Jilin's habitat protection has achieved remarkable results. Waterbirds gather in large numbers and tigers and leopards continue to expand their territories.

　　China News Service, Changchun, March 1 (Zhang Yao, Wu Linxi) On the eve of World Wildlife Day, the reporter learned from the Jilin Provincial Forestry and Grassland Bureau that Jilin Province has a network of forests, contiguous grasslands, and wetlands, and rare wild animals. The habitat environment continues to improve. In 2023, monitoring found a total of more than 600 Chinese Mergansers, and traces of tigers and leopards were found in many places.

　　Jilin Province is rich in forest resources and is the world's species gene bank and natural museum, with a forest coverage rate of 45.27%.

There are 496 species of terrestrial vertebrates and more than 2,200 species of higher plants.

Among them, there are 124 species of nationally protected wild animals such as Siberian tigers, Amur leopards, red-crowned cranes, and Chinese mergansers; and 23 species of nationally protected wild plants such as Manchurian yew.

Nearly 90,000 people are engaged in forestry and grassland work in Jilin Province, and the total output value of the forestry and grassland industry will reach 150 billion yuan in 2023, a year-on-year increase of 44.5%.

White cranes fly over Momoge National Nature Reserve in Jilin Province.

Photo by Zhao Lengbing

　　Habitat protection is key to wildlife conservation.

According to the Jilin Provincial Forestry and Grassland Bureau, for some endangered species in urgent need of rescue protection, Jilin Province has adopted natural forest protection and cessation of logging, grassland grazing ban, provincial important wetland list, and terrestrial wildlife protection regulations. Connectivity projects, afforestation and greening, desertification prevention and control, ecological benefit compensation mechanism, carry out special actions such as "Green Guard", "Green Shield" and "Qingfeng", as well as comprehensive monitoring of forest and grass wet ecology, establishment of special protection platforms and other measures to increase Human and financial investment provide important support for the protection of wild species.

　　Through years of efforts, 836.68 hectares of forests in Jilin Province have been recuperated, and 675,000 hectares of grasslands and 823,000 hectares of wetlands have been fully protected.

A Siberian tiger photographed by an infrared camera in Hunchun City, Jilin Province.

Photo courtesy of Jilin Provincial Forestry and Grassland Bureau

　　In 2022, Jilin Province implemented the Chinese Merganser "Residency Project", applied the Chinese Merganser Monitoring Information System throughout the province to monitor population dynamics, and was the first in the country to launch a three-year synchronous survey of waterbirds during the migration period.

In 2023, monitoring revealed a total of more than 600 Chinese Mergansers, and an average of 2,000 Siberian Cranes stopping to forage in the central and western regions of Jilin in spring and autumn. A total of more than 1.5 million waterbirds of 102 species were recorded throughout the year.

　　At the same time, Jilin Province has cooperated with the Northeast Tiger and Leopard National Park in wildlife protection, wildlife rescue, "human-animal conflict" early warning, and anti-poaching.

Monitoring shows that the habitat environment of tigers and leopards in Jilin Province continues to improve, and their activity range continues to expand. The number of Siberian tigers and leopards has increased from 27 and 42 before the pilot to more than 50 and 60.

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