On June 1, 2016, two men in Shaanxi Province, armed with slingshots, shot a white bird to the ground despite the villagers' persuasion. They then took the bird away, only to find that the white bird had a ankle ring and a code on it. The two realized something was wrong and discarded the injured white bird on the side of the road.
In the end, the injured white bird died due to excessive blood loss and ineffective treatment, and the two men who beat the bird were also imprisoned. It turned out that the white bird that was shot down by them was a precious national first-class protected animal crested ibis, a real "prison bottom sitting through the beast". The two men were also sentenced to 8 and 10 years in prison for illegally capturing and injuring protected animals.
Kill one and go to jail for 10 years! How precious is the crested ibis? Old rules, please ask the audience to order a free like and attention, thank you.
Known as the "Jewel of the Orient" among birds, the crested ibis has white feathers, a bright red face, and a handful of willow-shaped feather crowns on the back of its neck. Adult crested ibises are 60 to 79 cm long and weigh 1.4 to 1.8 kg. The crested ibises have a complex diet, usually foraging in shallow waters near the water's edge or in rice fields, looking for small fish, frogs, snails, earthworms and other foods.
As a bird endemic to East Asia, the crested ibises were once widely distributed in China, Korea, Japan and parts of Russia. Among them, Japan is a country that is very fond of crested ibises and regards them as a symbol of the imperial family. However, due to environmental degradation, in 1981 there were only 5 wild crested ibises left in Japan.
After the discovery of a sharp decline in the number of crested ibises, Japan has also taken many measures. In order to protect the precious crested ibis, Japan captured all five crested ibises and sent them to the Sado Island Conservation Center for captivity. Unfortunately, the good times did not last long, and the captive crested ibises appeared to have eggs that were not spermatozoa and could not hatch.
By 1985, Japan had also borrowed three wild crested ibises from China to breed, hoping to allow the native Japanese crested ibises to reproduce. Unfortunately, this "transnational marriage" of crested ibises ended in failure, and Japan's native crested ibises failed to leave offspring and died one after another, becoming extinct after 1995.
Due to the extinction of native crested ibises from Russia, Korea and Japan, only China has the crested ibises. In fact, the crested ibises in our country were almost considered extinct before 1981. Because since 1964, China's ornithologists have not seen the crested ibis, until 1981.
Since 1978, ornithologists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences who have a glimmer of hope have formed a scientific research expedition to investigate in nine provinces in the northeast, north China and northwest China, with a cumulative journey of more than 50,000 kilometers, just to confirm whether China's crested ibises have really become extinct.
In May 1981, Liu Yinzeng, an ornithologist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, found the nesting of two crested ibises in the mountain forest of Yaojiagou in Dadian Village, Baliguan Township, Shaanxi Province, with a total of 7 crested ibises, including 4 adult ibises and 3 juvenile ibises, which were the only 7 wild crested ibises in the world at that time.
When Liu Yinzeng found the crested ibis, they were all busy feeding their young chicks, indicating that the four adult crested ibises had full fertility. To observe the habits of the crested ibises, ornithologists set up simple tents under the trees to guard the world's last wild crested ibises day and night.
While the expert team was observing and guarding the families of these two rare birds day and night, a young bird fell from its nest. After the young bird falls to the ground, ornithologists immediately pick it up and quickly transport it to the Beijing Zoo for identification and protection. Their deeds have also been selected as language textbooks in our country.
Ornithologists have worked hard and obtained first-hand information about wild crested ibises, laying a solid foundation for the future conservation work in China. From 1993 to 2003, China has established thirteen crested ibis nature reserves in Shaanxi, Beijing and other places. In order to expand the population of the crested ibis, the Beijing Zoo has actively carried out artificial breeding research, with remarkable results.
Thanks to the efforts of bird experts, the number of crested ibises in China has gradually changed from 7 in 1981 to 100 and 1,000. As of May 2021, the total number of wild populations and artificially bred populations of crested ibises in China exceeded 7,000.
Although the number of crested ibises in China has grown to more than 7,000, it is still at risk of extinction. To protect our precious natural resources, but also to protect ourselves, please do not kill and eat any wild animals.