On September 22 and 24, the Three Gorges Corporation carried out breeding and release activities for rare and endemic fish of the Yangtze River in the Wudongde Hydropower Station reservoir area and below the Xiangjiaba Hydropower Station dam, respectively, releasing more than 758,000 rare and endemic fish fry from the upper reaches of the Yangtze River back into the Jinsha River, injecting new vitality into the recovery of aquatic biological populations in the river basin.
This release covered seven species of rare and endemic fish, including the round-mouth copper fish, the elongate loach, the long-finned gudgeon, the Chinese sucker, the rock carp, the thick-lipped bream, and the fine-scaled snow trout. Among them, the elongate loach and the round-mouth copper fish were the two key species for this release.
The elongate loach is a national second-class protected wild animal, and artificial breeding is highly difficult. Relying on the scientific and technological support of the Three Gorges Corporation's National Engineering Center Yangtze Rare Fish Breeding Base (Jinsha River), the Three Gorges Corporation has continuously carried out research on artificial breeding technology for the elongate loach. Through scientific management of parent fish water quality, water temperature, and nutrition, continuous optimization of induced spawning and hatching, and comprehensive prevention and control of diseases during the transition of larvae and juveniles to feeding, this year it achieved batch breeding of 53,000 fry of releasable size for the elongate loach, setting a record high. More than 30,000 of these were released in this activity.
The round-mouth copper fish is a national second-class protected wild animal and also a representative rare and endemic fish of the upper Yangtze River. Its artificial population domestication and large-scale breeding are recognized as a difficult problem in the industry. After more than ten years of continuous scientific research, the Three Gorges Corporation has successively overcome multiple technical challenges, including domestication of wild parent fish, regulation of gonadal development, and comprehensive prevention and control of ichthyophthirius disease. In 2026, more than 500,000 round-mouth copper fish fry of releasable size were independently bred, breaking the record for breeding scale over the years. Since the breeding and release of 23,000 fry of releasable size in 2021, the artificial breeding scale of the round-mouth copper fish has achieved a more than 20-fold increase in five years. These two release activities officially kicked off the sequential release of the round-mouth copper fish in three locations.
Next, the Three Gorges Corporation will successively carry out breeding and release of the round-mouth copper fish in the tail area of the Wudongde Reservoir in Panzhihua and the Heishui River basin in Liangshan Prefecture, actively exploring a new model of coordinated ecological restoration of main and tributary streams. At the same time, it will implement supporting work including tagged release, population tracking, and effectiveness evaluation, integrating scientific protection throughout the entire process of breeding, release, and monitoring, and continuously providing support and assurance for the protection of rare and endemic fish in the upper Yangtze River and the recovery of natural populations.
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