Conservationists are celebrating after a successful relocation of endangered finless porpoise in China marked another milestone in the journey to save the species from extinction.



There are estimated to be only around 1,000 0f the species remaining in the wild – making it rarer than China’s giant panda – and numbers are thought to be declining by more than 12% a year.

But four adults have joined an existing population of four that was relocated from Poyang Lake in March, taking to eight the number of healthy, breeding adults in a secure habitat in the Hewangmiao/Jichengyuan oxbow reserve.



The two males and two females were carefully selected and captured using specially designed nets. Following health checks, the porpoises were transported to their new home in the central province of Hunan on 1 December, where it is hoped they will boost the genetic viability of the existing population.



“The finless porpoise is on the brink of extinction so the progress being made to save the species is not only essential but inspirational,” said John Barker, WWF-UK’s head of China programmes. “It is a key milestone in both the conservation of the iconic species and the wider movement to conserve endangered cetaceans worldwide.”

The world’s only freshwater porpoise is found in coastal waters in south-east and east Asia, but its subspecies, N. p. asiaeorientalis, is found only in the middle and lower reaches of China’s Yangtze river and two connecting freshwater lakes, Dongting and Poyang. The finless porpoises’ new home is connected to the Yangtze at certain times of the year during flooding.



In 2013 the species was upgraded to “critical” on the IUCN’s “red list” of endangered species after a 2012 survey showed the population had halved between 2006-12. At this rate and without intervention, the porpoise, also known as the “Yangtze pig”, could disappear within a decade, WWF has warned.

The main driver of their decline is not clear because of the sheer range of human activities operating along China’s longest river, but sand dredging, shipping, legal and illegal fishing, pollution, habitat degradation and a reduction of fish prey are all factors.



Coordinated efforts to prevent the species from suffering the same fate as the Baiji or Yangtze river dolphin, which was officially declared extinct in 2007, began in the 1990s, when finless porpoises were taken from the Yangtze river and put into oxbow lakes alongside the main channel. While numbers plummeted in the main river, the population in the oxbows slowly increased, proving that the species could thrive when relocated to more secure areas.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Four finless porpoise were relocated in March from Poyang Lake to the Hewangmiao reserve. Photograph: Xiao Yijiu/Corbis

The latest porpoises to be relocated came from one of these reserves, Tian’ezhou. A census carried out last month found numbers had more than doubled in the last five years to around 60 individuals, with one-third of the porpoises either pregnant or mothers suckling calves. However, WWF says this reserve is now approaching capacity, making the latest porpoise relocation “vital and timely”.

Hewangmiao/Jichengyuan, which is home to 34 species of fish, is one of five freshwater reserves that have been chosen to protect viable populations and allow individuals to be exchanged between the sites to maintain the species’ overall genetic diversity.

“Our long-term strategy is for five oxbow reserves,” Barker said. “We would like to ensure a viable population of 600 finless porpoise in total, of which we want 200 in oxbows and 400 in the lakes and main river. You could say ‘well there are 1,000 the Yangtze at the moment’ – but they aren’t viable, simply because of the pressures and rate of decline. What we want to see is a proven stable or increasing population of 600 as a minimum. This would provide genetic variability for a viable long-term population.”

The finless porpoise relocation project is supported by WWF, HSBC Water Programme, Yangtze River Basin Fishery Supervision & Management Office, China’s Ministry of Agriculture, the Institute of Hydrobiology, Tian’ezhou National Nature Reserve, Hewangmiao Nature Reserve and Wuhan Baiji Conservation Foundation.

