Pajareo sin fronteras

  After a whirlwind two days in the Sierra Madre , the next stop of the mega Philippines trip with Doug and Andrew was another Luzon classic: the rainforests of Subic Bay. While all these spots are theoretically the same habitat (Luzon lowland forest), the suite of birds is surprisingly different, with only a few species being found in both spots. As if there wasn't enough endemism in the Philippines already, there are surprisingly stark differences between the wet, hilly forests of eastern Luzon and the flatter, drier forests of the west. Thus, it made sense to add this to our packed itinerary as the second (and last) stop in Luzon. I'd been to Subic several times before, most recently in December of 2022 , so I was pretty familiar with the area, and how to find the major targets. I also knew the best spots to eat and, even more importantly, where the annoying Subic cops hang out trying to extort bribes from unsuspecting tourists. Between accessible roads, relatively plentiful...

  After a couple of weeks working in Jakarta , I flew back to Manila and immediately started another trip. Ever since I moved back to the country in late 2021, I've been doing my best to put the Philippines on the map for birding friends back in the US, and ideally convince some of them to come and visit. Southeast Asia tends to be rather overlooked by American birders, who gravitate to Central America and South America if they need their fix of tropical birding (Europeans make it over much more often, presumably because they set their sights further afield once they've seen all 10 species of bird on their continent). Still, I hoped that posting pictures of strange malkohas, brilliant fruit doves, and colorful kingfishers would be enough to put it on the map even for Americans. The first person to take the hint was Larry back in 2022  (though he'd already been before so I can't really take much credit). Then, finally, my American birding friends Doug and Andrew decided ...