Upclose with the Philippine tarsiers
Although it was still sleeping time, seven-year-old Datu Charles moved down slowly from the branches as we were approaching his territorial domain inside the Philippine Tarsier and Wildlife Sanctuary one rainy afternoon. Still clinging to a much larger branch, he moved his head almost 360 degrees to the right with eyes open wide, as if he was checking the faces of his unexpected visitors.
Tarsiers, like Datu Charles, are known to be solitary animals that are not comfortable with the presence of human beings or any other animals within their territories. But when Datu Charles saw his master Carlito Pizarras, a diminutive 49-year-old with dark eyes and a quick grin internationally known as the Tarsier Man, he blinked his huge eyes several times and willingly allowed us to touch his head.
Datu Charles, the tarsier named after and who made the acquaintance of the Prince of Wales, heir to the British throne, during the royalty's visit to the Philippines, is just one of the few tarsiers (an endangered prehistoric primate that looks like a cross between E.T. and a koala the size of an apple) who have found a safer home inside the sanctuary. With a huge area of more than 167 hectares, the sanctuary houses more than a hundred tarsiers and other wildlife animals.
But while the sanctuary aims to protect and preserve the endangered tarsiers, threats against the animal remain. Illegal logging and slash-and-burn farming in the different parts of the country continue to destroy the tarsier's habitat. At present, only a few Philippine tarsier can still be found in Bohol, Samar, Leyte and Mindanao and is variously known to the natives as mamag, mago, magau, maomag, malmag and magatilok-iok.
"Unless the government strongly and religiously implements the law that protects the endangered animals, the tarsiers will be gone in few years' time," said Pizarras, who is also the sanctuary's field supervisor.
Pizarras, whose fascination to the tarsiers started when he was still 12, also stressed that the government's inaction against several families in Loboc town who hold tarsiers in cages as pets and make them perform like apes, have led to the death of several tarsiers.
Indeed, ignorance and greed of human beings have led to the massive destruction of what is touted today as the smallest primate. And while the government has adopted and approved laws that would protect endangered species, like the Philippine tarsiers, implementation of the said laws remains a problem.
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