Warm heart
The person who understands the elephant tells the story of the elephant
When Qiu Kaipei found the mountain bag where the wild elephants were resting, he heard the shouts of people.
He judged that the elephant group might have to transfer, hurriedly climbed up an open mountain, set up the tripod, and aimed at the flat area between the mountain packs with a long 300mm lens.
Sure enough, a group of wild elephants walking fast entered his lens.
This was the fifteenth day when Qiu Kaipei was alone in the forest chasing elephants in late November 1990.
On this day, he took the first color photo of an Asian elephant group in the wild in China.
As a staff member of the Yunnan Xishuangbanna Nature Reserve Administration, Qiu Kaipei has been alone in the tropical rain forest for 30 years, enduring loneliness and loneliness. With his rich experience in wild survival, he escaped countless dangers and photographed a large number of wild animals and plants in the rain forest. Became a famous ecological photographer in Yunnan and honorary chairman of Xishuangbanna Photographers Association.
He was tasked to establish the Wild Elephant Valley Tourist Attraction, and gave his life's hard work and feelings to elephants. He is one of the people who know elephants best.
Chasing an elephant alone in the jungle for 15 days
In 1973, the news documentary "Catch the Elephant" was screened nationwide, and people knew for the first time that Chinese wild elephants lived in Xishuangbanna.
In early November 1990, Qiu Kaipei, who had just transferred from the army, reported to the Xishuangbanna Nature Reserve Administration Bureau for work.
There is a 24-inch black-and-white photo on the wall of the secretary's office in a glass frame. The photo shows five wild elephants in the woods. The image is a bit imaginary.
This was the only picture of a wild elephant at that time and was regarded as a treasure.
The director hoped that Qiu Kaipei could take pictures of wild elephants to "promote Xishuangbanna well."
"I promised the director that this record will be broken within six months," Qiu Kaipei said.
Asian elephants and African elephants are the only two elephant species left in the world.
Most African elephants live in flat grasslands, while Asian elephants roam around in tropical rain forests.
The density of forests is so high that it is very difficult to see them, let alone filming systematically.
Hearing that a group of wild elephants came to the cornfield in the Shangyong Reserve of Mengla County, Qiu Kaipei excitedly carried the Nikon camera he had just bought back from the bureau, and boarded the shuttle bus that day, he rushed to Shangzhongliang Village, 200 kilometers away. Take a risk with your heart."
At parting, he told his colleagues that if he didn't come out after 15 days, he would come to him.
In November, the rice in the fields under the mountain had been harvested, and 2000 acres of winter corn was about to mature. The elephant group helped the farmers "harvest".
Every day before dawn, Qiu Kaipei took the meal prepared for him by his fellow villager and went after the elephants. He followed the footprints of the wild elephants to find their resting place, but he could not get close.
The guard elephant's perception of people is very sensitive, twenty or thirty meters away from it, it makes a low sound like a muffled thunder.
If it dares to approach, it will make a short, sharp yell and rush towards people.
Qiu Kaipei was in such fright every day, fearing and retreating without success.
One day, Qiu Kaipei spotted the guard elephant early.
With a small stature, he quickly climbed a high mountain banyan tree, but still couldn't see the elephants.
After waiting from 10 am to 4 pm, finally, the sound of the branches being torn off came from the woods. Qiu Kaipei was surprised to find that the elephant group was less than 40 meters away from him.
The elephant herd in action cracked the trees, and the baby elephants made pleasant cheers from time to time.
From official investigation to private investigation
Statistics show that in the 1990s, apart from Xishuangbanna, there were more than 10 wild elephants in the Nangunhe National Nature Reserve in Cangyuan Va Autonomous County, Lincang City, Yunnan. They were migrated from Myanmar to China in the late 1960s. The government is very Attaching importance to their protection, the Nangunhe National Nature Reserve was specially established.
At that time, people didn't know how many elephants there were in China.
In 1990, the Xishuangbanna National Nature Reserve Management Bureau cooperated with the World Wildlife Fund to conduct a three-year survey of wild elephant populations.
Qiu Kaipei also participated in this investigation.
Under the conditions at the time, investigation was not an easy task.
It is very difficult and dangerous for investigators to get in and out of the mountains.
At night, the forest is dark, and they can only guard on the tall observation tower built with bamboo thatch. During the day, the forest is so dense that weeds are often heard but it is difficult to see the sound of elephants.
The investigation team has been working for two years, but none of the photos of wild elephants have been taken.
Later, the investigation team invited an expert who had been photographing wild animals in Africa for a long time. The expert stayed in the forest for a month, but he was only sighing.
