Adams: An Exercise in Failure

 

The shores where the Spotted Imperial Pigeons flock to every May to August.

For those who read birding blogs to see birds, apart from the Spotted Imperial Pigeons, this will barely have any photos of other birds. For the most part, this is not a trip report. 

Last May, Angel, Ens, and I headed to Adams, Ilocos Norte, in hopes of seeing a few targets. The main target was Cordillera Ground Warbler and with the very tricky Sierra Madre Crow and Blue-breasted Blue Flycatcher as our secondary targets. Ens and I were fresh off the incredible success of seeing Luzon Jungle-Fly (which I will eventually get to posting about) and our Samar trip so while we knew that this bird was extremely difficult, we still liked our chances. 

My best shot, these birds were very far away and wary of people

A group of females with a single male on the rightmost side

Slight peeve but people seem to be quick to say "co-existence" whenever its a photo of a bird with humans. Worst one I've seen was some guy posting some Black-Winged Stilts with farmers in Candaba (which is one of the most threatened habitats) 

A closer view.  The male has a white line through its chest 

Before then, we had a quick stopover for Spotted Imperial Pigeons along the way in Pasuquin. This species has one of the most interesting local migrations of any endemic species as this usually deep forest bird flies all the way to the shore. This local migration puts this species in much more danger, and I’ve seen many records in the middle of Manila - I’ve also seen this species in quite a few poaching groups.

This population in Ilocos Norte appears to be in much better shape, as Richard Ruiz, Ilocos’s top birder and rarity expert, reports that hunting is no longer as prevalent. His yearly counts have even shown some increases in total number.

Walking on what would've been a pleasant but unfortunately cow poop filled beach, we saw a large flock. Our highest count for a single flock was 30 birds, but we think that there were multiple flocks of them, as Richard had counted a lot more in just the previous days. Down the line, we need to find more areas where these pigeons migrate and hopefully better protect them, as who knows how many beachside spots are hunted and trapped out. We ended this checklist with a respectable 20 species, little did we know that we would get way more species in a single day than 3 full days of birding at Adams.

Adams is close to the Patapat Viaduct - a well-known tourist spot.

Adams had the best lowland forest I've been to on Luzon and yet barely any birds

Really had no birds so this was my only photo from the Adams birding site proper

For the sake of keeping this blog short, apart from some quick flybys of Rufous Hornbill, the Northern subspecies Cream-breasted Fruit Dove, Green-backed Tailorbird, we legitimately did not see anything at the site of Adams. Ironically, my only Philippine lifer was the worst possible bird - a Common Myna, which is one of the most invasive birds in the world and is something that will likely cause a lot of problems for our native birds. This species was only recently found in Batanes and has quickly become established. Unfortunately, it’s likely to happen too and I dread these birds becoming a common sight.

Common Myna - hands down my worst ever Philippine lifer 

This Philippine Hanging-parrot showed well in our resort which also had more birds than the birding site

Begonia rieckei

Habitat looks beautiful but really no birds... ended up hiking up along this stream but really no birds

A nice mural showing Rufous Hornbills. We only had flybys so no pics for this trip

I repeat: we legitimately did not see anything, despite trying to go inside the trails and trying our hardest. I can say without any exaggeration that bird-wise, this is my worst trip, beating out Mindoro in the rainy season. We had a planned 4th day but we decided to head back to the Spotted Imperial Pigeons instead to get some better views! We tried to make a makeshift tent hide by, and it did work somewhat, but it looked absolutely dumb carrying it around. We then spent the afternoon waiting for our flight by buying bagnet, eating empanadas, and enjoying Laoag’s culinary scene, but as a birding trip, this was the closest to zero I have ever come to.

 

This trip had a complete lack of birds so this Philippine Green Pigeon will have to do. I've noticed that they seem to be a lot more rare nowadays?

I do take some consolation from this trip, as I saw the largest number of stick insects (spotted by Angel!) I’ve ever seen. We also had Amophophallus adamsensis. Not to mention our resort was beautiful with a nice beachfront, Ilocos food is top tier, and I got to spend time with my lovely partner and close friend!

Patapat Viaduct is probably one of the most famous roads in the whole PH for its scenic seaside and forest views

Amorphophallus adamsensis

Trachyaretaon sp. 

