|
Experience Nature in Chiku Rural Township
 |
| On a raft tour of Chiku Lagoon, you can quietly enjoy the sight of egrets in flight, soldier crabs and hermit crabs feeding, and little fish leaping out of the water--just like on the Discovery Channel.
|
Chiku Rural Township lies at the southwestern tip of Tainan County. Bounded to the west by the Taiwan Strait and to the south by the Tsengwen River, it has an area of 115 sq. km, as large as Tainan City. Many of Chiku's residents are engaged in sea salt production or aquaculture. Chiku is famed for the "three treasures"of its aquaculture industry--oysters, milkfish and saltwater tilapia--and also for black-faced spoonbills, salt mounds and mangroves.
In the part of Chiku to the west of Provincial Highway 17 there are salt pans and several thousand hectares of salt-water fish rearing ponds, while to the east there are mainly fields. But most crops do not thrive in Chiku's saline soil. A rare exception, and the star crop here, is the muskmelon. Many varieties are grown, most of them very sweet.
Every December to January, when the melons are in season and black-faced spoonbills are circling in the sky, Chiku Farmers Association puts on a "Muskmelon Festival,"so that as well as enjoying the sight of the spoonbills, visitors can also take part in activities such as pickling baby melons, painting melons and making oyster-shell art. During the festival, "spoonbill buses" take visitors on guided tours around Chiku's salt mounds, its internationally known black-faced spoonbill refuge, and its 1500-hectare lagoon with its oyster frames and sandbars, and a market sells local produce such as muskmelons, cherry tomatoes, spring onions, garlic, sesame oil and canned milkfish. In Tingshan Village, at the northern edge of Chiku Rural Township, one can see 40-plus rare land-growing mangrove trees at Tingshan Elementary School, and visit the famous Tingshan Salt Pans. But as manual salt harvesting ceased in June 2001, visitors will have to wait for the planned salt industry museum to become a reality to learn about the skills and laborious effort involved in traditional salt making.
A good way to end a visit to Chiku is to follow Provincial Highway 17 south and take in some of the sights of Tainan City, such as Anping Fort, the former premises of tea traders Tait & Co., Fort Provintia (Chihkanlou), or Woozland amusement park (famous for its high water-slides). When in Tainan, don't forget to sample Mr. Chou's shrimp rolls, and Yungtaihsing candied fruit.
Woozland Amusement Park
160, Lane 245, Chengpei Road, Annan District, Tainan City
Tel: (06) 257-3811
Chiku Farmers Association
272, Tacheng Village, Chiku Rural Township, Tainan County
Tel: (06) 787-1285 |
Chiku Lagoon, Tingtoue Sandbar, Clam Park, Chiku Lighthouse
 |
| Soldier crabs-which walk forwards, not sideways-live in large numbers on the soft mudflats of Chiku Lagoon, where they come out to feed at low tide. The crabs are distinguished by their ball-shaped blue carapaces and their long, white, slender legs and claws. |
Chiku Lagoon is prized by conservationists at home and abroad as Taiwan's last unpolluted wetland. The name refers to the expanse of seawater separated from the Taiwan Strait by the Chingshankang, Wangtsailiao and Tingtoue sandbars. The quality of the water makes it highly suitable for raising oysters to be eaten raw. Chiku Lagoon is home to hundreds of species of fish, shellfish, crabs, and migratory birds, including four endangered bird species. The water is one to two meters deep, and low tide exposes vast, ecologically rich mudflats.
A raft trip around the lagoon is a must, but be sure to choose a time when the tide is coming in, for at low tide the rafts are easily stranded and you may have get into the water and push--though of course this can be half the fun. Before your raft trip, take the opportunity to stroll along the harbor, where tropical fish swim in the clear, green seawater. On a guided raft trip you can learn all about the different kinds of oyster frames, including floating types, hanging line types and horizontal types, and also get a better understanding of the lagoon's ecology.
