Walk along the edge of Zuimei 331 National Highway丨Huxiao Laoye Ridge

Huxiao Laoye Ridge

Laoye Ridge, a branch of Changbai Mountain

The drizzle silently nourishes the continuous green mountain forests. National Highway 331 coming from Hunchun turns a corner and enters Heilongjiang.

This is Laoye Ridge, a branch of the Changbai Mountains. After crossing the border of Jilin Province, it is the jurisdiction of the Suiyang Administration Bureau of the Northeast Tiger and Leopard National Park.

The Northeast Tiger and Leopard National Park is located in the southern area of ??Laoye Mountains at the junction of Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces. It borders Russia and North Korea, with a total area of ??more than 1.46 million hectares. The park is located in the heart of Asia's temperate coniferous and broad-leaved mixed forest. The rich forest ecosystem nurtures and protects a complete wildlife community.

Go down 19 kilometers along the "Zero Kilometer" of National Highway 331, turn right at the "Second Inspection Station" onto a not-wide forest road, and then drive 10 kilometers up the mountain to reach the tiger mountain with an altitude of more than 700 meters. Leopard Park core area.

An old hunter’s pet dog was eaten by a tiger

During the Spring Festival this year, a Siberian tiger almost killed an old hunter in front of him In front of Liang Fengen, he killed his golden retriever dog and took it away.

Pushing open the two old wooden courtyard doors and going in, the door was open. Liang Fengen, who had just returned from collecting mountain products, was frying acanthopanax on the stove.

Lao Liang recalled: "At around one o'clock in the afternoon on New Year's Day this year, I took my dog ??out of the house and walked up the mountain. Halfway up the mountain, I suddenly heard something in the bushes thirty or forty meters ahead. There was movement, and the golden retriever suddenly rushed in. I didn't take it seriously, and kept walking. When I got closer, I saw that the dog was gone! There were a series of tiger footprints on the ground. I was so scared that I hurried home. The next day I boldly went up the mountain to look for it, and found a dog skin and half a wild boar a few miles away."

When the neighbors heard about it, they joked with him: "Who makes you young? It's time to compete with the tiger for food, so you must be punished now!" Lao Liang replied with a smile: "Not only my dog, but in the past two years, haven't three or four dogs in our farm been snatched away by the tiger? It seems that the tiger is here. ”

Liang Fengen is an employee of Nuanquanhe Forest Farm. He loved hunting when he was young. The forest farm used to rely on Liang Fengen to hunt wild boars and roe deer to improve the food for the employees. 20 years ago, Liang Fengen handed over the gun to the Public Security Bureau, and handed over the cover, clip, gun, and dagger to the field department, and became the first wildlife ranger of the Suiyang Forestry Bureau until his retirement three years ago.

Local monitors said that in recent years, wild Siberian tiger entities, footprints, feces and other activity information have been photographed here nearly 30 times. Tigers are no longer a new phenomenon.

Looking for tiger traces deep in the jungle

A few days ago, the far-infrared camera installed in Haw Par Park once again Wild Siberian tigers and Siberian leopards were photographed.

After lunch, under local arrangements, the reporter and his party followed two mountain rangers from the Suiyang Bureau site to the Nuanquan River Forest Farm located in the core area of ??Haw Par Park to look for tiger traces.

There are more than 400 far-infrared cameras and more than 100 rangers in the Suiyang Bureau of Haw Par Park. Guo Wenliang and Zhang Shaokun are the two most famous ones, and both have contact with Siberian tigers. A thrilling close encounter with a leopard.

Not far from entering the core area, there is a monitoring point. Guo Wenliang took off the camera and checked: On August 17, a wild boar came; on August 22, a roe deer came.

Continuing forward, the trees are dense, the streams are flowing, and the mountains are quiet with chirping birds. At the Nuanquanhe Forest Farm headquarters, we met Liang Fengen who had been waiting here for a long time. A group of five people got on an off-road vehicle and headed towards the Hubutu River deep in the jungle.

