Sta. Cruz Island Mangrove-Lagoon & Stingless Jellyfish @ Sta. Cruz Island Zamboanga City; Philippines

While on the Sta. Cruz island, we were also given a tour of the mangrove-lagoon. The tour is a partnership between the local management of the island and the native tribe who call the island their home. The mangrove-lagoon tour, once open to the public, aims to help bring awareness to the protection of the local ecology and teach the public the important role that the mangrove system plays.

*NOTE: The boats being used were donated to the natives by the Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation and does not have any political ties to any political group or individual! Yellow is the colour of Hope and always has been!

There's the village of the natives!

Upon reaching the mangrove-lagoon area, we were greeted by a lush and green mangrove forest. Mangrove forests are natural carbon sinks. They take in large amounts carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and pack it away in the soil for millennia! Mangroves also are a natural nursery for fish (and a multitude of other creatures) until they mature and start their life in the open ocean.

Mangroves also provide natural protection and act as barriers from strong tidal waves (storm surges and tsunamis, if any) by dispersing the energy in the waves.

On the tour, listening and learning about mangroves!

As we made our way through the mangrove-lagoon and learnt about the importance of mangroves (and how to tell the difference between a male and female tree; the trick is in their leaves) from our local guide, we slowly made our way to another unique "quirk" of this particular mangrove-lagoon.

Next stop, the area the Stingless Jellyfish call home!

Upside-down jellyfish

These jellyfish belong to the genus Cassiopea; as their more layman's name suggests, these jellyfish spend most of their time upside-down feeding on tiny plankton that get brought in by the tide.

Hello little jellyfish, sorry to have bothered your time!

These jellyfish are stingless and don't have any vemon (or may have some, but is very harmless to humans), so you can touch them with your bare hands no problem at all! But before you touch them make sure you wash off any lotion, sunscreen and any other chemicals off your hands or don't put on anything at all if you have plans to touch these beautiful creatures!

Our local tour guide as well as the natives (who were our hosts and our boatmen) taught us many valuable lessons about how we need to protect the environment in order for her to protect us. And who better to learn about the environment and its preservation, then those who live, work and interact with it almost everyday of their lives.?!

It's nice to know that there are people out there who make it their job (out of pure passion) not only to take care of the environment, but also teach others about the importance the ecosystems play in the area they are found (as well as their interconnectivity with other ecosystems). These are the people I look up to, and who are my heroes.