There is no road to Domingo's house.

To get there, you would need to take a boat. You paddle through a stretch of Laguna Lake so thick with waterlilies that it looks, at first, like solid ground—a continuous green mat stretching as far as you can see, with trash and dead fish caught in the gaps. Only when you look down do you realize there is water beneath it.

A fisherman, Domingo Canto, 54, has made this crossing every day for more than three decades. 

In Barangay Dalig, Cardona, Rizal, Laguna Lake is the lifeblood of the community. The fishermen here know its moods: the weeks after a typhoon when the waves run too high to go out, the warmer months when the water recedes, and the children play basketball on ground that will be submerged again by December. They know, too, that the water hyacinths have been here longer than any of them.

But they did not arrive uninvited. These plants were introduced to the Philippines in the early 20th century as ornamental plants, prized for their purple flowers. 

The Laguna Lake Development Authority (LLDA) has acknowledged that the surge of water hyacinths in Laguna Lake is a result of the water being eutrophic—saturated with nutrients from decades of domestic and agricultural waste that have settled in the lake. The very pollution that degrades the water is what makes the water lily thrive in it. 

"Hindi pa ako tao ay nariyan talaga 'yan" (It was already there even before I was born), says fisherman Juanito Bucal, 63, who has spent most of his life on this lake.

When asked if it might ever be removed for good, he doesn't hesitate: "Di na, wala na, 'di na matatanggal 'yan" (It cannot be removed anymore. It is just there, and it will never go away.) 

Water hyacinths, or otherwise known as eichhornia crassipes) are listed among the IUCN's 100 of the World's Worst Invasive Alien Species, with populations known to double in as little as 12 days. 

In Laguna Lake, conditions are almost always favorable. The LLDA conducts clearing operations throughout the year in coordination with the Department of Public Works and Highways and the Metro Manila Development Authority, but the agency itself describes the plant as a "perennial problem." 

Leave a single stem alone for a week, and it multiplies. "Sa loob ng isang linggo, iyan, mag-aanak nang mahigit sampung maliliit din" (In just one week, it will have spawned more than ten smaller ones), Juanito explains.

The lake does the rest. And even the seasons that seem like they should slow it down do not really stop it. 

When El Niño pulls the lake level lower, the plants become more concentrated in the shallower water rather than disappearing. This behavior suggests that low water levels are a driver of proliferation, compressing the infestation into whatever water remains. 

The waterlily has never truly left the lake, it only moves.

For Juanito, this is a problem with only one answer: you contain it, every week, with your own hands. He and a loose group of neighbors called the “Kubo Boys” wade in regularly to push the mats back and clear the pathways. 

Nobody asks them to. Nobody pays them. "Kasi mangingisda kami," he says simply. "Hindi kami makakalaot 'pag hindi lilinisin 'yan." (We are fishermen. We cannot go out to the lake if we do not clean it first.) 

Under the LLDA's charter, the responsibility for maintaining the ecological health of Laguna Lake belongs to the state. But Pamalakaya has documented the agency's pattern of denying Freedom Of Information requests and withholding cumulative impact assessments of the lake. 

The Commission on Audit has separately flagged the LLDA for failure to collect fees that would fund proper oversight. The Kubo Boys fill a vacuum that no government program has moved to close in Brgy. Dalig. 

The waterlily spreads across the lake in thick mats, cutting off sunlight from reaching the water below. Without light, the smaller organisms that fishes feed cannot survive. At night, the plant pulls oxygen out of the water, and without enough oxygen, fishes die or leave. 

Below the surface, things are quietly getting worse. The waterlily's roots decompose at the bottom of the lake, darkening the water and driving the fish out. "Bumabaho 'yun" (It stinks), Juanito says.

The smell rises when the mats are disturbed. The catch, already uncertain on a good day, has been thinning for years.

The municipal fishing output in Laguna Lake fell from 57,388.47 metric tons in 2020 to 42,253.13 metric tons in 2021—a drop of over 15,000 metric tons in a single year. While a 2019 study reported fewer and smaller fish across the board and said that all native species were less often caught than in the past. 

