Beijing Zoo October 2008
Hi folks:
I'm new on the site, but am already learning things I missed or got wrong at the Beijing zoo (thanks Chris 79, SunWuKung and others). I wrote the following lengthy review of the Beijing Zoo in 2008 in response to the overwhelmingly negative reviews of the zoo by panda-focused travelers on the TripAdvisor website. There is plenty to criticize at the Beijing Zoo, but it is truly an amazing zoo, and inspired me to learn a lot more about Chinese wildlife. I thought my comments might be of interest here (although in light of the recent post by Shirokuma on the restaurant menu, I withdraw my advice to try the restaurant instead of the insipid fastfood joint in the aquarium for lunch). Comments and corrections are welcome.
I'll try to find time to put up some photos from the Beijing zoo and zoos in Japan and St Martin in the coming weeks. Enjoy!
The Beijing Zoo features China’s indigenous animals
I did not initially have high expectations for the Beijing Zoo. Guidebooks praised the new aquarium, but criticized the conditions in the aging zoo and suggested that the pandas were the sole significant attraction. One book even suggested allowing only an hour for the entire zoo experience. Online reviews decry the conditions and recommend skipping it. After spending the entire day at the zoo and aquarium with my wife and 9-year-old daughter (admission to the zoo is included in the aquarium admission price), I am happy to report that there is plenty to engage the entire family, and particularly those with an interest in China’s native fauna and many endemic species (those found only in China). Many of the animals in the Beijing zoo are rare and are threatened or endangered. While it is always more exciting to see animals in the wild, zoos such as the Beijing Zoo provide a window into the lives of animals most of us will never otherwise see, help raise public awareness of their value, and foster support for conservation (and also for the infusion of money that would help modernize the Zoo). The Beijing Zoo and Aquarium have also played a critical role in breeding programs for such endangered species as the giant panda and Chinese sturgeon. One need not, however, be a conservation fanatic or wanna-be zoologist to enjoy the zoo. My 9-year-old daughter and wife, who are certainly neither of these, enjoyed spending the day watching animals, watching people, taking photos, and enjoying the beautiful zoo grounds while they tolerated my note-taking and purposeful agenda of seeking out native Chinese animals.
This report began with the intention of writing a short informational blurb for families planning a visit to the Beijing zoo, but after taking time to look in books and read online in order to put the animals we saw into a biological and cultural context, the report developed into a longer commentary on the zoo animals that considers their biodiversity, conservation, symbolism and myths, history, and in several case their domestication. My advice to the reader who is looking for a quick summary is that the earlier part of this report presents more overview while the later parts are more detailed, and the headings can help direct you to the information you are most interested in. Photos of most of the animals described can be found with an online search engine.
Aquarium:
The aquarium has a dolphin and sea lion show of the quality one might sea at Sea World or similar venues. The enormous seating area was filled with enthusiastic Chinese school children. The huge sea lion performing seemed different than any California sea lion I have seen, with a large head and a distinct mane, but I’m uncertain whether it was actually another species (such as the Australian sea lion). Likewise I do not know whether the dolphins were common bottlenose dolphins or some other species such as the very similar Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin found off the coasts of south China, India, Australia, and east Africa. Some dolphins are on display in a tank outside of the show pavilion, accompanied by an educational display in Chinese about marine mammals. Nearby are an interesting shark and ray tank, a pool of enormous and inquisitive green sea turtles, and an area of tide pool organisms. A separate room highlights the endangered Chinese sturgeon, which was severely depleted after the Yangtze River was dammed, blocking access to its spawning grounds. A breeding and reintroduction program is now reversing the sturgeon’s decline.
A large tropical reef exhibit features a huge tank through which one can travel in an enclosed escalator, several tanks featuring diverse living corals, displays on marine fossils, and many tanks highlighting particular species of fish, including an orange butterfly fish endemic to China. At the time of our visit (October 2008), there was also a room highlighting the fish and invertebrates of the Pacific Northwest coast of Canada, with informational displays in both Chinese and English.
