Recollections of Acacia confusa in the field
Acacia confusa is the only remaining Acacia species native to the Philippines. And I said "only remaining" not because the others already went extinct, but because these have since been transferred to other genera*. To see these trees in their natural state, we had to drive along a newly constructed road and into a dirt road leading to a bridge still in the process of construction. There was one large tree along the aforementioned newly constructed road, but the main population is on the adjoining scrubland which rises just a few meters above a vast river now almost totally covered with lahar from Mt. Pinatubo. No more trees exist along the main Zambales road, the last one having been balled out for relocation to a private home when the roadside where it was growing on for years was slated for road widening by the Department of Public Works and Highways. Road widenings have sharply increased in frequency since 2016, resulting in the killing of innumerable trees across the ...