Finding the Origin of the Traps
In Pu Mat National Park, there is a forest protection team called Antipoaching. The team was established by the Wildlife Conservation Center in Vietnam and paid salaries since 2018. With 15 members, most of them are engineers and forestry bachelors, recruited, trained and thoroughly trained. Not only requiring knowledge, forest skills, good health... to be selected as a member of the team, loving the forest and wildlife is one of the strict criteria.
Each trip through the forest, the team's silent footsteps often lasted more than a week. The luggage they brought on the trips up the mountain included rice, dried fish, salted pork, pots, hammocks, tents, medicine...
Not homesickness, missing loved ones… but the biggest fear for them is the traps that hunters set in the forest like a net of heaven and earth; if not careful, it is easy to get into trouble. Not to mention the fierce resistance of the hunters, with homemade hunting guns always in hand. And many things lurking in the forest, such as leeches, forest mosquitoes, yellow flies, rotten and broken tree branches and sudden floods…
Since its establishment, the team has conducted more than 2,000 patrols, with 7,466 days of walking in the forest. They also calculated the total walking distance of the team to be up to 68,665 km. During those trips to the forest, the team discovered 861 violators, and recorded 370 cases. In addition, they also removed nearly 15,000 animal traps, discovered 311 animals that were hunted, shot, and transported; destroyed more than 1,000 hunters' camps... Through camera traps, Pu Mat National Park assessed that since the team was established, the number of wild animals in the park has increased significantly.
Pu Mat National Park covers an area of over 94,275 hectares, spread over 3 districts: Tuong Duong, Con Cuong and Anh Son. The park has 82 species of 33 families belonging to the classes of mammals, birds, amphibians and reptiles. Of these, there are 48 endangered and rare species, 26 species are listed in the Vietnam Red Book, 21 species are listed in the IUCN Red List...
Meaningful message
More than 15,000 animal traps were confiscated by the rangers and forest protection team, lying around for many years in the warehouse of Pu Mat National Park since 2018. It was not until 2023, when lecturers and students from Hanoi University of Architecture visited Pu Mat National Park, that the idea of combining animal traps into the shape of elephants was sparked.
Deputy Director of Pu Mat National Park Le Anh Tuan said: Lecturers and students of Hanoi University of Architecture have requested to design the image of a mother and baby elephant, made from wild animal traps that were dismantled and confiscated by the rangers of Pu Mat National Park.
To complete this pair of mother and baby elephants, lecturers and students of Hanoi University of Architecture, along with staff and workers of Pu Mat National Park and forest protection households, worked hard for more than 10 days. The remaining 3,000 traps were placed in the belly of the mother and baby elephants. The wild animal traps used to “tie elephants” were mainly clamp traps, noose-wire traps, spear traps, etc.
Mr. Le Anh Tuan added: The display of a pair of elephants trapping wild animals here sends a message to tourists and locals not to use traps to hunt wild animals and to protect wild animals.
In the National Park area, there is often a situation where people from all over use traps and guns to illegally hunt rare wild animals. Since the beginning of 2024, the Pu Mat National Park rangers have removed and destroyed over 400 traps of various types, along with hunting guns and weapons used to hunt wild animals such as spears, nooses, etc.
Today, every time visitors visit Pu Mat National Park, they can also enjoy the image of a mother and baby elephant pair leisurely “walking”. When approaching, they can see that these two elephants are meticulously woven from wild animal traps, further demonstrating a strong message about the awareness of protecting forests and wildlife…
Source: https://baodantoc.vn/khi-chiec-bay-thu-hoa-thanh-voi-1717142147491.htm
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