Camera traps have captured images of a Saola, a rare mammal believed by many to have permanently vanished from Vietnam, moving along a stream in a valley in a remote area of the Annamite Range.
>>> Establishment of Saola Conservation Area in Thua Thien Hue
Image of a Saola moving along a stream in a remote valley of the Annamite Range in Vietnam captured by a camera trap on the night of September 7.
On November 13, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in Vietnam announced the rediscovery of a rare Saola through camera traps set in a conservation area in Quang Nam Province.
Saola (Pseudoryx nghetinhensis) is one of the rarest and most endangered mammals on the planet. Often referred to as the Asian unicorn, it is rarely seen and was first identified after its discovery in 1992.
On the evening of September 7, the camera trap captured images of a Saola moving along a stream in the remote valley of the Annamite Range in Vietnam.
“These are the most important photographs of a wild species in Asia, possibly in the world, in the last decade,” said William Robichaud, Coordinator of the Saola Conservation Group of the Species Survival Commission of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
The first live Saola was captured in 1996 in Laos. A few other individuals were captured in subsequent years. Unfortunately, Saola do not seem to adapt well to captivity; all of the above individuals died.
The Saola was first discovered in 1992 by a team of scientists from the former Ministry of Forestry of Vietnam (now the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development) and WWF while researching forest biodiversity in Vu Quang National Park (Ha Tinh, Vietnam), near the Vietnam-Laos border.
There, the research team found a skull with a pair of unusual horns in the house of a hunter. This was considered the first discovery of a large mammal species in the world in 50 years and one of the most remarkable discoveries of the 20th century.
More than 20 years later, knowledge about the ecology and behavior of the Saola remains very limited, and the difficulty in capturing this elusive animal has hindered scientists from making accurate population estimates. It is believed that there are about 200 or just a few dozen Saola left in the dense forests along the Vietnam-Laos border.
Saola is also known as the Asian unicorn because it is rarely seen and was identified after its discovery in 1992.
The last confirmed sighting of a Saola was in Laos in 2010. Locals in Bolikhamsay Province, Central Laos, captured a Saola, but it died shortly after. Previously, the last confirmed sighting of a Saola in the wild was in 1999 in Bolikhamsay through camera trap activities.
In Vietnam, the last time a Saola was seen in the wild was in 1998.
The Saola belongs to the hollow-horned ungulate group, resembling an antelope with two pairs of parallel horns that taper toward the end and can be as long as 50 cm.
The Saola symbolizes the biodiversity of the Annamite Range along the Vietnam-Laos border. Along with the discovery of the Saola, two other species, the Large Antlered Muntjac and the Annamite Muntjac, were also discovered in the forests of the Annamite Range in 1994 and 1997.
