Tibetan antelope
Head of a Tschirus ( Pantholops hodgsonii )
The Tschiru ( Pantholops hodgsonii ), also known as Orongo or Tibetan antelope, is a rehgroßer representatives of caprine, also referred to as antelope that lives in the highlands of Tibet.
Features
Tschirus reach a body length 130-140 cm, the tail is about 10 inches long, the shoulder height is 75 to 95 centimeters. The weight is in the males around 36-55 kg, the females are 25 to 30 kg significantly lighter. The coat is very dense and woolly, it is colored predominantly yellow-brown. The chin and belly are whitish, the front of the legs are the same as the face color is dark brown to black. The legs are relatively slender, the tail is short. Unique are the walnut-sized, inflatable nasal sacs that protrude from the nostrils. Only the males have horns, these are thin, approximately perpendicularly upwardly skewers and be around 50 to 70 inches long.
Distribution and habitat
Tschirus live in the highlands of Tibet, they come into the Chinese provinces of Tibet Autonomous Region, the south of Xinjiang, western Sichuan and southern Qinghai ago. In addition, they also live in the northern Indian region of Ladakh. Their habitat is upland steppes as the Chang Tang region at altitudes 3700-5500 meters.
Way of life
Tschirus go mainly in the morning and in the evening in search of food. They are herbivores, feeding on grasses and herbs. For the rest they pull in up to 30 centimeters deep wells back that they create themselves and where they are protected from the severe wind. In addition, these wells provide some visual protection from predators.
The female form with the pups groups of 10 to 15 animals, the males live solitary outside the breeding season. During the mating the males try to gain control of a female group. They fight aggressively with the horns against male rivals, these fights are brutal and sometimes also end with the death of one or even both counterparties. The males guard at this time the females jealous and drive them back, they should want to leave the group.
After about seven -to eight- month gestation period, the female gives birth in June or July, a young is born, twins are rare.
Since a few years, some Tschirus be kept for propagation in enclosures to speed up parallel to the animal protection in situ recovery of the stock.
Tschirus and people
Once belonged Tschirus the most common animals of Tibet. They populated the alpine steppes to hundreds of thousands. The IUCN leads the way since 2000 as endangered ( endangered ). The Tschiru Hunting is traditional to gain from the fur shahtoosh wool. The wool is often regarded as particularly warm to use for the production of luxury scarves. Three to five Tibetan antelopes are killed for their wool of a single scarf. Particularly disastrous for him, however, that the horns of the male in Traditional Chinese medicine has a salutary effect is attributed. Both in China and in India the Tschiru is now strictly protected. In 1998 the total population was estimated at 75,000, a decline of about one million in the 1950s. In China, the poachers was halted according to official figures.
In 2004, the subject of a successful Chinese film Kěkěxīlǐ "可可西里" was the combat poachers who prey on Tschirus, (English: Mountain Patrol ). The Chinese title is the name of the Hoh Xil region in the highlands on the border of Tibet, Qinghai and Xinjiang, where the largest herds occur.
One of the five mascots for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing - Yingying (迎 迎) - was a Tschiru.
System
The Tschiru is classified within the even-toed ungulate in the Bovidae family ( Bovidae ). The systematic position within the Bovidae, however, has long been unclear. He was placed alternately to the gazelle -like, the goat -like, as a close relative of the Saiga, or even in its own subfamily Pantholopinae. New molecular genetic studies show that the most likely position in the caprine is correct. Here he is phylogenetically as a sister group of the remaining caprine.