Reluctantly, the investigation team bought five automatic camera devices from Hong Kong and installed them on the elephant passage in the Wild Elephant Valley Scenic Area.
Five cameras shot more than 10 films in half a year, including wild boars, monitor lizards, wild elephants and other animals.
But because the camera lens is a 28mm wide-angle lens, only 3 wild elephants can be taken.
According to the survey, there are more than 20 groups of Asian elephants in Xishuangbanna, with about 150-180 heads.
In February 1996, Qiu Kaipei, who founded and served as the general manager of the Wild Elephant Valley Scenic Spot, organized his staff to start a four-year survey of Asian elephants.
The Mengyang Nature Reserve is a forest and wildlife type national reserve. Because the National Highway 213 passes through the middle, the protection is divided into the east and the west.
Wild Elephant Valley is located at the junction of the two areas and is also an excellent environment for elephants to inhabit.
Qiu Kaipei said that elephants are an animal that likes water. Except in winter, they spend most of their time playing in water, bathing and rolling mud. Wild Elephant Valley has a rich water system. It was called Sancha River in history. The three rivers are located on both sides of the river. In the dense valley rain forest, there are a large number of black bamboo, wild plantain, red deer grass, etc. that wild elephants like to eat under the forest. There are dozens of large and small wild elephants like "nitrate pond" on the mountain.
After the construction of the Yexiang Valley into a tourist attraction, many measures have been taken to attract wild elephants. Salt is regularly put in the nitrate ponds, and large areas of plants such as bamboo, wild plantains, elephant grass and other wild elephants like to eat have been planted, making Yexiang Valley Xishuangbanna. The area where elephants appear most frequently.
In the scenic area, an elevated corridor and a tree hotel are erected at high altitude. People can walk safely on the air corridor to watch the elephants, which provides good conditions for investigating elephants.
Through observation records, photographs, and videos, Qiu Kaipei’s team discovered that in the 1990s, after the country severely cracked down on the hunting of elephants, wild elephants had a peak baby boom.
According to their observations, in most elephant herds, baby elephants just born or 1-4 years old accounted for 40%-50% of the elephant herd; in 1999, in a herd of 20 elephants, there were 7 baby elephants under 4 years old.
By October 2000, this group of elephants had increased to 26.
In October 2000, they counted 191 groups (heads) of elephants and single elephants in the Wild Elephant Valley.
After comparative analysis, they believe that there are 47 elephant herds, and the total number of elephants is about 320.
Although there may be errors in the total number of wild elephants they surveyed, the results of this private survey without any expert participation provided extremely important information for later researchers.
Elephant's route
After working in Wild Elephant Valley for 10 years, Qiu Kaipei became one of the people who knew elephants best.
He can understand the emotions and information in the roar of elephants, can judge which elephant herd is from the route the elephants are walking, and estimate their whereabouts.
"Elephants do not walk aimlessly in the forest. Their goals are very clear. The route they walk and the time of arrival are very accurate." Qiu Kaipei discovered that each group of elephants chooses to cross the road at a different intersection. In the Wild Elephant Valley, there are forests hidden. There are more than 10 elephant groups crossings on the 7-kilometer road in China, and each crossing is exclusively dedicated to a certain group of wild elephants.
The Sixiao Expressway passes through the Wild Elephant Valley, and there is a special passage for elephants, but the elephants do not take the passage reserved for them at all. Instead, they have to cross the highway guardrail and pass through the dangerous highway many times. Cause a traffic accident.
"You can't blame elephants. People don't understand the habits of elephants." In Qiu Kaipei's view, this was originally a passage for elephants. Later, the environment changed, but the direction of elephant migration remained unchanged. I have to go through there."
Qiu Kaipei took pictures of elephants crossing the road many times.
Elephants are afraid of people and cars. Every time they cross the road, they will stop at the crossing for a long time. The leading female elephant stands on the side of the road and looks around with her long nose. When she confirms that there are no cars or people, she takes a sudden step. Crossing the highway at a very fast speed, the elephant group behind it ran across the road in twos and threes. There were too many vehicles passing by and the elephant group did not pass by for several hours. Qiu Kaipei asked the security guard of the scenic spot to stop the vehicle. The group passed smoothly.
What makes him most distressed is the elephant herd with baby elephants. Two or three elephants are guarding the baby elephants slowly crossing the road and walking to the drainage ditch on the side of the road. The baby elephants often fall into the ditch. The guarding elephants use their noses. Hook the baby elephant's body and push it up, repeating several times to push the baby elephant uphill.
