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July 15, 2014

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Saving rare deer from extinction is a labor of love

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THE wild Chinese water deer, a rare species in Shanghai for some 100 years, is making a comeback in forests along the banks of the Huangpu River in Yexie Town, thanks to a breeding program started six years ago.

The project in the Songjiang District is a joint effort by the Shanghai Bureau of Greening and Amenities and East China Normal University to save the deer from extinction.

Every morning at 7, deer keeper Jin Xinliang transports two barrels of soybean pulp to a seven-hectare breeding ground and fills up the four empty feeders deep in the woods.

The deer emerge from the shadows and approach cautiously.

“It’s like a daily appointment between us that none of us breaks,” Jin said.

The 62-year-old Yexie-native was a veterinarian for four decades before retirement in 2008. Because of his long experience and local knowledge, the forestry bureau assigned him the job of feeding the water deer and keeping an eye on their welfare.

Water deer are indigenous to China and Korea. They are goat-size, smaller than more common deer species. In 2008, 28 of the deer were introduced into the forest of Yexie from the Zhoushan Islands in Zhejiang Province.

They are breeding in a natural habitat of marshland, camphor and redwood thickets, and wildflowers galore. Their numbers have swelled to almost 150 in the last six years.

“I see them growing up, mating and producing fawns,” Jin said. “There is a special attachment between us.”

The deer are extremely timid and can be easily frightened, but they muster the courage to appear at feeding time every morning.

“They stand so close to me that I could almost reach out and touch them,” Jin said. “But after eating, they disappear quickly back into the forest.”

Chinese water deer are said to have originated in the Shanghai area, dating back to the New Stone Age, according to archives. They are the area’s largest indigenous mammal.

On a trip to Shanghai in the 1870s, the Duke of Bedford was attracted by the sight of the strange deer and transported several to Britain for further study. The animals were housed at the London zoo. Biologists there determined they were a species of ancient deer from the Cervidae family. Because the deer loved swimming, they called them “Chinese water deer.”

Urbanization has not been kind to the species. Traces of the breed were lost by the early 20th century.

In 1987, East China Normal University began to raise the deer on Changxing Island in Shanghai’s Chongming County. In 1989, three female deer gave birth to healthy fawns. Today a habitat for more than 10,000 of the deer has been established on the island.

“Its return to the wild fills a blank, diversifies the local animal species and completes the ecological and biological system,” says Pei Enle, director of the Shanghai Wild Life Preservation Station.

Deer keeper Jin lives alone in a single-story house in the forest, with only a dog and cat for household company. There is TV, but reception is poor.

Every day after feeding the deer, Jin walks around the woods to check for broken fences. When he returns home, he tends a backyard garden that supplies cabbages and sweet potatoes for the deer. The wild animals would normally eat fallen leaves and other woodland herbaceous material, but sometimes natural food is scarce and they need some outside rations.

“When I find does pregnant or suckling newborns, I will give them extra soybean pulp,” Jin said.

Every 20 or 30 meters in the forest, there is a small wooden hut built as a deer shelter from rain and winds. The deer never use them.

“They are very shy and easily frightened,” Jin said. “I worry when they get frightened that they will run recklessly, posing a risk of injury or death.”

One winter three years ago, Jin sensed something was wrong. One less deer came to eat in the morning. Looking around, he found that someone else had been in the habitat and had left some hand tools there.

Poachers? Jin didn’t know. He certainly didn’t see anyone. But the incident caused him to reinforce the fences and report the matter to the Wildlife Preservation Station. Scientists subsequently attached radio devices on the deer’s necks to monitor their movements.

Jin takes great delight in the life cycle of the deer. The annual rutting season is November or December, and the females give birth in May. A doe may have from one to three fawns. After birth, the young are hidden away for safety. After one week, the fawns begin walking on wobbly legs. Since May is a rainy season in Shanghai, Jin keeps watch for any fawns trapped in deep puddles. Every year he has to bury the few that don’t make it.

“I love being with these animals,” he said. “I don’t know if they know me, but I know them. They are my children.”




 

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