The rain forest exhibit has a lush pleasant atmosphere provided by an artificial waterfall. Large pools of koi greet visitors. There are many tanks of freshwater fish, some familiar from home aquaria. One pool has a large number of attractive silver arowana from the Amazon basin, labeled in English. Most tanks are labeled only in Chinese characters, but some have Pinyin, English and/or scientific names to provide a point of reference for those of us illiterate in Chinese. One tank contains the gigantic arapaima from the Amazon Basin, perhaps the world’s largest freshwater fish. Large catfish in the same tank are possibly Mekong River giant catfish, but I could find no identification of these fish that I could decipher. Another tank features the world’s largest salamander, the endemic Chinese giant salamander, an inhabitant of mountain streams that is known in Chinese as ‘baby fish’ because of its baby-like cry.
We had lunch in the aquarium snack shop, which served Chinese fast food as uninspired as any fast food burger joint in America. There seemed to be a restaurant in the zoo that might be a better bet for lunch. There is an extensive gift shop and counters of kitsch all through the aquarium. We bought some stamps with Chinese fish, and there are some educational toys along with stuffed animals and marine-themed figurines, but much of the merchandise seemed like an irrelevant intrusion.
Zoo Overview
The zoo is large with spacious grounds spanning the Beijing-Miyun Diversion Canal, along which you can take a boat to the Summer Palace (Yihe Yuan) if you tire of the zoo early. While my focus in this report is on indigenous and endemic Chinese animals, the zoo has animals from Australia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas as well. We missed several potentially interesting areas, including the nocturnal animal house, bears, lions, Australian animals and others.
Pandas are the best known of China’s endemic mammals, thanks in part to their role in international diplomacy and their adoption as the logo animal of the World Wildlife Fund. Over 100 other species of mammals are endemic to China, out of a total of 580 species of Chinese mammals. Some 40% of China’s mammal species are considered to be threatened. The pandas are the stars of Chinese conservation efforts, but hopefully they will entice wildlife-lovers and Chinese government officials to look far enough to see that the pandas are just the standard-bearers for a host of animals that urgently need protection.
Besides pandas, other notable indigenous animals of China in the zoo include the golden monkey; a large assemblage of deer including the tiny “barking deer” (muntjacs) ; a wealth of pheasants; cranes; the Amur tiger; the Asian elephant; the Bactrian camel and numerous others.
Panda Village
Entrance to the panda village requires an additional ticket of 5 yuan over the zoo admission fee. It’s an insignificant price to pay to help support the improved conditions that the pandas enjoy. The pandas have a new building for the 2008 Olympics to complement the Asian Games Building that I assume dates to the 1990 Asian Games in Beijing. Ten or more pandas seemed relatively content and more active than in some panda exhibits I’ve seen, munching on bamboo, ambling about, or sleeping in trees. The Zoo has been a leader in panda breeding, and the upper level of the Olympic Building has a large photographic display on the zoo’s role in panda conservation, China’s panda reserves (the best known being Wolong in Sichuan), and the effect of the May 2008 earthquake on the pandas. Both panda buildings have enough kinds of panda kitsch for sale to tempt panda lovers with a variety of tastes. My daughter spent her money on a singing panda stuffed toy wearing a traditional Chinese blouse – at least the money presumably helps to support the zoo directly or indirectly.
Also in the panda village are red pandas, golden monkeys, and the very rare Chinese crested ibis. All are endangered. My wife particularly enjoyed photographing the red pandas, while my daughter was amused by the baby golden monkey swinging from its parents’ tails. Red pandas are bred successfully in several zoos around the world. Although Seattle residents such as myself were fortunate enough to see a golden monkey on loan to Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo several years ago, golden monkeys are not permitted permanently in zoos outside of China. While all three of these animals are rare treats, the crested ibis is the rarest. The crested ibis once occurred widely in China, Taiwan, Korea, Japan and Russia, but was nearly exterminated by hunting (for hat feathers) and habitat destruction. After the 1960s, a small population on Sado Island, Japan was thought to be the last wild population, until seven birds were discovered in Shaanxi province in China in 1981. Since the last wild Japanese bird died in 2003, the only remaining wild population is in Shaanxi, where captive breeding programs are helping to bring it back from the brink of extinction. On September 25, 2008, ten crested ibises were re-introduced to the wild on Sado Island. Another 50 are planned to be introduced by 2015.