Once, a newborn baby elephant was so soft that the elephant couldn’t push it up. There were so many vehicles passing by. Every time a car passed, the elephant had to turn its body to the road to prevent the vehicle from causing damage to the baby elephant. hurt.
People still don’t know how the elephant herd came into being and how it differentiated, but Qiu Kaipei observed that the elephant herd knows where food is rich, and uses the migration route to delineate its living territory. Each elephant herd walks along the occupied territory and walks along the occupied territory. As they proceeded along the route, they respected the territories that other elephants had already occupied, yelled and greeted each other, and then left.
The crops in many villages in the reserve are often infringed by elephant herds, but no matter what year, the same group of elephants or the same elephant is infringed on the same crop, and there have been no scenes of multiple elephant groups fighting.
Each of the nitrate ponds in the Wild Elephant Valley is dedicated to a different group of elephants, some come once or twice a year, and some come only once a year or two.
However, elephant groups also have common resources that they share.
There is a river in the Wild Elephant Valley, which is the best place to watch wild elephants in the scenic spot.
Most elephant groups have to bathe here, and sometimes two groups of elephants come in one night.
The first group will leave after playing for a few hours and let the other group of elephants.
Here, the elephants stick their noses into the mud in the river and stay still for a long time.
Qiu Kaipei guessed, "There may be some kind of minerals in the mud of the river bend that are not available elsewhere."
The creed of getting along with people and images
In August 1995, in Pu'er City, where no wild elephants have been infested for decades, a single elephant suddenly appeared by the forest next to the airport.
The news spread and attracted countless people to watch, some of whom brought food that elephants liked.
"For most people who have not been directly harmed by elephants, this male elephant is the star in their hearts. Indulged in the affinity between elephants and people, they have forgotten the ferocious side of elephants." Qiu Kaipei remembered this. Within a year or two after the elephant, he kept coming back and forth to Pu'er, eating the farmers’ crops in summer, and walking into the farmers’ homes in winter, finding out the food hidden by the farmers and eating them. It caused the local people to feel miserable. Love first and then hate.
Because they have been alone for a long time, most of them have a pair of attractive tusks, which are often the target of hunters. They suffer the most damage, and they have a hatred of people. They maintain a high level of people at all times. Vigilance is the easiest to attack people. The elephants that have caused deaths and injuries in Xishuangbanna over the years are mostly caused by unique elephants.
"If people do not offend me, I will not offend others. If they do not offend me, I will offend others." This is Qiu Kaipei's creed of how elephants get along with people.
The principle of this creed is: distance.
Seeing their companions crashing down in the slaughter of humans, they were afraid that people would become elephants’ instinctive reaction. “They look for forest concealment wherever they roam, just because they are afraid of people seeing it.” Qiu Kaipei said that in the forest, elephants are always there. Be wary of people. If they are 50 meters away from people and people no longer approach them, they will take the initiative to avoid conflicts with people.
In the elephant group, there is always an elephant serving as a guard. The guard elephant is either more than 20 meters away from the elephant group and walks parallel to the elephant group, or it is more than 20 meters behind the elephant group.
When the elephants stop to eat or sleep, the guard elephants will also observe the surrounding conditions at a distance of ten to twenty meters.
The scientific community believes that the IQ of Asian elephants is higher than that of African elephants, which is equivalent to that of 5-year-old or even 7-year-old children.
In Qiu Kaipei's view, their ability to adapt to the environment is incredible.
For example, elephant herds infringe the crops of the common people. Farmers heard that elephants were afraid of fire, so they burned a few fires on the corn field, but the firewood was thrown far away by the wild elephants and they still ate the corn.
In order to resolve the conflict between humans and elephants, the forestry department introduced solar electric fences from the UK. At first, elephants were afraid of electric fences, but after a few touches, they had a way to deal with them: use non-conductive tusks. The wire was picked up and broken, or the tree was knocked down on the wire, the wire was crushed, and then passed; later, people built a steep groove to stop the elephant, but in the rainy season, it will slide, and the elephant will fall from the slide. Get down; or pass by a detour where there is no ditch repaired.
The caring first baby elephant
One day in August 1989, a group of wild elephants came to the cornfield in Dahebian Village of Mengyang Town. They didn't eat corn, they just sat together and screamed sadly, and did not leave until the third day.
After the elephant herd left, the villagers approached and found a two-meter-deep hole with a baby elephant in it.
Everyone took out the baby elephant. It was a newborn baby elephant with blood oozing from the umbilical cord.
It turned out that the baby elephant fell into the cave as soon as it was born. After more than 50 hours of guarding, the elephant group gave up the rescue effort.
