Indigenous communities in the Philippines have relied on resilient floating homes for 60 years, but invasive species and drastic changes to water levels in their region are making life increasingly challenging.
The Manobo tribe in the Agusan Marshlands of the Philippines designed their floating bamboo homes to be resilient enough to handle flooding and extreme weather conditions, as a profile by the BBC explained.
However, these days, the water level can vary as much as 32.8 feet due to an increasingly erratic flooding season. At the same time, large wetland areas of the marsh have also dried out.
"My experience when I was child, the Agusan Marsh was still vast with so much water. When I got married, there was so much change because of climate change," Marties Babanto, one of the Manobo community leaders, shared with the BBC.
"The marsh is turning dry and the storms have gotten stronger and altered our environment," she said.
The invasive water hyacinth is also plaguing the waterways, impacting travel, fishing, and local ecosystems. They form dense, impenetrable mats that float on the water's surface and can double in size in just 6-18 days.
Locals have had to tow their homes to different areas of the water to escape the plant's unwelcome embrace and find new fishing zones in order to survive.
"They're destroying our fishing nets and we're trying our best to remove them," Datu Reyes, the tribal Manobo chieftain of Lake Panlabuhan in the Agusan Marshlands, shared with the BBC.
Not only does the water hyacinth clog pathways, but it also degrades water quality by blocking the air-water interface and reducing oxygen levels that local fish rely on.
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Given the situation, the adaptable floating homes have given the Manobo community a way to deal with the increasing severity of typhoons and floods, but they're being pushed to their limits on a daily basis.
The Philippines has always been prone to natural disasters, with around 60% of its land area and 74% of its inhabitants estimated to be at risk from floods, droughts, tsunamis, and landslides.
The severity of these events has been increasing as rising temperatures and sea levels have exacerbated weather events. The region is also particularly prone to cyclones, experiencing about 20 per year, with approximately eight making landfall as typhoons.
The U.S. is also experiencing problems related to wetlands, with more than half of them gone from the lower 48 states as of 2019, compared with the 1780s.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a report earlier this year, which details that loss rates have increased by 50% since 2009. Proper conservation is needed to protect these ecosystems, or there will be continued impacts for people, as well as habitats for fish, wildlife, and plants.
"The reasons for these losses are multiple, but the results are clear – wetland loss leads to the reduced health, safety and prosperity of all Americans," Martha Williams, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, explained.
"This report serves as a call to action to stop and reverse wetland loss and ensure we continue to provide future generations with clean water, protection against natural disasters, and resilience to climate change and sea level rise, as well as habitat for many plants and animals."
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