THE NEW FACE OF VOGUE PHILIPPINES

The April version of Vogue Philippines acquired overall consideration when it put 106-year-old Apo Whang-Od, otherwise called Maria Oggay, on the cover of its Excellence Issue.

Choosing Whang-Od was a particularly bold decision considering that Vogue Philippines’ debut issue was released in August 2022, less than a year ago.

Maria Oggay, Apo Whang-Od’s mother, is 106 years old. She is regarded as one of the generation’s last mambabatoks, or hand-tattoo artists. Apo Whang-Od currently employs around 90 apprentices.

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New Species of Hedgehogs in Davao, Philippines

DAVAO CITY, Philippines - Less than two months into 2023, scientists have discovered two new species of soft-furred hedgehogs, known as gymnures, in the mountains of Eastern Mindanao.

According to the study paper “A re-assessment of diversity among Philippine gymnures with a new species from Eastern Mindanao,” the new species was identified using a combination of mitochondrial genetic, qualitative, and quantitative morphological data.

According to Heanery, the Negaunee curator of mammals at the Field Museum in Chicago, “one of the highly distinctive things about the Philippines is that every isolated mountain or small mountain range where we have done surveys has several species that occur nowhere else—not even on adjacent mountain ranges on the same island.”

Danilo S. Balete, Lawrence R. Heaney, Eric A. Rickart, Roselyn S. Quidlar, Dakota M. Rowsey, and Link E. Olson were the researchers who first identified the new species.