Home, Sweet Home
Text by Zi Ran Photographs by Sun Huajin unless otherwise credited
On March 3, 2016, World Wildlife Day, 16 Pere David’s deer were shipped from Dafeng Pere David’s Deer National Reserve in Jiangsu Province to Dongting Lake in Hunan Province, and set free in the boundless reed swamp, where they disappeared in the wilderness.
The campaign was jointly sponsored by the State Forestry Administration and Hunan Provincial People’s Government and carried out by the Forestry Department of Hunan Province, China Green Foundation (CGF), and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), kicking off the Wildlife Footprint, a 100-species satellite tracking program launched by the CGF and WWF.
Only found in China, the Pere David’s deer has a horse’s face, a deer’s horns, a donkey’s tail, and a cow’s hooves. In remote antiquity, it was considered an auspicious animal, attractive to hunters, and a worship totem and offering in sacrificial ceremonies. It is considered an icon of booming vitality because its antlers fall off and grow again annually.
Fossil records show that Pere David's deer emerged over 2 million years ago and reached its heyday some 10,000 to 3,000 years ago. Archaeologists found that during this period of time, the quantity of their bones unearthed rivals that of domestic pigs. The species declined suddenly after the Shang and Zhou dynasties some 3,000 years back and teetered on extinction during the early Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). None in captivity survived the Eight-Power Allied Forces’ invasion of Beijing in 1900.
Fighting for power. Pere David’s deer, a social animal, only acts aggressively during mating season.
Late autumn: Crossing the woods in fog. The staple food for Pere David’s deer is Chinese pennisetum. Led by female deer, they search for the next spot after finishing grazing in one area.
During mating season, bucks often decorates their antlers with grass to attract does.
Pere David’s deer usually lives near water with flourishing plants. The species excels at swimming.
A doe can only give birth to one offspring each year.
1865
In the autumn of 1865, French naturalist and missionary Pere David incidentally discovered the strange animal in Nanhaizi, a royal hunting ground, as he observed animals on the southern outskirts of Beijing. He immediately realized that the strange deer might have never before been documented. He paid 20 taels of fine silver to the guard of the hunting ground to buy a skull and two pieces of fur from the animal and shipped them back to France.
1866
In 1866, David presented the sample to the Museum of Natural History in Paris, and the animal was catalogued as a new species, a unique family of Cervidae. Named Elaphurus davidanus in Latin, it has since been known as Pere David’s Deer due to its discoverer. Beginning in 1866, envoys and priests from Britain, France, Germany, and Belgium visiting China shipped dozens of the species from Nanhaizi to European zoos through various means.
1895
As time passed, isolated deer in zoos of Europe died one after another, and the overall population shrank. In 1895, Herbrand Russell, 11th Duke of Bedford in Britain, invested heavily to acquire 18 Pere David’s deer for zoos in Paris, Berlin, Cologne, and Antwerp, and released them in 3,000 acres of Woburn Abbey north of London. Those few are the ancestors of every surviving Pere David’s deer on the planet today. After World War II, they numbered 255. The animals were moved to large zoos in other parts of the world to keep them safe from the war. By the end of 1983, the population topped 1,320.
1956
In 1956 Beijing acquired a pair of Pere David’s deer and in 1973, two pairs. Unfortunately, they could not revitalize their species due to breeding difficulties and inability to adapt to the environment.
Nicely complementing Pere David’s deer, cattle egrets eat parasites on the deer as well as insects and frogs they disturb.
1985
In 1985, thanks to the tireless endeavors by the WWF, the British government ordered five zoos in London to provide Pere David's deer to China at no cost. In August 1985, 22 deer arrived in Beijing. That night, they were released in Nanhaizi where they were originally from.
1986
In August 1986, 39 such deer were shipped from seven zoos in Britain to Dafeng City in Jiangsu Province via Shanghai, and released in the coastal mud flat where their ancestors lived. Today, the population remains stable in several areas of China, including Nanhaizi Pere David’s Deer Park in Beijing, Dafeng Pere David’s Deer Nature Reserve in Jiangsu, and Shishou Pere David’s Deer Reserve in Hubei.
Thanks to a campaign jointly sponsored by the State Forestry Administration and Hunan Provincial People’s Government, 16 Pere David’s deer carrying satellite trackers and radio positioning devices were released into the wild to collect data to study the animal’s lives, routines, and environmental demands. by Yao Yi
In 1985, thanks to the unremitting efforts of the WWF, Pere David’s deer returned to Nanhaizi, the former Royal Hunting Ground in Beijing. By 2015, the animal’s global population passed 6,000. In addition to over 219 breeding centers in 25 countries, 5,000 are in China – 49 times growth over 30 years and 83 percent of the world’s total.
This year, 16 Pere David’s deer were released into the wild wearing satellite trackers with radio positioning devices that allow researchers to study their lives, routines, and environmental demands. Like many animals, Pere David’s deer inspires riddles: “Can it survive the dramatic changes to its living environment?” “Can they adapt to the great wilderness?” Satellite trackers will send back important data enabling protection and administration to be performed in a more scientific way.
Dongting Lake, a vast expanse of water that ebbs and flows with the change of seasons, is a favorable habitat for Pere David’s deer, a species that swims, gallops, and jumps through wetlands. Information bounced off satellites will shed light on many issues bothering conservationists.
“It is extremely important for us to employ high-tech means to study and protect every habitat for wild animals,” opines Yi Qing, media officer of the WWF. “In the past, zoologists tracked animals on foot and observed from fixed points, extremely difficult methods which prove impossible for species such as migratory birds. Today, however, the wide application of satellite tracking is providing valuable information on large wild animals such as giant pandas, snow leopards, elephants, white-crowned cranes, and lesser white-fronted geese, no matter how inaccessible their living environments are.”
In the future, more migratory birds as well as aquatic and land species will be equipped with satellite trackers and become “messengers” facilitating communication between man and wildlife.