Pangquangou National Park

Brown-eared pheasant is an ancient bird in China, which has a history of 3 million years. Confined to very few habitats, and found only in Shanxi and Hebei Province, north central China, its slow breeding keeps it extraordinarily small in number; which is a number a little more than the world's rarest animal giant panda. It is, therefore, recognized as one of the world's rarest birds, which is included in the Convention of International Trade for Endangered Wild Animals and Plants, and is at the first level of China's protection. Aiming at conservation and reproduction of this world­rare valuable bird, and protection of its habitat, the park was set aside in 1980.

Resting 150 kilometers away from Taiyuan, the capital city of Shanxi Province, north central China, the park covers 10,443 hectares, stretching 15 kilo­meters long and 14.5 kilometers wide. With a complex terrain, it is highlighted by towering peaks and mountains, of which 10 peaks soar to a height of over 2, 000 meters above sea level, the major peak piercing to the sky at 2,830 meters in elevation. Varied climates, a variety of soils, cool annual mean temperature and sufficient rainfall support more than 500 species of lush vegetation including the pure and mixed coniferous or broadleaf heavy woods, that blanket the mountains and peaks and cloak 90 percent of the park's land, making it a well-conserved treasure-house on the dry loess plateau. A stunning view in the park. The forests are populated with a great variety of trees, common and abundant are wilson spruce (Picea wilsonii), Meyer spruce (Picea meyeri), larch, Chinese pine, aspen, oaks, poplars, birch and a variety of firs.

The park is prolific in ancient, gigantic and queer-shaped trees. Some over 100 or over 200 years old pines, elms, firs and poplars soar more than 25-30 meters and have diameters up to around 1 meter; some have very stout trunks that would require 3-4 people, hands clasped, to encircle.

Some queer-shaped trees created a sight unique to this park. A big fir and a smaller fir joined their trunks, and offer an illusion of one big tree when looked in a distance, but the trunk is composed of a big one and a small one which have their separated crowns when taking a close look. This fir, therefore, is called a joined fir. In an­other place in the park, you find a pine tree and a poplar tree joined their trunks at 4 meters above the ground. Also in the park, you can spot that a larch was gripped by two aspens and became a joined trunk as if the larch were embraced by the two aspens. These odd­shaped trees came up from a wind-down, which exposed their tap­roots to the air, and then the running rain water pushed their tap­roots together. The wind forced their trunks joined and eventually merged. These impacts occurred more than 50 years ago, therefore these trees of freak shapes are over 50 years old.

Wildflowers bloom throughout the park from early spring to summer, during which wildflowers drape the hillsides, alongside the trails, roadways and the streams. The fields in front of the foot­hills are carpeted with a profusion of flowers. Scarlet wild lilies are blooming as though impatient to end their long winter dormancy. Purple mountain lilac, pink wild rose, yellow manchu rose, blue woodland forgetrne not, pink mountain apricot blossoms, blue and red wild chrysanthemums brighten the landscape and perfume the air.