China’s smiling angel: Small victory for Yangtze River porpoise is big wave to take endangered species forward
- Conservationists hail a slowing decline in numbers of the aquatic mammal
- Human activity has played a part in fate of porpoise population
Conservationists say there are signs of hope for the Yangtze finless porpoise, the only aquatic mammal left in China’s longest river, after years of attrition from pollution, overfishing, hydroelectric dams and shipping traffic.
An oxbow lake along the middle reaches of the Yangtze River is a focus for efforts to save the aquatic mammal population, put at 1,012 by the government last year.
Porpoise numbers fell by nearly half from 2006-2012 to an estimated 1,040. But the rate of decline has slowed markedly since then, suggesting that conservation measures may be effective.
Glimpses of the Yangtze finless porpoise, known in Chinese as the “smiling angel” for its perma-grin, are rare. But introduction of porpoise to several conservation areas off the busy river meant, researchers said, that its numbers were increasing.
About 30 to 40 porpoise were taken to the Tianezhou Oxbow Nature Reserve in central China’s Hubei province, a curving lake linked to the Yangtze by a stream, in the early 1990s. There are now about 80.
“We found out animals cannot only survive but also reproduce naturally and successfully at Tianezhou. That’s very encouraging,” said Wang Ding, 60, a porpoise expert with the Chinese Academy of Sciences.