Monkeys
Golden monkeys are also found outside the panda village in their own exhibit, where an aging but modestly roomy series of pens houses three of the four species of snub-nosed monkey (Rhinopithecus, also known as Pygathrix). All four species of snub-nosed monkey are rare, and the three represented at the Beijing Zoo are endemic to China: the golden monkey (jin si hou) with its striking golden fur and blue face; the even rarer Yunnan snub-nosed monkey, which lives at the highest altitude of any primate (up to 5000 m); and the critically endangered Guizhou snub-nosed monkey, of which only a few hundred survive at the Fanjing Shan Nature Reserve in the Wuling mountains of central China. The fourth species of snub-nosed monkey (which is not represented at the zoo) is the Tonkin snub-nosed monkey of Vietnam, as critically endangered as its cousins. The golden monkey house also houses a fourth native Chinese monkey, the pig-tailed macaque, sadly confined to a very small and miserable-looking cage where a single macaque looks wistfully through the fence at visitors.
Nearby the much newer Marmoset House has a selection of monkeys and apes from elsewhere in the world, including another endangered Chinese native, the hoolock or white-browed gibbon, one of which swooped down from its perch to inspect my daughter with a suddenness that was startling. Gibbons are the smallest and most primitive of the apes, and are well known for their rapid brachiation and loud vocalizations. Several species are found in India, Indonesia and China. Marmosets (Callithrix) are smallish new world monkeys that eat tree gums and typically breed in monogamous pairs, usually bearing twins. One of the marmosets, whose pen extended over the entrance archway to the Marmoset House, seemed to enjoy attracting a lot of attention by loudly banging a rock against the roof of the entrance as visitors walked by. We skipped the gorilla house in the interest of seeing more Chinese animals, since we can see captive gorillas at home.
Carnivores
We also unfortunately missed the Amur (or Manchurian or Siberian) tiger, found in the region of the Amur River that forms the boundary between Siberia and China (Manchuria). This largest of cats breeds well in captivity and can be found in many zoos, but unfortunately zoo-bred animals do not adapt to the wild well and have not been used successfully in re-introduction programs. Survival of the Amur tiger will depend on thoughtful habitat conservation and enforcement of anti-poaching laws. The Siberian Tiger Project, AMUR, ALTA (Amur Leopard and Tiger Association), and the International Tiger Coalition are among the groups working to protect the Amur Tiger. We did see the much smaller Chinese leopard cat and the Eurasian lynx.
Other native Chinese carnivores at the zoo were the red fox, raccoon dog, hog badger, and the masked palm civet. The Chinese raccoon dog, though generally considered to be a distinct subspecies from the Japanese raccoon dog or tanuki, is perhaps better considered to be a separate species, since the chromosome numbers (karyotypes) of the two raccoon dogs differ by eight Robertsonian translocations (chromosome fusions). The tanuki is well-known and loved in Japanese folklore; the animated movie Pompoko gives westerners an education in both the real and imagined behavior of this interesting small member of the dog family. I do not know if the Chinese raccoon dog has a similar associated folklore or not. The Siberian subspecies of raccoon dog was introduced to Latvia in 1948 and has spread to parts of Europe.
Although hog badgers (zhu huan) are naturally nocturnal, the ones we saw were actively pacing around in the middle of the day, popping in and out of burrows, seemingly content to let visitors get a good look at their amusing antics. Indeed, they have a reputation for playfulness. Similarly, the nocturnal masked palm civets were also out and about in the afternoon, seemingly curious about visitors. The palm civets are widely eaten in southern China, and became suspected of introducing the SARS coronavirus to the human population, resulting a cull of the animals. Because of their large range across much of southeast Asia, they are not currently considered to be endangered, although they are protected in Hong Kong.
