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Explore the region
About Lizhong Water Forest
Lizhong Water Forest (李中水上森林) is a planted wetland forest of dawn redwood and pond cypress in Lizhong town (李中镇), Xinghua (兴化), Jiangsu, close to Shunsheng Bridge (舜生桥) on the Xing–Sha road (兴沙公路). In May 2014 it became Xinghua's first national 4A-rated scenic area.
The forest is man-made. In the early 1980s local officials and villagers cut the unused flats here into long raised plots, known as duoge (垛格), and planted them with dawn redwood (水杉) and pond cypress (池杉), trees suited to growing in water. The Xinghua city government describes the method as 'trees on the plots, fish in the ditches' (林垛沟鱼): some 100,000 trees stand on the strips of land, with fish in the water channels between them.
The government puts the whole ecological forest base at 18,894 mu, with a first development zone of 1,500 mu, of which 1,050 mu is woodland. It calls Lizhong the largest artificial wetland forest ecosystem in the Lixiahe (里下河) region. Birds recorded here include owls, wild ducks and egrets; the government put their number at more than 60,000 at the peak and about 30,000 in ordinary times.
Inside the park, wooden boardwalks wind among the trees, with stone bridges and pavilions set between the woods and the water. Visitors can float on wooden rafts, wearing bamboo hats, around the outer edge of the forest, past groves given nicknames such as Heroes' Wood (好汉林), Wild Boar Wood (野猪林) and Muddled Wood (糊涂林). The city government also describes shows drawn from local fishing life, including the release of wild ducks and fishing with cormorants.
What to look for
- Rows of dawn redwood and pond cypress on raised plots between water channels
- Egrets, wild ducks, owls and other birds living in the forest
- Wooden boardwalks, stone bridges and pavilions through the forest
- Raft trips around the outer edge of the forest
- Named groves such as Heroes' Wood (好汉林) and Wild Boar Wood (野猪林)
- Cormorant fishing and wild-duck release shows
Location & getting there
Getting to Lizhong Water Forest
- Search for 李中水上森林 with 泰州市 and 兴化市.
Find Lizhong Water Forest
李中水上森林 · 兴化市
No reliable map pin yet: search by the Chinese name.
Sources & visit information
Written from the linked sources and checked sentence by sentence against quoted extracts by a separate reviewer on 2026-09-23. Opening hours, admission and access arrangements are not covered; confirm current visitor information with the site.
Some facts checked against Wikipedia contributors, "兴化李中水上森林景区" · CC BY-SA 4.0.