In Brgy. Dalig, Juanito puts it more plainly: what used to be a night's haul now takes a week to accumulate. 

Setting up for an early catch, Domingo leaves for the water at midnight.

He sets his traps—bubô as they call it—and comes home around four in the morning. 

"Minsan nga alas dose ng gabi aalis na 'yan" (Sometimes he leaves as early as midnight), his wife says. "Pag sinwerte madami, pag minalas walang huli. Hindi araw-araw may huli" (When luck is on his side, the catch is good. When it is not, he comes home with nothing. It is not every day that there is a catch), she added.

His boat is small and fiberglass, which, he points out, does not float the way wood does. If it goes down in the mud, "Kanya-kanya nang languyan ‘yan." (Everyone swims for themselves.) 

"Sanay na ako." (I am used to it.) Whatever fish makes it back to shore has to be sold the same day, before afternoon. After that, it softens, and softened fish are worthless. 

"Yung lumambot na. ‘Pag hindi naubos tinatapon nalang. Kasi kung ibebenta pa nila tapos nagkasakit ‘yung bumili, kasalanan mo pa" (The ones that soften—if they do not sell, you just throw them away. Because if you still sell them and the buyer gets sick, that becomes your fault), Domingo shared. 

When the fishing is done, Domingo harvests waterlilies.

He picks only the long stalks—anything less than a meter gets left behind. "May sukat 'yan, lalo na 'yung ginagawa naming pang-export—may haba siya—mga mahigit isang metro 'yan ang haba." (There is a measurement for it, especially for the ones we make for export—it has to have a certain length, at least a meter long.)

The stalks go to a warehouse where he and others dry them, strip them, scrape them, and weave them into products for export. 

"Pagkagaling namin sa waterlily, diyan naman kami sa warehouse" (After harvesting the waterlily, we go straight to the warehouse), he explains. "Kung ano-ano ginagawa, may nagtatali ng waterlily, tapos ilalagay namin sa [...] kubol tawag namin d'yan, hinihintay na lang namin matuyo." (All sorts of things are done there—some tie the waterlily stalks, then we place them inside a tent, and we just wait for them to dry.) 

The same plant that Juanito pushes out of the way every week becomes, in Domingo's hands, the second half of his working day.

He does not pretend the waterlily isn't a problem. "Totoo yung sinabi na sagabal sa amin" (It is true that it is a hindrance to us), he says. But then, "Yung iba [waterlily] para sa amin, kasi nga ginagawa naming hanapbuhay… talagang tulungan na lang… para guminhawa ang bawat isa," (But the waterlily is also for us because we make a living out of it; we just have to help each other so that everyone's life gets a little easier), Domingo added. 

"Ang pinakamaganda sana diyan ay maging masagana ang lawa, dumami ang isda at mawala ang waterlilies talaga." (The best thing that could happen is for the lake to be abundant again, for the fish to multiply, and for the waterlilies to truly disappear.) 

The municipal office of Brgy. Dalig has actively supported the harvesting and weaving of waterlily stalks as a way of regulating the plant's abundance in the area—a community-level response to a problem the state has not yet solved. 

The LLDA does have a water hyacinth livelihood program that was formalized in a 2012 memorandum with the Department of Trade and Industry and the Asian Social Institute for fisherfolk families across the Laguna Lake region. But a regional program and a community that can access it are different things. 

Juanito and the Kubo Boys only got paid when hired to clear the lilies—the same work they had already been doing for free. Domingo's afternoons spent weaving for export serve the same purpose, quietly, without proper subsidy from the agencies mandated to manage the lake. 

Life in Brgy. Dalig has always been arranged around what the lake decides to do. The families stay because this is what they know and because leaving would mean starting over with nothing. 

The water hyacinths keep coming back because that is what they do—and later this year, with the amihan blowing in, it is coming back faster than ever. The fishermen keep going out because that is what fishermen do.

"Ganto ang buhay namin dito" (This is the life we have here), Domingo says. 

The waterlily does not care either way. It just keeps growing.