Cát Tiên National Park

11.423333333333107.42861111111Koordinaten: 11 ° 25 ' 24 "N, 107 ° 25' 43 " O

The National Park Cat Tien ( Vietnamese Quốc gia Vuon Cát Tiên ) is an important national park in the south of Vietnam, about 150 kilometers north of Ho Chi Minh City. It protects one of the largest remaining areas of tropical lowland rain forest in Vietnam.

History

The area of the National Park Cat Tien was placed under protection in 1978 and then consisted of the two parts of Nam Cat Tien and Tay Cat Tien. Cat Loc, the third part of the present park was placed under protection in 1992, after there a population of extremely rare Javan Rhino was discovered. Since they had already believed, this subspecies of the Java rhinoceros would be extinct, this discovery led to the park international attention. In 1998, a single park from these three parts.

During the Vietnam War, parts of the area with herbicides such as Agent Orange were sprayed. In the affected areas grow until today no trees, but only bamboo and grass.

Biodiversity

Approximately 50 percent of the park is covered by evergreen forest, mainly of wing fruit plants. Another 40 percent are made of bamboo forests, the remaining 10 percent is arable land, wetlands or overgrown with grass.

The wildlife of the park is impressive, but partly serious threat. So there is in the park Asian elephants and sun bears. For the Gaur is the protected area is still an important refuge dar. In contrast, the banteng, the wild water buffalo and the Kouprey in the park are extinct .. The same is probably true for the critically endangered Javan rhino, which here with one of the world's two populations occurred. Some sources also mention tigers, leopards, clouded leopards, Dhole, Asian black bear, but a recent series of studies could not confirm this.

The park is home to many small mammals, including monkeys dresses, yellow-cheeked crested gibbons, long-tailed macaques, civets, mouse deer and tree shrews. The bird species live in the park, among other things, the Malays duck and the hornbill.

Endangering

Cat Tien is an important reserve in Vietnam. It is the home are on the Red List of endangered species for 41 species and protects about 30 percent of the occurring species in Vietnam.

Nevertheless, the park is threatened by the spread of the surrounding communities, illegal logging and poaching. The park also for the larger species is not large enough, which leads to conflicts with the local population if these animals move outside the park. This problem mainly applies the elephants of the park. This like walking, also the population is probably too small to be able to exist permanently.

Since the early 1990s, partly as a result of the discovery of the rhino, donors from all over the world and the Vietnamese government have started to invest more money in the park.

Currently, flora and fauna of the national park are acutely threatened by the construction of hydroelectric power plants Dong Nai 6 and Dong Nai 6A. For the protection of the park a petition is prepared for it.

Swell

• Gert Polet and Stephen Ling: Protecting mammal diversity: opportunities and constraints for pragmatic conservation management in Cat Tien National Park, Vietnam. Oryx Vol 38 No 2 April 2004