Spatial and Short-Term Temporal Patterns of Octocoral Assemblages in the West Philippine Sea

Octocorals are relatively understudied than other coral reef organisms despite their ecological and economic values. The Philippines is known to have high marine biodiversity, but information on octocorals is lacking. This study investigated spatial and temporal variations in the assemblage of octocorals in selected reef sites in the West Philippine Sea (WPS)- the Kalayaan Island Group (i.e., Pag-asa, Sabina, Lawak, and Northeast Investigator) and Ulugan in 2017 and 2019. Results showed high octocoral taxonomic richness (at least 10 families) in the study sites. Mean percent octocoral cover in WPS was 5.35% SE ± 0.55, with Sabina having the highest octocoral cover in both years. Significant differences in octocoral cover were observed among sites in both years, but among-station differences were only observed in 2017. Octocoral assemblage also differed among sites in both years (ANOSIM: R > 0.5, p < 0.05), wherein different octocoral taxa dominated in different sites. In particular, variations were driven by high cover of holaxonians, nephtheids, and coelogorgiids in Sabina, and clavulariids, tubiporiids, and xeniids in Northeast Investigator in 2017. In 2019, significant variations were driven by high cover of helioporiids in Pag-asa, while Sabina had higher abundance of holaxonians, nephtheids, alcyoniids, and xeniids. Short-term temporal variation on octocoral cover in monitoring stations in Pag-asa was not observed (Kruskal-Wallis, p > 0.05), although the overall mean octocoral cover increased from 1.23% ± SE 0.47 in 2017 to 2.09% SE ± 0.37 in 2019. Further, there was no significant change in the octocoral assemblage in Pag-asa between years (ANOSIM, R = 0.11, p = 0.07). This study highlights high octocoral taxonomic richness in the WPS relative to other sites in the Indo-Pacific Region and provides baseline information on the octocoral assemblages, which can be useful for future ecological studies and marine biodiversity conservation efforts.

Tintinnids (Ciliophora, Oligotrichea) within power plant discharge and marine protected areas in Masinloc-Oyon Bay

There are only five studies on tintinnids of the Philippines. We present a checklist of tintinnids (Ciliophora, Oligotrichea) from Masinloc-Oyon Bay, Province of Zambales, West Philippine Sea. Masinloc-Oyon Bay is a unique in having both marine protected areas and a coal-fired thermal power plant within the same bay. Field sampling was performed in July 2017, which recorded 10 species belonging to one order, six families, and seven genera. Station 1 inside the power plant’s outfall had the lowest diversity, whereas the stations within marine protected areas had a relatively higher species diversity index. Our new data are the first records of tintinnid species in Masinloc-Oyon Bay. These records add to the regional checklist of the Philippine Sea.

Infodemics and Deadly Racist Viruses: covid-19 Response in the Chinese-Filipino Community

In the last decade, the Philippines has experienced an escalation of anti-Chinese sentiment due to many factors, founded and unfounded. The growing presence of illegal immigrants and crimes associated with them; an increase in the number of Chinese workers, who are perceived as competing with Filipino workers; an increase in Chinese businesses, especially in retail, some operating without permits; the continuing dispute between China and the Philippines over the islands in the West Philippine Sea; President Rodrigo Duterte’s China pivot policy and what has been deemed as favoring China to the detriment of the Philippines. This confluence of events has served to worsen the image of China. The covid-19 pandemic and the way the government responded to it worsened the sinophobia directed at anyone considered “Chinese,” including Filipinos of Chinese ancestry. This paper explores the racism vented against the Chinese and how the local Chinese-Filipino community has responded with positive action to help mitigate the anti-Chinese wave.

