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Top 6 Swamps/Wetlands in China w. Google Earth Links

May 24, 2010

[sources] 1. tianya | 2. lvyou | 3. hljhulin | 4. DX | 5. t-365 | 6. Tiger Yang

A swamp is a wetland featuring flooding of large areas of land by shallow bodies of water.

A wetland is an area of land whose soil is saturated with moisture either permanently or seasonally.

Wetland, the Kidney of Planet Earth. Wetlands are considered the most biologically diverse of all ecosystems. And they have the strongest purification capability of all ecosystems. However, the environmental importance of wetlands was only realized by human in recent decade or two.

China has 66 million hectares of wetlands, about 10% of world’s total. That ranks 1st in Asia and 4th in the world. So China is one of the countries that have most complete categories of wetland types and most abundant in quantity, too. However, in recent decades along with the economical boom, wetlands have shrunk sharply. Recently, China realized the importance of wetlands, and started to take actions on wetlands protection.

Today I am going to show you the top 6 most beautiful swamp/wetlands in China. You can view all of them in Google Earth here.

1. Zoige 若尔盖: Green jade on Tibetan Plateau
Google Earth | Wiki | location: Ngawa, Sichuan

A vast marsh lying mostly in northern Sichuan province, west-central China. It occupies about 1,000 square miles (2,600 square km) of the eastern part of the Plateau of Tibet at an elevation of 11,800 feet (3,600 metres) above sea level and extends westward across the border of Sichuan into southern Gansu and southeastern Qinghai provinces.

In their historical Long March, the Chinese Red Army passed this wetland many times and left many touching stories. The first bend of Yellow River is here.

Bayanbulak

2. Bayanbulak 巴音布鲁克: Miracle created by snow water from Tianshan Mountains
Google Earth | Wiki | location: Hejing, Xinjiang

Located in the basin of Tianshan Mountains, Bayanbulak is surrounded by snow peaks, about 2500m above sea level, and covers 22,000 km2, the 2nd largest grassland in China. It has the largest Wild Swan Conservation Area and a great summer resort Gons National Forest.

3. Sanjiang Plain Wetland 三江平原湿地: The remaining magnificence
Google Earth | Wiki | location: Heilongjiang

Sanjiang literally means Three Rivers (Heilong River, Wusuli River, Songhua River). The deposition and irrigation of these three big rivers made Sanjiang Plain the largest marsh/wetland region and the richest (most productive) arable land in China.

The area is significant for the number and variety of globally threatened waterbirds it supports. In addition, the lakes and rivers support three endemic cyprinid fish species, three rare and two endemic amphibians and over 424 species of flowering plant, including four that are rare endemic species.

4. Yellow River Delta Wetland 黄河三角洲湿地: Ongoing vicissitudes
Google Earth | Wiki | location: Dongying, Shandong

Here the freshest land is forming and expanding every year with the loess carries by the dirtiest big river in world — Yellow River. Plenty of water, rich vegetation, a unique hydrological intersection of sea water and fresh water, all these form a broad plankton flourished wetland, which is very suitable as birds’ habitat. Nearly 300 species of birds have been found here. Wetlands International officials ridiculed as the “Bird’s International Airport”

image

by {link:http://www.flickr.com/photos/drnantu/1239135432/}gongfu king{/link}

Zhalong Swan

5. Zhalong Wetland 扎龙湿地: Grace homeland of Cranes
Google Earth | Wiki | location: Qiqihar, Heilongjiang

This 840 square mile (2175 square kilometers) marsh reserve serves as a stopover and nesting area for a large number of storks, swans, herons, grebes and other species. Lying on a migration path stretching from the Russian Arctic around the Gobi desert to South East Asia the land under this preserve is used by migrating birds between April and October.

image

by {link:http://www.flickr.com/photos/wensi/963931851/}wensi.f{/link}

Red Shore

6. Liao River Delta Wetland 辽河三角洲湿地: The red carpet
Google Earth | Wiki | location: Panjin, Liaoning

Liao River Delta is famous for its unique “Red Carpet Shore” as show in the pictures. It is also known to have the largest reed marsh in the world.

[Scenic Splendor of China Series]
This is one post of the Scenic Splendor of China Series. In 2005.10, Chinese National Geography (CNG) selected 114 “most beautiful places” covering 17 different types of scenic patterns. The complete list is here. In Chinese. These scenic places will be covered individually in future.

[Chinese Keywords]
中国最美的地方 沼泽湿地



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