Periphetes sp. with some sort of spider 

This single bush had at least 8 stick insects. The red ones are the males! 

Periphetes sp.

How lovely!

Ilocos Empanadas >>>> 

Ilocos Bagnet

THAT SAID, I STILL WANT MY BIRDS. I’ve always considered myself a birding hedonist for lack of a better term. This may be controversial but I feel like people have gone too far in the direction of not letting themselves be disappointed or emotional in birding. It’s gone to the point where some even shame people for seeking out lifers, and there's now some sort of stigma to being frustrated when you miss your targets. I guess there’s some sort of stink of people acting like brats when they miss out on birds or even resorting to unethical behaviour to force those birds out but the pendulum has swung too far and not letting yourselves feel disappointment dulls the excitement of seeing your targets and I’m sure there's a medium where you can let yourself be disappointed and frustrated without resorting to bad behaviour. You can be emotional while birding (as long as you don't act stupid).

Going to these places takes time, effort, and money, so of course I really want to see the target birds. There are still so many places I’d love to visit and many other birds to find, and the truth is, if you only have a limited amount of days, you do try to visit new places. The birds really don't owe you anything to show themselves to you, but it's only natural to at least want your efforts to pay off.

Birding is special as there’s a much larger room for that disappointment. Imagine going to the locations of world-famous landmarks and suddenly being told that they’re not showing up today. It’s the sense of accomplishment in the face of failure that allows me to enjoy that unbeatable thrill of birding. I jumped for joy when I got close views of the Celestial Monarch, we made a celebratory circle (and missed out on photos lol) when we finally found the Luzon Jungle Fly after 3 days hiking Pulag back and forth and I ran around like a maniac and cried when I finally saw the Bicol Ground-warbler on my 26th visit to Infanta. These memories are precious to me and I’d never have felt this form of elation without all the previous disappointments.

We came across this old man taking his Red Junglefowl out for a walk. I'm glad the guy seems to be taking care of it well but this is just evidence of trapping.

Beyond just the gamified and personal sense of finding birds or not, there are also much bigger issues behind a lot of birding failures that are actively linked to deforestation, hunting, and land conversion. I missed out on Mindanao Bleeding-heart because it got flushed by an illegal logger. Could you imagine that up to the 2000s, you could still find Blue-backed Parrots in PICOP? Whiskered Pitta used to be a roadside bird in Infanta until 2020-ish. White-fronted Tit used to be regular in Subic until they closed off the spot to make bombs. Adams itself became controversial because of a hunting incident in 2014 in which caused a lot of controversy in the birding community and it did make birders persona non grata in the area for a while. While we ourselves didn't see any hunting, conversations with other birders who have visited the area mentioned seeing snares. While our Adams target birds are very difficult regardless of the conditions, it's hard not to think that it doesn't play a part.

I hate that more and more it's become an all too common response to a newbie or foreigner whenever they express shock at all the destruction of habitats, “Welcome to the real world” / “It is what it is” / “Ganyan talaga” almost with this certain smugness. I know that as private citizens we have day jobs and for the most part can’t be the ones to create that radical change needed, but why is this defeatism and cynicism worn like some sort of badge of honor of “keeping it real”.

I know there's a large subset of people who try to relax and forget about the world (because unfortunately it is bad enough), especially in the Philippines, but it's really just so hard to stay that way when the habitats our beloved birds call home are constantly under attack. I've only been birding for 7 years, but have already seen so much loss and destruction. I know this blog is getting preachy, but at the same time, it's a message that I legitimately believe in and I think is something worth fighting for. Wanting a better future despite everything doesn’t make you naive, it just shows you care!

The beach at our resort in Pannzian

There’s so much beauty and magnificence out there in the wild and finding that is cause for celebration and not seeing your targets is cause for frustration. Even worse is missing or even losing these birds forever due to outside factors. So yes, wins and losses deserve to be experienced in full!!

My next blog will definitely have more actual birds! I have a backlog of pre-camera trip reports that I’ll try to sprinkle in between some more recent trips with much better photos, so for the start of this blog, posts won't be in chronological order.

Some sort of tiger butterfly