Elephant and camel
Two familiar large Chinese animals at the zoo are the Asian elephant and the Bactrian camel. Elephants are more frequently associated with Thailand or India, but can be found in southern Yunnan province, notably in Yexianggu (Wild Elephant Valley) on the Sancha River. Elephants were found in the Yellow River Valley during the Shang dynasty (1600-1100 BCE), but were dramatically reduced in number and area as early as 500 BCE. Wild elephants are endangered due primarily to loss of forest habitat, but also because of ivory hunting. Elephants have been tamed at least since the Harrapan civilization around 2000 BCE, and have been used in war, ceremony, logging, transport, tourism, and other tasks. Elephants were commonly used in warfare in India, Burma, and Thailand, but only rarely China, for example in 554 by the Western Wei and 971 by the Southern Han. Their usefulness in warfare declined following the invention of gunpowder by Chinese alchemists in the 9th century, but elephants are still used in forestry in Thailand.
Domesticated Bactrian camels are not uncommon, indeed my daughter rode one at the Great Wall at Badaling, but wild populations have been reduced to less than 1000 animals in the Gobi Desert along the Chinese-Mongolian border. A large reserve has been established in Xinjiang autonomous area in China at a site previously used for nuclear testing, the Arjin Shan Lop Nur Wild Camel Nature Reserve. A captive wild camel breeding program is underway in Mongolia. The wild camels are able to drink salty spring water. They are genetically distinct from the domesticated camels, and may represent a distinct (and critically endangered) species. Their domesticated cousins are thought to have thrown their fortunes in with humans before 2500 BCE, and were critical for the development of the Silk Road. Although these camels are slower than horses or donkeys, they can bear large loads across the desert for days without water. Even so, limits to their carrying capacity and the arduous and dangerous nature of the journey kept the Silk Road a route primarily for luxury goods such as silk and porcelain rather than lower-priced commodities.
The silk itself, of course, comes from another domesticated Chinese animal, the silkworm, domesticated in China at least 5000 years ago. According to legend, Lei Zu, the wife of the Yellow Emperor, discovered how to get silk in the 27th century BCE when a silkworm cocoon fell into her tea and she pulled a loose silk thread, wrapping it around her finger as she unwound it to reveal the silkworm inside. She asked the Yellow Emperor for a white mulberry grove in which to raise silkworms, which eat the mulberry leaves, and she invented the silk reel and silk loom. The silkworm is native to northern China where white mulberries still grow in the mountains outside Beijing. Its wild relative is a distinct species from which the silkworm has diverged considerably under domestication. The silkworm genome has been sequenced by Chinese and Japanese scientists, continuing a 5000 year tradition of genetic investigation and genetic engineering using this domestic animal.
Horses, sheep, goats, gazelles
The same area in Xinjiang where the camels are still present is also home to other rare Chinese native mammals represented at the zoo, including the kiang and the argali. The kiang or Tibetan wild ass is a beautiful donkey-like animal formerly considered to be a subspecies of the onager or Asiatic wild ass, but now given its own species. Kiang occur throughout Tibet and over the border of neighboring countries as well as in Xinjiang. The last wild populations of its relative, Przewalski’s horse, died out in Mongolia in the 1960s, but the Przewalski’s horse has recently been re-introduced to Xinjiang and Mongolia from captive populations bred in European zoos. Przewalski’s horse is the closest living relative of the domestic horse, but does not appear to be its ancestor.
The argali is the largest wild sheep, with large curled horns that can reach 2 m long. It was described by Marco Polo and therefore is also known as the Marco Polo sheep. Its neighbor at the zoo is the far more common bharal or Himalayan blue sheep, which is a major food source for snow leopards. Other Chinese sheep or goat relatives at the zoo include the Himalayan goral, the red goral, and the peculiar takin, the national animal of Bhutan. The takin’s golden fur has been thought to be the origin of the Greek legend of the golden fleece. In Bhutanese mythology, its origin is attributed to the 15th century Lama Drukpa Kunley, who is said to have eaten an entire cow and goat, then stuck the goat’s skull on the cow skeleton and commanded it to rise up and graze.
A goat-like animal which may have been present in the zoo, although we did not see it, is the chiru or Tibetan ‘antelope’, found on the Tibetan plateau and in India. The chiru was chosen as one of the 2008 Olympic mascots, and a pavilion about the five mascots was unfortunately closed when we got to it. The extremely fine wool of the chiru is highly prized for shawls, and this has led to the slaughter of thousands of animals, severely depleting populations. It is hoped that its role as mascot will help bring awareness of its plight.
