Cat Tien National Park

Cat Tien National Park ( _vi. Vườn quốc gia Cát Tiên) is an important national park found in the south of Vietnam, approximately 150 km north of Ho Chi Minh City. It protects one of the largest areas of lowland tropical rainforests left in Vietnam.

History

Cat Tien national park was protected initially in 1978 as two sectors, Nam Cat Tien and Tay Cat Tien. Another sector, Cat Loc, was gazeted as a Rhinoceros Reserve in 1992 upon the discovery of a population of the Vietnamese Javan Rhinoceros, an occasion that brought the park into the world's eye. The three areas were combined to form one park in 1998.

The park suffered historically during the Vietnam War when it was extensively sprayed with herbicides like the defoliant Agent Orange. To this day these areas have extensive bamboo and grassland cover and trees have not yet grown back.

Biodiversity

Cat Tien National Park consists of evergreen tropical and deciduous forest, dominated by Dipterocarpaceae, Fabaceae and Lythraceae (especially "Lagerstroemia" spp.), with 40% of the park comprising bamboo woodland, and the remaining 10% farmland, wetlands and grassland. The park fauna is impressive, if highly threatened, comprising of such impressive megafauna as Javan Rhinos (one of only two populations in the world), Asian Elephants, Gaur, Sun Bears and, possibly, Banteng, and Wild Asian Water Buffalo. Some accounts also list tigers, Leopards, Clouded Leopards, Dholes and Asiatic black bears, however a recent series of surveys did not confirm this. The park also holds hosts of smaller [http://www.namcattien.org/mammals.htm mammal species] , including Yellow-cheeked Gibbons, Silvery Langurs, Crab-eating Macaques, Pygmy Slow Loris, as well as civets, mouse deer, and treeshrews.

The park also has impressive [http://www.namcattien.org/birds.htm bird species] including White-winged Ducks, Siamese Firebacks, Great Hornbills and Black Eagles.

Threats

Cat Tien comprises an important reserve in Vietnam, both for the habitat it protects and numbers of species. As well as being a critical reserve for the Javan Rhino, it also is home to 40 IUCN Red List species, and protects around 30% of Vietnam's species. The park is, however, threatened by encroachment from local communities, illegal logging and poaching. In addition, the park is too small for the larger species found inside it, this leads to either their local extinction or to conflicts with local people as these animals move beyond the confines of the park. This problem is particularly intense for the park's elephant population, which is prone to wandering and is considered too small to be self sustainable.

Since the early 1990s, partly as a result of the discovery of rhinos in the park, international donors and the Vietnamese government began to invest more money in protecting the park and managing the resources of local State Forest Enterprises, nearby and adjoining forests, in co-ordination with the park as a whole. There have been moves to combine a management plan that allows for both traditional park management and some limited resource utilisation by local people, which include the Stieng, Ma, Ta Lai and Cho'ro minorities.

References

Protecting mammal diversity: opportunities and constraints for pragmatic conservation management in Cat Tien National Park, Vietnam, "Oryx", 38, Polet & Ling, (2004) [http://www.wwfindochina.org/Cat-tien/Mammals%20of%20Cat%20Tien%20NP.pdf]

External links

* [http://www.namcattien.org Cat Tien National Park: further information including species lists]
* [http://www.aboutvietnam.org/Video/Cat_Tien_National_Park.html Video: Cat Tien National Park in Vietnam]
* [http://www.footprintsvietnam.com/destination_cat_tien_national_park.htm A Tourist Company dealing with Cat Tien]
* [http://friendsofmonkeyworld.co.uk/archives/36 Monkey World: Gibbon rehabilitation at Cat Tien]
* [http://www.panda.org/about_wwf/where_we_work/asia_pacific/our_solutions/greatermekong/greater_annamites_ecoregion/index.cfm?uProjectID=VN0022 WWF in Cat Tien]