Changqing Nature Reserve 长青国家级自然保护区

About Changqing Nature Reserve

These are conservation habitats, and a visit should not be planned as an unrestricted wildlife trek. The public-facing Huayang scenic area provides a practical introduction through its Qinling Four Treasures education area and the old mountain settlement on the Tangluo route. Together they explain both the region’s ecology and the long history of people travelling through these valleys.

On 20 March 2014, local residents reported a wild giant panda wandering in the riverbed below the old town at Huayang; staff from a Shaanxi rescue and research center for rare wildlife sedated it and examined it on site. It was found listless, undernourished, suffering from severe skin disease and ascites, with cracked paw pads suggesting a serious mineral or vitamin deficiency, and was taken back to the center that evening for further treatment.

In 2018, a brown adult giant panda was photographed and filmed in the reserve for the first time in 26 years, since February 1992, the ninth such sighting recorded in the Qinling region; earlier brown-panda sightings had all come from the core area of the Shaanxi Qinling mountains. At the IUCN's 2014 World Parks Congress, the reserve was included in the first Green List of well-managed protected areas worldwide.

What to look for

• The Qinling Four Treasures visitor-education area in the Huayang scenic area, introducing the region’s characteristic animals.
• Huayang’s old settlement and its setting on the historic Tangluo route through the Qinling.

The surrounding area

South of the Qinling, with rice-sheet breakfasts, Han history and plank-road interpretation.

Location & getting there

Getting to Changqing Nature Reserve

Approach Huayang Town from Yang County on the Yang–Hua tourism road, which links the Yangxian West station area with Huayang.

• Use the public Huayang scenic-area entrance for a visitor outing; confirm separately any conservation-area activity rather than entering reserve trails independently.