Not to be confused with the Tibetan ‘antelope’, the small Tibetan gazelle or goa represented in the zoo is endemic to Tibet on high-altitude steppes and grasslands, where it was found to be rarer than the kiang or argali. The charming goa stands about two feet tall, and males have tapering curved horns. It is threatened by hunting, severe winters, and competition from domestic livestock. Three other gazelle species are found in northwest China and Inner Mongolia, where fencing that blocks migration routes and escape routes from predators is a major survival challenge for them.
Deer
China has a diverse fauna of deer, with many representatives at the zoo. Larger deer include the hog deer from Yunnan province, the white-lipped or Thorold’s deer from Tibet, the red deer common throughout Eurasia, the roe deer (recently split into the European roe deer and the east Asian or Siberian roe deer), the sika deer from east Asia, the sambar (shui lu) from Hainan and southern China, and Pere David’s deer (mi lu). The latter endemic deer became extinct in the wild in 1939, but a captive herd had been maintained by the Emperor and described by missionary Pere David in the 19th century, after which animals had been sent to Europe. A captive herd was established at Woburn abbey in Britain and in the 1980s the deer were re-introduced to China, notably at Milu Park in Beijing.
My favorite Chinese deer, though, are the small muntjacs (ji). These small dog-sized deer have protruding tusks and are said to bark like dogs, although any barking they did could not be heard over the barking of breeds of real domestic dogs housed nearby in the children’s zoo, in what is likely to strike Americans as one of the most unsettling displays in the zoo. The common Indian or yellow muntjac (huang ji) is found widely in southern China, while the black muntjac (hei ji) is endemic to western Zhejiang and southern Anhui. The Chinese or Reeve’s muntjac, not found at the zoo, is endemic to Taiwan and eastern China. The huang ji were quite interested in us, whether out of boredom or expectation of handouts I’m not sure. A juvenile, not much bigger than a chihauahua, peeked out of its house a few times.
The huang ji is well known to cytogeneticists as the mammal with the fewest chromosomes: six in females (three pairs) and seven in males (who have two dissimilar Y chromosomes). Its close relative the Chinese muntjac has 48 chromosomes, and the somewhat more distantly related water deer (he ji), also represented at the zoo, has 72 chromosomes. This vast disparity in chromosome number between relatives is due to the systematic end-to-end fusion of more numerous smaller chromosomes into fewer large chromosomes in the huang ji, and is theorized to come about by preferential transmission of fused chromosomes into the female egg, as has been documented to occur in human females.
Pheasants and other ground birds
Besides deer, another family well represented in China and at the Beijing zoo is the pheasants, along with other ground birds. Some 49 species in this group are found in China, with 16 of them endangered.
The most familiar of pheasants is the red junglefowl in its domestic form as the chicken (ji), found in kitchens and restaurants throughout the world. Two breeds of chickens are present in the Beijing zoo, gui fu ji and yuan bao ji. Both have feathers on their feet, but otherwise I can find no information about these breeds. The red junglefowl is found throughout southeast Asia including south China, although in alarmingly decreasing numbers. Mitochondrial DNA evidence suggests that it was first domesticated in Thailand about 8000 years ago (6000 BCE), although evidence for multiple domestication events and introgression of the yellow skin gene from the grey junglefowl have also been claimed to contribute to the ancestry of chickens. The oldest archeological evidence for domestication is from northeast China about 5500 BCE. Chickens likely spread along what was to become the Silk Road to Iran, India, the Middle East, and eventually Europe. They also were spread across the Pacific by Polynesians, and wild red junglefowl (moa in Hawaiian) serenade visitors to Koke’e Park on Kaua’i. Carbon dating also suggests that chickens reached South America prior to Columbus, with Polynesians invoked as the most likely means of transport, although Chinese voyagers have also been suggested, most recently by Gavin Menzies in his controversial book “1421”.
Another familiar pheasant is the ring-necked pheasant, widespread in brushy areas of China and also introduced to much of the USA. The small chukar, the national bird of Pakistan, is also familiar to Americans from its introduction as a game bird to the American West, particularly in the Great Basin states, Columbia Plateau, and in Hawai’i. In both America and Asia it inhabits open dry areas. Its English name comes from Urdu chakhoor.
