Giant Salamanders

Good news for Andrias davidianus (Chinese Giant Salamander)

China Launches Campaign to Protect Aquatic Wild Animals
(June 25, 2003, Xinhua News Agency)

China will launch a large campaign to crack down on illegal hunting, killing, purchasing, selling, importing and exporting aquatic wild animals, Chinese fishery authorities said on Wednesday.

The campaign will focus on illegal hunting and the trading of rare and endangered aquatic wild animals including the Chinese sturgeon, giant salamander and sea turtle, said officials from the Fishery Bureau under the Ministry of Agriculture.

China will ban any activities that utilize aquatic wild animals under state protection, and any activities that may pose harm to the animals, except for scientific research approved by the government.

Meanwhile, government departments will carry out a thorough investigation into units with approval to raise, exhibit, process and utilize aquatic wild animals, while those engaged in such business without government approval will be severely punished.

The government will for the time being stop issuing certificates for hunting, breeding, transporting and utilizing aquatic wild animals, said the officials.

Sounds like a joke considering the Three Gorges Dam project, which will probably endanger autochthonous Chinese wildlife at large scale even more than poaching could ever do. It will certainly threaten unique and endangered species like the Chinese sturgeon and the Chinese paddlefish.
No offense Tim, but there are always two sides to the medal.

Ralf

True, but still nice to hear that at least some are being saved from this kind of fate :

Chinese Restaurateurs Serve Endangered Salamanders to fight SARS effect on profits

[Copyright 2003 South China Morning Post Ltd. (Hong Kong)]

May 7, 2003 - Times are bad for restaurateurs in Guangzhou. So bad that one restaurant in Baiyun district is trying to lure back customers amid the Sars outbreak by serving up endangered salamanders - raw. Managers of the Longxi Restaurant, owned by a village co-operative, advertised its new dish last Tuesday, hoping to capitalise on the Labour Day holidays and reverse the 40 to 50 per cent drop in business.

One manager said: 'We have just received our licence to serve salamanders, so we thought an exotic dish would bring back diners. But no one has shown any interest.' No one has tasted the new delicacy, but chefs at the 1,000-seat restaurant think of it as a fish and are going to serve it raw, steeped in a rice wine, or steamed. 'It is especially good for women because it will give you a clear complexion,' one waitress told two female diners.

Managers later admitted the claim about its nutritional value was just promotional spiel, but according to the Chinese traditional medicine bible Compendium of Materia Medica, eating salamanders keeps hair jet black, and boosts longevity and immunity. The meat, which is also said to have cancer -fighting properties, is allegedly so tender and fragrant that it has been likened to aquatic ginseng. The creatures are so valuable that in the 1970s, China earned rare foreign currency from salamander exports.

It is not known what type of salamander the restaurant plans to serve, since none of the creatures was at hand. Judging from the description of its size, it is likely to be a Chinese giant salamander, which can grow to a metre in length. It is called a wawa fish in Putonghua because of the sound it makes and it looks like a fat slug with vestigial legs. Diners must order salamander in advance. Each weighs more than 1kg and costs 600 yuan (HK$ 570) per 500 grams. Restaurant managers said they were sourcing only 'maimed, second -generation salamanders' which had been born on farms. They said the price for illegal wild salamander was 1,000 yuan per 500 grams. A Guangzhou fisheries official said wildlife protection laws allowed trading in certain endangered species which have been bred in captivity, but only second-generation offspring. As salamander numbers are still quite low, trading is not encouraged and only disabled salamanders are going to make it to Longxi's tables legally.

An official at the provincial fisheries law enforcement bureau confirmed that the restaurant had been issued a permit to serve salamanders, crocodile meat, two rare kinds of lobster and a rare species of perch.

A sign in the restaurant boasts that it serves all the wild animals from China's five best-known mountains, but managers denied they were currently serving anything more exotic than crocodile meat and snakes. Near the Donghu park, another desperate restaurant has recently put up posters advertising crocodile dishes.

Salamanders, despite being endangered, did not figure in a recent nationwide crackdown on the trade in and consumption of wild animals. The crackdown was launched after the discovery of the coronavirus in Sars patients suggested animals were linked to the disease's spread. Yesterday the Information Times reported that consumption of exotic food was as popular as ever despite the crackdown. Its reporter visited several wholesale wild animal markets in Guangzhou's Zengcha Road and found trading was brisk in the many birds, boars and other animals which traders claimed were captive-bred.

Source: http://www.seafood.com/news/current/96495.html