The baby elephant was quickly sent to the Mengyang Reserve Management Office. This was the first wild elephant found in Xishuangbanna in decades. The Reserve Management Bureau organized experts for treatment and care.
Four or five staff members waited in turn 24 hours a day, feeding him, taking baths, taking his temperature regularly, recording all his activities, and naming him Mengmeng.
After careful breeding, Mengmeng grows sturdy and lovely. In order to adapt it to life in the wild, after several months of training, he finally learned to eat wild plants.
According to media propaganda, people from all over the country send money to it, and people come to visit it every day and give it bananas and other fruits.
Mengmeng has always been kept in Sanchahe Protection Station, and many national leaders have visited it when they visited the Xishuangbanna Nature Reserve.
When Mengmeng was 4 years old, one day suddenly fell down and couldn't stand up and didn't eat.
With the assistance of the World Wide Fund for Nature, an elephant disease treatment expert was invited from Sri Lanka.
He said that the baby elephant got the disease caused by the lack of immunity.
The immunity of elephants can only be obtained by eating breast milk, and Mengmeng has never eaten breast milk.
The breeders who accompanied Mengmeng day and night were unwilling to give up. They used Chinese herbal medicine to treat Mengmeng.
More than a month later, Mengmeng really stood up, followed the keeper around and ate a lot of food, but after a while, its body began to shrink and its appetite decreased day by day, and finally fell down one day. Didn't get up.
Later, Xishuangbanna found too many baby elephants who were just born, some were dead and some were dying.
In August 2002, the Shangyong Reserve Management Office received a report from a farmer and found a baby elephant.
The baby elephant was immediately accepted by the Wild Elephant Valley Elephant School.
The breeder judged that the baby elephant was born for more than 20 days. After rescue, the baby elephant's physical signs returned to normal. The baby elephant follows the breeder every day, just like its mother, without leaving the person for a moment.
However, it soon began to have a fever until he died.
Later, the veterinarian found that its heart had a serious defect.
"We only found out after consulting the information that the elephant mother judged whether the baby elephant had congenital diseases from the process of pregnancy, delivery, and baby elephant. If there is, the elephant mother will abandon the baby elephant without mercy." Qiu Kaipei It is said that this is the last resort of the elephants for the survival and development of the population. It is the result of self-coordination and self-control of the animal kingdom.
When the elephants migrate
"Wild elephants eat a lot. Each elephant eats more than 100 kilograms of plants every day." Qiu Kaipei said. Elephants do not have a fixed nest. They are walking, and they stop in the forest wherever they want to sleep. They have enough rest. Go on again.
In summer, there is plenty of food, and you can eat in two or three hours. Then you can find a place to play in the water and take a bath until dawn; in winter, the grass is withered and the trees are thin, and it takes an evening for the elephants to eat.
Like humans, newborn elephants and baby elephants under two years of age sleep longer.
The baby elephant was sleepy and fell asleep regardless of the occasion. The other elephants had to stay by their side and let the baby elephant sleep.
In the summer of 1992, 5 wild elephants in the Mengyang Nature Reserve in Xishuangbanna swam across the Lancang River to Menghai County on the opposite bank, where they settled, and then they continued to travel between Menghai County and Lancang County of Pu'er City, increasing from 5 To more than 10; before the arrival of 5 wild elephants, a male elephant came to explore the road. In the process of exploring the road, 3 villagers were injured or killed.
"When the total amount of wild elephants exceeds the capacity of the natural environment and the food supply is insufficient, the wild elephants can only find new living places." Qiu Kaipei said that the fundamental reason for elephant herd migration is the impact of changes in the food source environment. How to provide habitat for wild elephants poses a challenge.
In his view, to solve the human-elephant conflict, the first thing to do is to solve the survival problem of elephants, such as relocating villages in protected areas and expanding the forest homes of wild elephants; relying on biological corridors to connect forest islands in Xishuangbanna.
Shen Shixi, a children's literature writer, once worked in the Xishuangbanna Army Division, and he was also fascinated by elephants.
In the early 1980s, Shen Shixi published an animal novel "When the Elephant Herd was Migrating", which described the panic caused by the elephant herd due to the earthquake and the elephant herd carried out a large-scale migration.
In order to prevent the elephant herd from flowing out of the country, the local military and civilians worked together to successfully stop the elephant herd and return them to the forest where they lived.
In 2011, Qiu Kaipei wrote in an article: "This is a purely fictional story. But maybe one day, a fictional story will become a reality. This is what we would never want to see."
China Youth Daily · China Youth Daily reporter Zhang Wenling Source: China Youth Daily