The Tibetan snowcock from above the treeline of the mountains of Tibet and western China is represented at the zoo, but not its cousin the Himalayan snowcock from similar habitat. The Himalayan snowcock has also been introduced to America, where a small population can be found in the Ruby Mountains of Nevada.
Two spectacular pheasants at the zoo are the golden pheasant of central China and its close relative Lady Amherst’s pheasant from Tibet, Yunnan, and Guizhou. Sarah Countess Amherst, wife of the Governor General of Bengal, sent the latter pheasant to London in 1828, from whence a feral population was established in England that is now almost extinct. Feral golden pheasant populations also exist in England, where they have interbred with Lady Amherst’s pheasant, and they have been kept in captivity in America since colonial days and were possibly kept by George Washington. Surprisingly, little is known of their habits in the wild in China.
Missing from the zoo are the even more spectacular peafowl. The range of the well-known Indian blue peafowl does not enter China, but the green peafowl is found from Burma to Java, including Yunnan and possibly southeast Tibet. It is considered to be vulnerable to extinction due to habitat loss and hunting.
Tragopans or ‘horned’ pheasants are spectacular birds that have brightly colored plumage with red, black and white markings. The males have fleshy horns that become erect in display and a fleshy lappet covering the throat, colored in red and sapphire blue. There are five species, all found in China, of which two are represented at the zoo: Temminck’s tragopan of forests in India, Vietnam, Tibet and northern China, and the endangered Chinese or Cabot’s tragopan of southeast China. The three remaining species of tragopan (Blyth’s, western and satyr tragopans) are found mostly in India, Nepal and Bhutan. They typically live in forests or rhododendron thickets at moderate to higher elevations in mountains. Except Temminck’s, all tragopans are threatened or endangered.
Related to the tragopans, the zoo houses a Chinese monal from central China. The iridescent male monals have a purple crest, green head with blue skin around the eye, reddish gold mantle, and blue-green and black feathers. The females are brown with a white neck marking. The two other species of monal, the Himalayan monal and Sclater’s monal, also can be found in China. The Himalayan monal is the national bird of Nepal. All are considered vulnerable or endangered because of habitat loss and hunting.
The largest ground birds on display were not pheasants at all. The great currasow with its peculiar yellow knobbed beak is related to the currasows, chachalacas and guans of Central and South America, belonging to a different New World family of fowl-like birds than the predominantly Eurasian pheasants. We first saw a great currasow in a private backyard zoo outside our hotel in Cozumel, Mexico two years ago. The endemic Cozumel Island subspecies of the great currasow is endangered, like many other Cozumel endemics, both from human encroachment and hurricanes.
The turkey-sized great bustard, in contrast, is a Chinese native but is more closely related to cranes and rails than to fowl. Great bustards are found patchily throughout Eurasia from Spain to northeast China, including in wetlands outside Beijing. They inhabit open fields and rice paddies and are omnivores. These are running birds that fly infrequently, never alight in trees, and in fact lack a rear toe that could help them grab a branch. The great bustard and other even ‘greater’ bustards such as South Africa’s Kori bustard are the heaviest flying birds, weighing sometimes over 40 pounds, or over twice what a typical crane, turkey, or most swans might weigh.
Housed anomalously in the same general area as the groundbirds was a Eurasian eagle owl. This large owl with long ear tufts is found throughout China in mountainous wooded areas, but is generally rare throughout its range. In Central Asia, feathers of the Eagle Owl, particularly from its breast and belly, were valued as precious amulets protecting children and livestock from evil spirits. Talons of the Eagle Owl were said to ward off diseases and cure infertility in women.
Cranes
The zoo has a collection of cranes which we unfortunately did not get to visit before dusk and closing time. Nine of the 15 species of crane occur in China, and cranes are prominent in Chinese art and folklore, where they are associated with long life. Known for their beauty, long annual migrations, elaborate courtship rituals, and loud trumpeting cries, cranes are imposing birds that are unmistakable. Nearly all cranes are vulnerable or endangered, some critically so. Most Chinese cranes breed in wetlands and fields in northern or northeast China and winter farther south. These include the common crane, Demoiselle’s crane, the red-crowned (Japanese) crane, white-naped crane, and black-naped crane. Others such as the hooded crane and Siberian white crane breed mostly in Siberia and winter in China. The sarus crane formerly inhabited southern China but is now found primarily in India, Nepal, Pakistan, southeast Asia and Australia. The American sandhill crane visits northern Siberia and is a very rare vagrant in China.
