On December 9, the Prioksko-Terrasny Reserve hosted a delegation of Chinese experts in the conservation of biological resources in order to share experiences and establish partnerships.

The purposes of the visit of the delegation of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and the State Forestry Administration of P.R. China, headed by Ms. Chu Su, included getting acquainted with the procedure of recovery of rare animals and the establishment of cooperation in the area of protection of forest biological resources.

The staff of the reserve, headed by the chief researcher, M.M. Zablotskaya, PhD in biology, warmly welcomed their Chinese guests. Maria Mikhailovna conducted an interesting and informative seminar, making the guests familiar with the rules and conditions of the animals in the Bison Breeding Centre, also telling them about peculiarities of bison breeding in captivity. The deputy director of bison keeping and breeding in the reserve, I.I. Zemplyanko, added some commentaries to the speech, answering guests’ questions about the organization of regular veterinary checks and the reconstruction of the reserve’s infrastructure.

During the guided tour, the hosts and guests discussed the specialties of the system of organization, management, aims and tasks of Russian specially protected natural areas, as well as the protection and recovery methods of rare animal and plants species not only in the Prioksko-Terrasny reserve, but also other reserves of our country. In particular, Maria Mikhailovna talked about the organization of Przewalski’s horses transportation to the reserve in Orenburg with 14 animals living there already, and a possibility in the future to settle these animals in the wild, like now we do it with the European bison.

The topic of rare animals’ recovery raised a great interest of the Chinese delegation. The expert working on the problem of panda recovery paid special attention to the questions about the number of bisons at the moment of their resettlement into the wild and the methods of protection of wild rare animals from poaching, epizootic outbreaks and others.

The discussion continued on the round table with tea, where the Chief Security Officer of the natural area, N.V.Knyazkov, delivered a short message on the security issues and the struggle with the African swine fever among wild boars and the rabies among foxes. Fortunately, lately there were no registered cases of the African swine fever among boars, however, the problem of rabies still exists among the foxes – there were a few registered cases on the reserve’s territory. The deputy director of research work, U.A.Buivolov, told the guests about the plant tessellation in the reserve, which interested them a lot.

Our Chinese colleagues acknowledged many years of great work made by the reserve in the area of research, nature conservation and ecological education. They admitted that they had learnt a lot of new and useful information for their work and expressed a hope for further exchange of experiences and, possibly, a work in the partnership.