Northeast China’s Jilin Province is planning to upgrade one of its nature reserves to a national one for Siberian tigers.
Huangnihe Nature Reserve, in the Mount Changbai area, was established by the provincial government in May 2000. About 96.4 percent of its area of 23,476 hectares has witnessed a growing number of wild boars and roe deer, which often fall prey to tigers, thanks to the hunting ban imposed by the provincial government five years ago.
Over 40 cattle, raised by local farmers, have been attacked by Siberian tigers since last autumn and 15 of them have been eaten by the tigers.
A panel of experts followed and videotaped the process of a Siberian tiger chasing after a roe deer last month in the nature reserve.
It was an adult male tiger, said Li Tong, a wildlife expert of the panel. The tiger stopped “hunting” after the roe deer ran across a forest road.
Guo Keqin, an official of Hungnihe Nature Reserve, estimated that four to six Siberian tigers are in the reserve.
Chinese, Russian and American experts believed two years ago from a survey that less than 20 Siberian tigers were living in the wild in northeast China. Mount Changbai is their main habitat.
Mount Changbai, stretching into the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), is known as a gene pool of the species and an area with the most intact ecological system.
(People’s Daily 12/29/2000)
