Program Overview
The Cao vit gibbon (Nomascus nasutus, abbr. CVG), also known asthe Eastern Black Crested Gibbon is a critically endangered species with an estimated 74 individuals left in the wild. 36 of themnow live in Bangliang Gibbon National Nature Reserve, Guangxi, China. [1] As a result of human activities like deforestation for logging and agriculture, encroachment of human civilization, and poaching, the CVG was consideredextinct for more than 50 years, but in 2002, it was miraculously rediscovered,making it the second most endangered primate in the world after the Hainan crested gibbon (Nomascus hainanus).
The nature reserve, although a 6530 hectares’ area of protected land,could only provide CVG with habitat of 1660 hectares. To support the growing CVG population, our program in Bangliang aims torestore and expand the current CVG karst forest habitat, providing the gibbons with trees as food, shelter, and corridors for locomotion, and hopefully one day, allowing CVG to increase the area of their home ranges in order to better repopulate and survive.
[1] https://www.conservation.org/priorities/biodiversity-hotspots
Habitat Restoration
CVG habitat restoration efforts center around connecting the 130 hectares of existing but fragmented viable habitat within the nature reserve. Planting important food sources and sleeping trees in strategic locations, which will both strengthen existing habitats and create new corridors between already viable habitats, will increase the overall CVG habitat quality and connectivity.
For the next two years after planting, the saplings will be carefully maintained, by weeding and fertilizing individuals every spring and autumn to bolster viability. During this time frame, the saplings are also annually monitored for health and growth, through height and diameter measurements. Long-term annual monitoring and sampling of the planting sites as a whole will contribute to creating a cohesive database with which to craft thorough and informative forest reports, detailing the overall progress of the project.
International Gibbon Day
Gibbon is one of the most endangered primates on earth, and the only one of the apes living in China. International Gibbon Day was initiated by the International Union for Conservation of Nautre (IUCN) in 2015, to raise awareness about gibbon species and gibbon conservation to protect them.
Since 2021, Shanghai Roots & Shoots has been working with Shanghai Zoo every year to host a series activities 'Making Toys for Gibbons', which engaged students and the publich to learn about gibbons, making enrichment toys for them, and call for public attention and protection of the endangered gibbon species.