Waterfowl
The zoo contains a couple of ponds with waterfowl. Whooper swans, a black-crowned night heron, Dalmatian pelicans, swan geese, greylag geese, bar-headed geese, common shelducks, ruddy shelducks, mandarin ducks, mallards and others not identified waded or floated about the ponds. Of these, the Dalmation pelicans are rare in China.
As someone whose earliest memory of ducks is of domestic ducklings sliding down a slide in the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, it has taken me nearly 50 years to get around to contemplating the history of duck domestication, which is believed to have occurred in China by 2500 BCE. This fact gives me a new perspective on a favorite early childhood book, The Story About Ping (
http://www.vidyaonline.net/arvindgupta/ping.pdf) , the wayward domestic duckling who becomes separated from his family living on a wise-eyed boat on the Yangtze River. (This book also introduced me to the use of cormorants in fishing.) The transformation of the ubiquitous mallard into the domestic duck by the genetic engineers of ancient China helps to explain why duck is a far more popular food in China and southeast Asia than elsewhere in the world, and also gives perspective on the origin of Peking Duck, first served to the Mongol emperors 700-800 years ago.
Beijing birds
Beijing has remarkably few birds, even for an urban setting. Nevertheless, three species are ubiquitous and can be found at the zoo and everywhere else. These are the Eurasian tree sparrow, the common magpie and the azure-winged magpie. Magpies are regarded favorably in China because of the assistance they provided in bringing together the divine weaver girl with her mortal husband the cowherd boy. When the couple were trapped on opposite sides of the Silver River (Milky Way) , the magpies used their bodies to form a bridge between them.
Three other kinds of urban birds are less frequent: jungle crows, rock doves, and the domestic pigeon. While in cites throughout Europe and America, rock doves are the birds that we think of as domestic pigeons, the flocks of pigeons that soar the skies of Beijing are distinct from the rock doves occasionally found in Beijing parks. These domestic pigeons are mostly white (unlike the rock doves) and seldom or never alit on any surface, seemingly circling unendingly through the air. We were told that pigeons are kept by some people in Beijing, and these white birds seem likely to be flocks kept for racing, homing or other activities. Indeed, I think I recall that during my youth my uncle’s racing pigeons in Pacific Palisades were also mostly white and also roosted mostly at home.
My view of the Beijing Zoo
Zoos reflect our relationships with animals in all their complexity. We stand and gawk in awe at their amazing power, beauty, adaptations, complexity and diversity. Monkeys may help remind us that we are also animals, while domestic dogs in a zoo rather startlingly remind us of the impersonal relations we have with most animals except for a lucky few. Some animals suffer from the confinements we put on them, both in the zoo and in their diminishing natural habitats, while others adapt to us or to our cities and thrive among us, and still others receive our help in escaping extinction and adapting to our changing world. We tell stories about many animals, and study them for both aesthetic and engineering designs, as well as insights into our own bodies and behaviors. The Beijing Zoo reflects all of these relationships we have with animals.
China’s fauna is poorly know in the West, and perhaps even in China, where local knowledge of animals in rural areas that have poor educational and informational facilities may not be transmitted to learning centers in modern megapolises like Beijing. The Beijing Zoo is a treasure-trove of educational opportunities about these animals, and is likely to be central link in developing support for conserving China’s unique endemic and endangered fauna. I personally have spent a couple of weeks of my ‘free’ time since leaving China in learning about the rare and not-so-rare animals I was lucky enough to see at the Zoo. I would never have done so, or at least not in the same depth, if I had not actually seen the animals. Connecting with animals in zoos is a window into learning more about them, and learning about them is the first step in conserving them. Conditions in the Zoo could certainly be improved. Probably the most likely way for this to occur is for visitors to support the zoo, and give both positive and negative feedback to the zoo and to any tours that take tourists there, stressing both its value and the need for improvements and for support of conservation efforts.
What a pity!