Not long after entering the depths of the jungle, there was a wooden pavilion, which was a feeding point. In the pavilion, a shallow pit about one meter in diameter was dug out on the ground, and there were messy animal footprints in the pit. The three mountain rangers exchanged words: "These are the footprints of sika deer", "The tracks are very new, they must have been here not long ago", "Well, it looks like there are more than one"; "The pointed ones on the front of the feet are doe's, and the round ones are "A male deer", "Yes, the two hooves of a female deer are clamped tightly together, and the marks on the front of the soles are sharp"...

The further you go inside, the more lush the vegetation becomes, and in some places you need a machete to clear the way. .

While walking, a fast-flowing river appeared in front of me. This river is called the Hubutu River, which is the boundary river between China and Russia. It is densely forested and sparsely populated, making it the best habitat for wild animals. Lao Liang pointed to the jungle not far ahead and said, "There are tigers coming out here."

As the sky darkened, the group returned to the original route. Near the parking spot, we found a pile of excrement with wild fruit residues. "This is Heixiazi dung. Now, they specialize in eating wild fruits; after a while, grasshoppers and other insects will begin to store fat for the winter."

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Local department statistics: Compared with 2011, the number of wild boars here increased from 0.57 to 1.79 per square kilometer, the number of roe deer increased from 0.87 per square kilometer to 2.8, and the number of sika deer increased from 0.03 per square kilometer. It only increased to 0.1.

Although no traces of Siberian tigers and leopards were found along the way, everyone was happy that Siberian tigers and leopards have a good environment and sufficient food here.

The world's first construction

Northeast Tiger and Leopard Migration Corridor

At noon, the construction site of National Highway 331 , construction workers are carefully installing signs that read "Horning is prohibited in the Northeast Tiger and Leopard National Park"

Laoye Ridge belongs to the territory of the Northeast tiger and leopard, and all human activities must be considered first. "Master" feeling. In the reconstruction and expansion of National Highway 331, Heilongjiang Province spent more than 100 million to build three migration corridors for Siberian tigers and leopards.

Building migration corridors for big cats, This is the first time in the world

Rendering of the artificial tunnel for the Northeast Tiger and Leopard Migration Corridor

Project Coordinating Minister Cheng Guozhonghe from the border of Jihei Province to Dongning on National Highway 331 is in charge of the project. Under the leadership of Zhang Chuanyou, the reporter conducted an on-site visit.

Driving from the border of Jihei Province towards Dongning, the car stopped at K17+300 meters. Cheng Guozhong said that this area was originally connected by mountains. , densely forested, because the mountain was dug up for road construction. Next spring, a 300-meter-long artificial tunnel will be built here. The sides and top of the tunnel will be filled with soil to follow the mountain. Trees will be densely planted on both sides to form a barrier, and trees will be sparsely planted in the middle. , make shrubs and weeds grow as quickly as possible, and set up guides such as fallen trees and tree roots to integrate the natural landscape above the tunnel with the surroundings, making it easier for Amur tigers and leopards and other wild animals to pass here.

In K26. Stop again at +350 meters. Zhang Chuanyou said that a one-kilometer-long animal crossing detection management corridor will be installed at both ends of the corridor, and the red light will automatically light up when an animal crosses the road. p>

The last passage is under the Luoquan Gou Bridge. The surface of the bridge pier will be treated with cement imitation wood grain and vine plants will be planted to increase the concealment of the bridge pier and facilitate the passage of wild animals.

Highway builders. They say that every shovel of soil we dig and every tree we move must comply with the management standards of Haw Leopard Park, in order to minimize the impact on the living environment of animals and achieve a harmonious life between man and nature.

Next fall, this innovative move to protect endangered wildlife will surely become a popular place for self-driving tours.

Photography: Wu Shujiang Zhang Shu

Editor: Yang Ye

Coordinator: Chen Changxin

Producer: Liu Rongsheng