Isla Pulo 2.08

Pulo Island, commonly known as Isla Pulo, is a long, narrow island surrounded by mudflats in the Manila Bay coast of Navotas, about 13km north of Manila in the Philippines. It is a sitio in the northern village of Tanza connected to the mainland of Navotas by a 500-meter long bamboo bridge. The island is known for its mangroves for which it was declared a "marine tree park" and as one of four ecotourism sites in Metro Manila established under the National Ecotourism Strategy in 1999. It is also home to a resettlement site of about 137 indigent families mostly occupying the island's southern tip.The island's name is redundant, for "pulo" already means "island" in the Filipino language.DescriptionIsla Pulo runs along the coast of Manila Bay from the mouth of the Tangos River in Navotas to the village of Salambao at the city's border with Obando, Bulacan near the mouth of the Meycauayan River. It is about 2.1km long and 0.16km wide at its widest point, with an area of. It is joined at low tide to the mainland of Navotas by intertidal mudflats.The island is known to host the remaining old growth mangrove forest found in Metro Manila. Its mangroves and surrounding mudflats provide sanctuary for 11 species of migratory birds, including the Chinese egret, tern, kingfisher, gull and plover. The most common type of mangrove found on the island is the Avicennia rumphiana (bungalon). It is also inhabited by 3 species of crabs and 14 species of shellfish.