Part 13: The difficulty of preventing animal trapping in Pu Mat National Park

(Baonghean) -During each patrol, the QLBVR stations of Pu Mat National Park discovered and confiscated hundreds of animal traps set up all over the forest. The actions and methods of setting traps by hunters are increasingly sophisticated and unpredictable, making the work of protecting rare animal resources on an area of ​​more than 93 thousand hectares of the Park more difficult and complicated.

Traps spread throughout the forest

Pu Mat National Park is known as one of the forest areas with many rare animals living such as tigers, saola, horse-faced monkeys... With an area of ​​over 93 thousand hectares spread over the territory of 3 districts Anh Son, Con Cuong, Tuong Duong, the work of protecting rare animal resources is as important as the work of preventing forest fires and preventing forest product theft. What many forest protection officers are most concerned about is the act of trapping wild animals by people living around the forest that still takes place secretly despite being mobilized, propagandized, and even administratively punished.

In the first 6 months of 2011, the number of traps collected by forest rangers reached thousands. The main types of traps commonly used are: spears, noose traps, clamp traps, etc. According to Mr. Dang Dinh Xuan, Head of the Forest Ranger Department of Pu Mat National Park, the actual number of traps set by animal thieves in the forest is much larger. He also said that many times, forest rangers do not have time to collect traps during forest patrols, so they have to destroy them. The main animals that animal thieves often target are wild boars, weasels, monkeys, squirrels, etc.

Brake wire trap - a type of trap commonly used by animal thieves.

The place we were aiming for was Khe Bu, where many animals live and where people often set traps for wild animals. Mr. Nguyen Dinh Tien and Mr. Nguyen Cong Thanh (officers of Khe Bu Forest Protection Station) led us into the forest. Mr. Tien confided: Now, the tricks of setting traps are very sophisticated and complicated, each season they will set a different style, such as the rainy season is the season to set traps, and in other seasons they often go into the forest to clear the way to lure animals.

After noon, we finally arrived at Khe Chat, the vines were tangled like spider webs, the old trees were so big that two people could not hug around. While walking, the whole group had to concentrate to observe every sound, to check for animal traps hidden in each bush, under the dry leaves. "When you come here, you have to be careful because animal traps are set everywhere. Many times, if you are not careful, you will fall into their traps", Mr. Tien walked while waving his stick in front. Whoosh! The stick hit a trap, dry leaves flew everywhere, the trap was pulled up high. Mr. Tien picked up the animal trap and said: This is a noose trap, using a brake rope, it is designed very simply but once the animal is caught, it will be difficult to escape. Every time we patrol, we discover hundreds of traps like this. If we are not careful, the animals will fall into the trap immediately.

Going about 1 km further, we discovered about a dozen similar brake wire traps. However, according to Mr. Tien, there were actually many more traps around here. They could not collect them all during their forest patrol.

Need to prevent trapping of wild animals

According to Mr. Xuan, the main hunters are people living around the buffer zone of Pu Mat National Park. In the past, people considered trapping animals as their main source of income, but due to propaganda and mobilization, the situation of setting traps in the forest has decreased a lot. However, now they do it secretly so it is very difficult to detect. People often set traps in the forest such as in Trung Chinh village (Yen Khe, Con Cuong), Tung Huong village, Quang Yen village (Tam Dinh, Tuong Duong)... Each time they set traps in the forest, they bring food and sleep in the forest for 10-15 days. Sometimes after setting traps, they go to Laos to play and then come back to visit the traps a few days later.

To avoid detection by the Pu Mat National Park rangers, the thieves, after trapping wild animals, butcher them, clean them, put them in Styrofoam boxes, and then bring them back. Before going to Khe Bu, we went to Trung Chinh village, pretending to be buyers of wild animal meat to sell, but we had absolutely no leads. When we asked, we learned that now, the thieves have connected with middlemen and traders in the lowlands. Whenever there is goods, the two sides discuss over the phone. The middlemen will drive directly to the village and then bring them straight to pubs and restaurants. Because we are strangers, it is difficult for us to buy even a kilo.

The civet was captured by the Park's staff.
from trappers

It started to rain, knowing that we were tired and could not continue, Mr. Tien suggested that the whole group return to the Station. They said that although the forest rangers had tried very hard, preventing animal trapping was still extremely difficult and arduous. With an area of ​​over 93 thousand hectares, the forest rangers and staff were very thin, making the work of patrolling, detecting and confiscating animal traps "beyond our capacity". Khe Bu Forest Management Station alone had 7 staff members, but the area assigned to protect was over 25 thousand hectares. On average, each person was assigned to manage over 3 thousand hectares. That was not a small area of ​​forest, making the work of patrolling the forest, detecting and confiscating animal traps even more difficult.

“Sometimes, due to the large number of traps, we cannot bring them back, so we have to destroy them right in the forest. During patrols, if we find an animal caught in a trap, we will check to see if the animal is still healthy and the wound is not serious, then release it back into the forest. But if the wound is too serious, we will give first aid and then take it to the Animal Rescue Center at the Park for care and nurturing,” said Mr. Thanh.

The pouring rain of the July afternoon made us walk faster towards Khe Bu National Park. The further we went, the heavier the rain fell, stinging our faces. The whole group was silent, one person following the other as we walked. We knew that the rain would stop and the sun would shine, but when would those animal traps disappear, scattered all over the forest, along the animal tracks? When would those animals ever be able to live “in peace”?

Pham Bang