ausubel

"The problem is the way of our thinking."

"Dream of the future generation and hear them calling."

"What are you doing? Can't you see?"

"Opportunism and greed."

"You're either a property or a person." - Tom Linzey

"It's the human brain that could only recognize that we could affect the future by what we do today."

"The consumption is not bad but totally out of balance." - Stephen Hawkins

"Global warming is real and destructive. It defy's imagination."

"Technology can't do what nature can do for us."

"We keep doing what we kept doing at an accelerating rate." - Stephen Schneider

"You name it, they've got it!"

"What is at stake? HAPPINESS!"

These are some thoughts that caught my attention, short phrases yet strong. We should stop doing things that could harm our environment and start preserving it. A huge change comes from a simple step. No matter how small of change a single person can do, if we all do it, then the impossible could be possible.