At a large forest park in eastern Beijing, 11 birds on the state -level protection list were recently released, which owed to Beijing's big step in wildlife protection.
These birds had recovered after the Beijing Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation Center rescued and took care of them. "We will speed up our efforts to push the establishment of district-level wildlife rescue centers to guard the health of wildlife," said Mr. Du, director of the center. The center was set up in 2001 and built a wildlife rescue base in the capital's Shunyi District in 2005. Staff at the base have rescued and rehabilitated over 30,000 wild animals in total.
Wildlife protection has been strengthened in Beijing in recent years. On June 1, the city's newly adopted regulation (法规) on wildlife protection took effect, introducing stricter and more concrete measures to protect the environment and wildlife. For example, the regulation states clearly that Beijing bans hunting throughout the year, compared with the previous regulation which bans hunting during the periods of March to May and September to November each year. The new regulation also gives more serious punishment for illegal hunters.
After years of monitoring, the species and quantity of wild animals in Beijing are continuously increasing, with the number of terrestrial spinal wild animals (陆地脊椎野生动物) growing from 461 species in 1994 to more than 500. The habitat of the endangered bird has expanded from Fangshan District to the whole city.
"The enforcement of the new regulation marked a new stage in Beijing's wildlife protection work," said Mr. Du." We will step up the publicity of the regulation and raise citizens' awareness of wildlife protection," Du said. "In our protection of mountains, rivers, forests, farmlands, lakes and grasslands. we take into full consideration the requirements of ecological corridor construction (生态走廊建设), food- chain construction and wildlife and their habitat protection."
