"Yiqiuzhi" in Night Shanghai
How do modern metropolises coexist with wildlife? Fudan scholars studying
Reporters Yang Jinzhi, Lan Tianming, Wu Zhendong
At the moment you are watching this report, in Shanghai, 80 infrared-triggered cameras are recording the activities and changes of wild animals day and night. The locations of the cameras include forest parks, botanical gardens, zoos, communities, university campuses, and suburban areas.
Wild animals are a topic that Chinese people pay more and more attention to. What many people don't know is that in the city, many wild animals are near you. Are they harmful? Carrying a virus? How should we treat them? How to coexist with them?
Starting in 2019, the team of Wang Fang, a researcher at the School of Life Sciences, Fudan University, and nearly 100 citizen volunteers, tried to find out with 80 infrared cameras.
Shanghai in the dark, haunting
Binjiang Forest Park, Gongqing Forest Park, Pujiang Country Park, Fudan University Campus, Shanghai Ocean University Campus ... The places selected by the Wang Fang team and volunteers of the "Citizen Scientist" project are mostly green areas where wild mammals are most likely to be active, By the water source, or in a sparsely populated area with a good natural environment. They tied the cameras with wire to a tree trunk at a knee-height above the ground to mimic the sight of wild beasts.
Regardless of the current epidemic prevention and control period, or the previous peak of the garden tour, 80 infrared cameras were unattended and recorded every scene of Shanghai wild animals in front of the camera.
Diao Yixin and Gu Bojian, Ph.D. students of Wang Fang, told reporters that 9 of the 10 infrared cameras currently installed in the Haibinjiang Forest Park of the project have repeatedly photographed weasels, and 7 have recorded crickets.
"The density of such wild animals had not been predicted before. After 6 pm, the park was closed, and these animals emerged from everywhere, and began to occupy this place, which is full of people during the day." Said graduate student Weng Yue.
"Everyone knows the idiom" Yiqiuzhi ", but many people have said that they have never seen the animal" 貉 ". The investigation found that they live near the people of Shanghai. According to Wang Fang's team, there are more than 60 communities in Shanghai There are haunts, they also exist in Nanjing, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Wuxi and other places in the Yangtze River Delta.
Lynx is a wild canine, slightly larger than cats and rabbits. "The temperament is relatively docile. When we do experiments to give them blood samples and wear neck rings, you hold down their heads and they cooperate well. This relatively easy-going wild animal may be more suitable for urban activities. Human beings live together, "Wang Fang said.
In Qingpu District on the outskirts of Shanghai, Wang Fang had a "wonderful" time with a cricket. The uncle might think he was a good companion, sitting at his feet several times with one butt, crunching and dazed late at night.
There is more than 貉. Previously, Wang Fang used cameras in cities to capture pictures of bats hiding on the ceiling of residents' homes, hedgehogs walking leisurely on the grass, weasels focused on foraging in the bushes, etc ...
North American raccoon, London squirrel, and maybe "Beijing Boar" in the future
Many wild animals show strong adaptability after entering the city. Wang Fang's team tracked and found that in the urban area of Shanghai, Lai's choice of lairs included cracks under the balcony of residential buildings, walls, storage rooms, bridge pier, gas pipes, and abandoned sewers.
Wang Fang said that with the continuous improvement of the ecological environment, how wild animals live in the city, how to interact with people, whether there will be conflicts, and whether there will be infectious diseases, the relevant knowledge needs to be further expanded. The question of how to coexist with wild animals will be increasingly prominent in front of people. "For example, in Beijing, if we look to the next 30 or 50 years, the emergence of wild boars in the city is almost inevitable. Because the mountains around the city are very suitable for wild boars," said Wang Fang, who grew up in Beijing.
"Generally speaking, urban biodiversity areas have relatively few pests and mosquito-borne diseases. But biodiversity is not a static concept and does not necessarily mean good." Wang Fang said.
Wang Fang worked and lived in the United States for 5 years. During his time in Washington, a raccoon broke into the research room, turning a trash can and a refrigerator, causing a short circuit in the electrical wire, which caused a blackout in the entire laboratory.
Looking at the world, urban wildlife is not uncommon. For example, wild boars in Berlin, Germany, grey squirrels in London, and monkeys in Indian cities, local residents have become familiar with them.
Wang Fang's team found in an investigation in Shanghai that wild animals such as crickets, hedgehogs, weasels, and chipmunks often encounter disasters in the city: some community residents ask the property to kill or fill the cave after seeing the wildlife; some wild Animals lost dormant shelters and foraging grounds in urban construction, or were poisoned and killed by spraying insecticides and poisons on lawns.
"Cities and wilderness are different. There is no way for animals to find undisturbed habitats like heaven. They can only live with people, and contradictions are inevitable." Wang Fang said.
In some communities in Shanghai, some residents know the existence of plutonium. Some residents call their crickets "sisters" and understand that "as long as you don't provoke it, it won't provoke you". But some people complained: "Will the raven spread rabies, can you kill them?" "This bitch hates it so much that he plans the soil in my little garden!" ...
It is understood that these hedgehogs, mules, or squirrels living in the city may indeed carry viruses, and more wild animals will inevitably cause damage to community facilities and vehicle tires, and similar problems also persist in cities in other countries for a long time.
However, Wang Fang believes that time and time again and again proves that poisoning, culling, and even consumption, these measures that are easy to be remembered in the first place, have no way to control wild animals with strong adaptability, but will cause a chain of ecological disasters. With more difficult consequences. "They need to adapt to cities and humans, and we need the wisdom to coexist with them."
We still do n’t know enough about wildlife “citizens”
"The task of understanding urban wildlife has never been so urgent." Wang Fang expressed concerns to reporters. Because only by understanding their distribution and habits, understanding their response to human activities, assessing their overlap with human production and life, and their possible risks, can a scientific and reasonable management plan be formulated.
To this end, Wang Fang plans to set up hundreds of infrared trigger cameras in Shanghai in three years and establish a citizen information network so that anyone can see information about wild animals such as badgers and weasels in a unified database. . "These long-term monitoring data can help people see changes in wildlife populations, possible diseases, and explore their relationship with cities."
With the help of the city ’s wildlife management department, he and the members of the Shanshui Nature Conservation Center planned to bring GPS trackers to 10 tadpoles and other wild beasts to study and analyze which roads and neighborhoods can be used as homes and which neighborhoods become "Death Trap".
After completing the data collection and analysis, the project staff will also work with the urban forestry department to draw a “red line of protection” for urban animals, and plan ecological corridors to protect key habitats of salamanders and other animals.
In fact, almost every international metropolis has its own unique biodiversity. New York has begun monitoring raccoons, white-tailed deer, possums, etc. around the city more than a century ago. In Berlin and Barcelona, people began to pay attention to the movement of wild boar 20 years ago. "But at present there is almost no systematic urban wildlife monitoring in China." Wang Fang said.
At the same time, Wang Fang's research team also plans to carry out several other observation projects: analysis of environmental DNA, understanding the situation of aquatic animals such as frogs, turtles, fishes, etc .; monitoring of butterfly gardens, grasping the dynamics of urban insects; Find out the types and range of urban bats in the dark.
Wang Fang believes that there is no end to the monitoring and management of urban biodiversity. We must put our perspective in the process of urbanization and dynamically adjust the solution. "We should realize that cities are becoming a common home for people and wildlife, and understanding and living in peace with wild 'neighbors' is what it means to have a better city life."