Abundance, Distribution, and Diversity of Tuna Larvae (Family Scombridae) in the Philippine waters

The Philippines is a significant producer of tunas globally but has experienced a decline in tuna production in recent years. Thus, efforts to explore and assess new fishing grounds were conducted by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) through M/V DA-BFAR. Assessment of the spawning and nursery grounds of tunas in the country’s EEZ was also undertaken to properly manage and conserve tuna stocks. The said assessment commenced in 2006 and is continuing up to the present. All the data from 2006-2018 were compiled, including the data from collaborative studies with the University of the Philippines-Marine Science Institute and Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center to create an overall profile of Scombridae’s abundance and distribution larvae in Philippine waters. The study results showed that family Scombridae is most abundant in the Philippine waters along Batanes-Polillo and areas off Eastern Luzon. Species diversity in Philippine waters was considerably high, with about six to eight dominant species. The most dominant species was Thunnus albacares., followed by Thunnus obesus, Auxis spp., Katsuwonus pelamis, unidentified Scombrid larvae, Rastrelliger spp., Thunnus alalunga, and Thunnus tonggol. The Scombridae species are diverse in the West Philippine Sea and Batanes-Polillo waters but not in Davao Oriental-Surigao waters.

Application of DINCAE to Reconstruct the Gaps in Chlorophyll-a Satellite Observations in the South China Sea and West Philippine Sea

The Data Interpolating Empirical Orthogonal Functions (DINEOF) method has demonstrated usability and accuracy for filling spatial gaps in remote sensing datasets. In this study, we conducted the reconstruction of the chlorophyll-a concentration (Chl-a) data using a convolutional neural networks model called Data-Interpolating Convolutional Auto-Encoder (DINCAE), and we compared its performance with that of DINEOF. Furthermore, the cloud-free sea surface temperature (SST) was used as a phytoplankton dynamics predictor for the Chl-a reconstruction. Finally, four reconstruction schemes were implemented: DINCAE (Chl-a only), DINCAE (Chl-a and SST), DINEOF (Chl-a only), and DINEOF (Chl-a and SST), denoted rec1, rec2, rec3, and rec4 respectively. To quantitatively evaluate the accuracy of these reconstruction schemes, both the cross-validation and in situ data were used. The study domain was chosen to be the Northern South China Sea (SCS) and West Philippine Sea (WPS), bounded by 115–125°E and 16–24°N to test the model performance for the reconstruction of Chl-a under different Chl-a controlling mechanisms. The in situ validation showed that rec1 performs best among the four reconstruction schemes, and that adding SST into the Chl-a reconstruction cannot improve the reconstruction results. However, for cross validation, adding SST can slightly improve spatial distributions of the root mean square error (RMSE) between the reconstructed data and the original data, especially over the SCS continental shelf. Furthermore, the potential of DINCAE prediction is confirmed in this paper; thus, the trained DINCAE model can be re-applied to reconstruct other missing data, and more importantly, it can also be re-trained using the reconstructed data, thereby further improving reconstruction results. Another consideration is efficiency; with similar reconstruction conditions, DINCAE is 5–10 times faster than DINEOF.

Similarity in benthic habitat and fish assemblages in the upper mesophotic and shallow water reefs in the West Philippine Sea

The South China Sea (SCS) is a biodiversity hotspot, however, most biodiversity surveys in the region are confined to shallow water reefs. Here, we studied the benthic habitat and fish assemblages in the upper mesophotic coral ecosystems (MCEs; 30–40 m) and SWRs (8–22 m) at three geographic locations (Luzon Strait; Palawan; and the Kalayaan Group of Islands) in the eastern SCS (also called the West Philippine Sea) using diver-based survey methods. Mean coral genera and fish species richness ranged from 17–25 (per 25 m2) and 11–17 (per 250 m2) in MCEs, respectively; although none of these were novel genera/species. Coral and fish assemblages were structured more strongly by location than by depth. Location differences were associated with the variability in benthic composition, wherein locations with higher hard coral cover had higher coral genera richness and abundance. Locations with higher algae and sand cover had higher diversity and density of fish herbivores and benthic invertivores. Fishing efforts may also have contributed to among-location differences as the highly exploited location had the lowest fish biomass. The low variation between depths may be attributed to the similar benthic composition at each location, the interconnectivity between depths due to hydrological conditions, fish motility, and the common fishing gears used in the Philippines that can likely extend beyond SWRs. Results imply that local-scale factors and anthropogenic disturbances probably dampen across-depth structuring in coral genera and fish species assemblages.