China's largest wetland museum, Huanghekou Wetland Museum, in Dongying City, east China's Shandong Province, has opened to visitors.  

Covering 7,856 square meters and with an investment of six million yuan (US$722,892), the museum lies in the Yellow River Delta National Nature Reserve, which boasts one of the 13 most important wetlands in the world under the protection of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).

"The museum will collect and exhibit rare wetland resources, and become a research center for experts and institutions both at home and abroad and an educational base for students and environmentalists," said Liu Yunhua, director of the local environmental protection bureau.

The nature reserve covering an area of 153,000 hectares is the largest delta nature reserve in China and an important transfer station and habitat for birds from northeast Asia and around the western Pacific.

With the most complete, widest and youngest wetland ecosystem in a warm temperature zone in China, the reserve boasts five wetland types including shrub wetland, meadow wetland, swamp wetland, river wetland and shore wetland.

It has 393 known species of plants and 1,542 species of animal. Among them, 58 animals such as the red-crowned crane, erne, bustard and China merganser are under state protection.

The reserve is also one of the most important habitats for the endangered black-beaked gull.

(Xinhua News Agency February 2, 2004)