In my short quest being in China my love towards wildlife is driving me to different wildlife zones in this diverse flora and fauna of this huge country. Alike India, China has it all like greenery,snow capped mountains, deserts and abundant in wildlife. I found it difficult to understand the awareness levels of the educated English speaking mass of China. Very few of them even have an idea what they have in store for wildlife. When I ask them do you know this place, they ask me is that zoo? Are you kidding me? There is surely an issue with the language and understanding. So when you get out in this country a smart phone really helps a lot.
I am based in this beautiful next generation city Shanghai. So I decided to explore the near by provinces in search of wildlife. After a lot of research I found that there are few natural reserves ( as they call for restricted wildlife reserves) in the Jiangsu province. After a bit of struggle to make people understand where I wanted to go they got my point and I decided to go to Dafeng Milu Reserve and Yan Cheng Wet Land Natural Reserve in Jiangsu Province. I decided to stay in the Dafeng Peninsula Hotel as it was almost equidistant from both the reserves plus an amazing hotel to spend a quality weekend.
To brief about the reserves and what to expect from them I am going to explain each reserve in brief.
Dafeng Milu National Nature Reserve, Dafeng, Jiangsu
Dafeng Milu National Nature Reserve with an area of 2666.7 hectares is located in Dafeng County at the Yangtze estuary, south of Yancheng. The reserve overlaps with the transition zone of Yancheng Nature Reserve. The Nature Reserve is 50 kilometers southeast of Dafeng and 95 kilometers southeast of Yancheng City. It is 300 kilometers away from the northwest of Shanghai, northeast of Nanjing and southeast of Xuzhou. The reserve was founded to reintroduce Milu deer (Pere David’s Deer) to the wild and is the largest of its kind in China. This is an endangered deer and this reserve has the highest number of them in the world.
Milu Deer at Dafeng Reserve
After I reached there I was little disappointed due to facility to explore the facility by special means. You need to accompany the electric carts with tourists and go inside the facility. So its difficult to take good shots along with people with touristic mindset. But I managed to take quite a few shots with the time I got. There are chances that you may see some avian species around the park like Ivory winged Magpie, Chest Nut startlings, White whiskered green bulbul, sparrows what I remember in the short time I got outside the Milu enclosure.
Ivory Winged Magpie
The next day I set my target at the Yan Cheng Wet Land Reserve, by far the largest in China as I heard. But I was happy to get some hands on the wildlife in China :)
Yancheng Coastal Nature Reserves
The Yancheng coast is a large and dynamic wetland with extensive mudflats, river channels and salt marshes. The wetland has two National Reserves: Yancheng Nature Reserve and Dafeng Milu Nature Reserve. The Nature Reserves are internationally assigned as Reserves for the Biosphere by UNSECO and as Wetlands of International Importance (Ramsar Convention on Wetlands sites).
Getting out of the hotel at 8 am in the morning after a heavy breakfast, I set out with my two charged batteries and my equipment to have a great day at the reserve. They are using this reserve as a breeding section for the endangered Red Crowned Cranes but you will find many other species like the Siberian Crane, Great Egret, Greylag Goose, Brahminy Shelduck and many water birds.
Brahminy Shelduck
Greylog Goose
After having a rather productive day I thank that I survived the chilling cold at 1 degree and had some memorable shots of the birds. If you are willing to travel in China for wildlife ensure that you have enough research and facts right before you set out for the travel. I am going to travel to other provinces like Sichuan - the home for the Giant Panda and also home to many bird species.
References and more information at:
http://tastejiangsu.com/attractions/wetlands.html
www.yczrbhq.com - Official Website of the Yan Cheng Wet Land - Better use Google Chrome for translation
