Image/Video courtesy Martyn Willes

Every day at sundown, when all God fearing citizens of the World are contemplating retirement to the safety of varietous shelters, the 1.8 million inhabitants of the Monfort Bat Cave are just waking to the opportunity of emergence into a night-long feast on their favourite prey: nectar and fruit . . . lots of nectar and fruit. The Monfort Bat Cave on Samal Island is home to the largest colony of fruit bats in the world (see previous World record article).

On one not-so-moonlit evening in June the GetWet camera crew braved torrential rain to bring you this 2-minute video-segment of the “bat emergence” – an event that actually spans approximately three hours, starting with one or two fruit bats gingerly inspecting the fresh air outside the cave entrance and then calling back to their friends and colleagues with a semi-audible “all-clear”.

Image courtesy Asian Bird Fair

The 1st Asian Bird Fair will be held in Davao City later this year in conjunction with birdwatching clubs from: Thailand, Malaysia, Taiwan, China and Singapore. The plan is to promote birdwatching as a eco-adventure, recreational sport and to: encourage international friendship, collaboration and the exchange of experience & best practices among the birdwatching clubs of Asia; foster bird-watching as an eco-tourism activity; highlight bird festivals, bird fairs and bird races in the Asia region; and, promote the host cities/countries – their natural beauty, eco-adventure activities, wild bird conservation and cultural heritage.

In conjunction with the 1st Asian Bird Fair, a birdwatching adventure tour will take place in the forests and wetlands of the provinces of Bukidnon and Surigao del Sur, to the North & West of Davao City.

Image courtesy Martyn Willes

The Paniki Festival (Bat Festival) celebrates the World’s largest colony of fruit bats that inhabit the Monfort Bat Cave on Samal Island, Davao del Norte. Guinness World Records have this year recognised the uniqueness of Samal Island’s Monfort Bat Cave and have accorded it due certification (see previous Samal Island Fruit Bats Into Guinness World Records story)

As many as 1.8 million Geoffroy’s Rousette fruit bats (Rousettus amplexicaudatus) occupy the Monfort Bat Cave (to a density of 645 bats per square meter!) and leave their bat cave on Samal Island every evening in a veritable cacophony of skin flapping, to forage for wild fruits across the expanse of the provinces adjoining the Davao Gulf.

Photo courtesy batsanctuary.org

13th January 2010; Samal Island - Philippine fruit bats that roost on Samal Island were officially accorded the Guinness World Record of largest colony of any fruit bat species. On any given day approximately 1.8 million Geoffroy’s rousette fruit bats (rousettus amplexicaudatus) inhabit the Monfort Bat Cave on Samal Island.

The Monfort Bat Cave & Conservation Foundation aims to protect the Samal Island fruit bats through research programs that lead to better education and conservation of habitat. Education programs will foster a greater understanding of the role of fruit bats and dispel the myth that fruit bats compete with humans for food when the reverse is actually true. Samal Island and the nearby provinces of Davao would not enjoy such an abundance of durian and other tropical fruits if it were not for centuries of natural seed and fertilizer dispersal undertaken free of charge by the fruit bats.

Photo courtesy Bernadette Villaluz

UPDATED 11/06/2009

The rare exotic tropical plant has been identified: Amorphophallus paeoniifolius (Araceae). Sometimes known as the “elephant foot yam” or “corpse plant” (because of its short lived but foul smell upon flowering). Apparently the Amorphophallus paeoniifolius flower as photographed was the first stage of a process wherein the squashed “flower” and surrounding leaf eventually fall off and the stem continues to grow to allow developing seeds the greatest chance of dispersal once ripe.

Although not exceptionally rare the plant is