MOST everyone is familiar with the tales surrounding Mariang Makiling, the ?diwata? who inhabited the sacred mountain and guarded its forests.

Last Feb. 12 at the UP Los Baños? (UPLB) Makiling Botanical Garden, concerned parties from the UP Alumni Association (UPAA), its conservation group the Mariang Makiling Foundation, the Department of Tourism, artist groups, UPLB and the local government, joined hands at the Mariang Makiling Ecological-Cultural Festival for a common concern. They gathered to implore the beloved deity of the mountain to revive the great mountain and its watersheds, now an endangered scientific site because of human greed and negligence.

Actress and singer Karylle, with her roots in Calamba through father Dr. Modesto Tatlonghari, was chosen to personify the diwata.

In July last year, the UPAA?s Mt. Makiling Foundation and the UPLB launched the Mt. Makiling Conservation Movement by planting 507 seedlings of flowering trees and timber along the periphery of the Makiling Forest Reserve.

However, it is obvious that all these efforts must go beyond the launches; beyond the high visibility of getting an artista to pose as Mariang Makiling and inviting some name painters like Araceli Dans to paint her; beyond having Batangas Gov. Vilma Santos as speaker and Dulce as singer; beyond calling on Behn Cervantes to direct the ceremonies and arm-twist his show-biz friends into participating; even beyond chancellor Dr. Luis Rey Velasco galvanizing his entire university force to help out.

Proclamation 106

In 1910, the government issued Proclamation 106, establishing the Mt. Makiling Forest Reserve. The UPLB has been at the forefront of the reserve?s management ever since it established the Philippines? first school of forestry in 1910. In 1920, people started to move in and establish homes in Mt. Makiling, burning and clearing the forest cover. Today, half of the forest has been destroyed.

In 2008, the UPLB Makiling Center for Mountain Ecosystems (MCME) reported to have gained significant headway in harnessing the participation and partnership of upland farmers in addressing environmental degradation problems within the Dampalit Watershed. And so on and so forth.

According to award-winning zoologist Dioscoro Rabor, Mt. Makiling is said to shelter an exceptional diversity of woody plant species totaling more than the entire number of woody species found in the United States of America: at least 50 species of mammals, 120 bird species, six species of amphibians, 19 types of reptiles, and at least 7,000 insect species.

The Mt. Makiling Forest Reserve is one of the country?s 18 centers of plant diversity; a vital watershed of the towns of Laguna and Batangas; a source of geothermal power through its hot springs; and the natural habitat of endangered flora and fauna with more than 3000 species of plants and ferns. It has been called a living museum of Philippine natural history, and the center of forestry education, research and extension.

In 2006, super typhoon ?Milenyo? hit Mt. Makiling causing landslides and flooding in most of the surrounding communities like never before. An estimated 450-hectare area of the reserve had landslide scarring on almost all sides. On the ground, the landslides loosened boulders, uprooted century-old trees, and created new waterways. ?Milenyo? brought whatever restoration and rehabilitation that had been gained to many decades back.

Hopefully, this latest effort that has brought together anxious and worried citizens would work, even if nothing much has in the past.

E-mail the author at bibsycarballo@yahoo.com.