Final Report - Asian Development Bank

TA 4721-PRC: Preparing the Shaanxi-Qinling Mountains Integrated Ecosystem Management Project
Final Report Appendix 5
3. Qinling Fauna
a. Overview
40. The Qinling ecosystem is sufficiently biodiverse and distinct from other ecosystems that it is
assigned its own biogeographic unit, the Qinling Mountains. Similar to the case for flora, the fauna of
the Qinling reflects the meeting of temperate and sub-tropical faunas. Fauna species totals for the
Qinling are listed in Table 5.
Table 5: Numbers of Vertebrate Species in the Qinling by Taxonomic Order
Order Family Genus Species
Fish 6 13 67 109
Amphibians 2 7 12 19
Reptiles 3 8 26 26
Birds 17 49 166 308
Mammals 7 27 81 115
Total 35 104 462 577
41. The fauna of the Qinling, similar to the flora, is distinguished by its diversity in general, and
by its mammalian diversity in particular. Birds and mammals are the most thoroughly studied,
whereas the invertebrate fauna is relatively unknown but promises to be rich as well. In an eight-year
study of the butterfly fauna of the south slope of the Qinling 191 species were recorded, three of which
were new to China and 44 were new to Shaanxi 8 . One new genus and three species of eriophyid
mites were discovered in the Qinling in 2006 9 . Also in 2006 nine new Qinling species of linyphiid
spiders were assigned to an existing genus while five more new species were assigned to a new
genus 10 . Increased scientific attention to the Qinling invertebrate fauna would probably lead to
additional discoveries of new taxa.
42. The Qinling is renowned nationally and globally as a site supporting China’s “big four”
species of watchable wildlife: Giant Panda, Golden Snub-nosed Monkey, Crested Ibis, and Golden
Takin. Several nature reserves in the Qinling support the three mammals, while the Project Area
supports Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys and Golden Takin in the wild and a formerly wild but now
captive population of Crested Ibis (numbering over 220 birds in 2006). The Project Area also has a
captive population of around 12 Giant Pandas at the Louguantai breeding center. Descriptions of the
status of the “big four” Qinling species are given below.
b. Giant Panda (Ailuopoda melanoleuca)
i. Conservation History of Giant Panda
43. Giant Pandas are endemic to China and the northernmost areas of Vietnam and Myanmar
that border south China 11 . They now survive in five mountain ranges of Sichuan, Gansu, and Shaanxi
Provinces. The entire Qinling lies within the former range of Giant Panda. After 30 years of
conservation effort, China's national wild panda population was estimated at 1,596 in the national
census in 2003-4, a substantial increase from the several hundred thought to survive when the first
research project began in the early 1980s. In 2005, around 183 pandas were held in captivity
worldwide, mostly at the captive breeding center at Wolong, (over 100 pandas in 2006) but also in the
breeding center on the proposed Project Area (12 pandas), and in zoological gardens around the
8 Zhou, X, L. Sun, W. S. Pan, Z. Lu, Y. Ni. 2002. The Faunal Study on the Butterflies of the South Slope of
Qinling Mountains. Peking Univ. Vol.37 No.4 pp.454-469.
9 Xue, X.F., Z. W. Song and X. Y. Hong. 2006. A new genus and three new species of Phyllocoptini (Acari:
Eriophyidae: Phyllocoptinae) from the Qinling Mountains, Shaanxi Province, northwestern China.
Zootaxa1275:31-41.
10 Tanasevitch, A. V. 2006. On some Linyphiidae of China, mainly from Taibai Shan, Qinling Mountains,
Shaanxi Province (Arachnida: Araneae). Zootaxa 1325:277-311.
11 Hu, J. C. and F. W. Wei. 2004. Comparative ecology of Giant Pandas in the five mountain ranges of their
distribution in China. Pages 137-148 in Lindburg, D. and K. Baragona (eds), Giant Pandas Biology and
Conservation. Univ. California Press, Berkeley.
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