An Impact of Mountaineering in Mt. Pulag

This is an amazing photo of Mt. Pulag in the Philippines. But if you advocate ecotourism and responsible hiking, you can see the impacts here. The dwarf bamboos hardly grow beyond six inches because of the very low fertility of the soil typical in high elevations. Unfortunately, hikers who believe that leaving behind “biodegradable” left-over food to be "environment-friendly" made spots of the grasslands nutrient-rich and caused the sprouting of massive clumps of dwarf bamboos and totally changed the landscape of the area. The old mountaineering tenet of “leave nothing but footprints” really means a lot. 

I don't mean to put mountaineering in a bad light. But we have to realize that we create impacts to the places we visit. And by accepting that fact, we can find the solutions to mitigate those impacts.

Mountaineers and hikers already have a high degree of environmentalism, but there is that constant challenge for us to continuously level up.  

Thanks to Rommel Bundalian for sharing his photo.