Wangtsailiao and Tingtoue sandbars reveal shocking evidence of the rapid degradation of Taiwan's coasts. Hsu Hsien-ping, a guide at the Salt Country Culture and History Workshop, says that Tingtoue sandbar used to be home for thousands of egrets and other birds, but noisy tourists frightened the egrets away, leaving only the signs explaining their natural history, erected next to the beefwood forest by the Tainan County Wild Bird Society, as a poignant reminder.
 |
| The beefwood stumps sticking up out of the yellow sands of the "beefwood graveyard" on Tingtoue sandbar bravely stand guard on Taiwan's west coast. |
Leading the way through the woods where the egrets once lived, Hsu brings us to a "beefwood graveyard"--many dry tree stumps sticking up out of the yellow sand. Chiku's coastline may recede inland by 20 meters or more in just one summer, and the pace of erosion is accelerating. Hsu surmises that this is due to sand extraction for coastal industrial zones, and to reservoirs preventing river silt from reaching the coast.
Chiku Lighthouse, located on Tingtoue sandbar at about the most westerly point in Taiwan, bears witness to the coastal erosion. Three predecessors of the present structure have been successively swallowed by the sea since 1957, and today large seawalls are being built around the lighthouse in the hope of saving this disappearing land.
In front of the Tainan Branch of the Taiwan Fisheries Research Institute, at the south end of the lagoon, is the Clam Park, where at low tide adults and children alike can dig for various species of clams.
Salt Belt Guided Tours:
Salt Country Culture and History Workshop
Tel: (06) 721-1079
http://home.kimo.com.tw/saltcity/
Kuotai Raft Tours
Tel: (06) 788-1688 / 0933-274-251
Fare: NT$150 per person |
Hsi Nan Chun Holiday Fish Farm
 |
| The fresh seafood of Chiku's seafood street is a delight to gourmet palates. The popular An Ke Seafood Restaurant (372, Tacheng Village), is the oldest eatery on the street. |
Hsi Nan Chun Holiday Fish Farm is in Hsi-nan Village, near the mouth of the Chiku Creek. Fish farming has declined in recent years. Hsi Nan Chun's owner, milkfish farmer Wu Chung-chang, looking for ways to develop tourism, had the idea of a fish farm holiday resort. He has retained the farm's working fish pools, and recreated the traditional tunnel-shaped thatched shelters on platforms over the pools. Before the farms had mechanical pumps, by dawn each day the dissolved oxygen in the pond water would be so depleted that the milkfish might easily suffocate. The fish farmers slept in the shelters, and as soon as they heard the fish coming up to the surface and trying to breathe air, they immediately agitated the water to aerate it. Wu Chung-chang managed to find an old craftsman who still knew how to build the shelters, and so was able to recreate a piece of fish farming history.
Hsi Nan Chun Holiday Fish Farm
42-1, Hsi-nan Village, Chiku Rural Town ship, Tainan County
Tel: (06) 787-4365
Rooms: Thatched shelters NT$600 per night, day rate NT$300; rooms from NT$1500 per night. Restaurant: Pre-booked tables from NT$2500.
|
Chiku Salt Pans
 |
| The towering salt mounds of the Chiku Salt Pans are known as the "Snowy Mountains" of Tainan. Novel attractions at the salt pans include healthful brine baths and salty ice lollies. |
The offices of Chiku Salt Pans-- Taiwan's second largest commercial salt pans--are located at Chungliao Village, Chiku Rural Township, at the end of County Highway 176. Salt production began in 1935, and at their height the salt pans covered an area of more than 2000 hectares. Today, as well as seeing mountains of salt, visitors to the salt pans can bathe in the new brine baths. These contain a 15-cm layer of brine sludge, and brine liquor from the evaporation of seawater, which is rich in minerals such as calcium and magnesium. A liberal rub with the brine liquor is claimed to work wonders for both the constitution and the complexion. Besides unique salt-flavored ice lollies, other products on sale at the shop include gourmet salt, bathing salts, salt toothpaste, salt soap, algae soap and algae soya sauce.
Chiku Salt Pans
66, Yancheng Village, Chiku Rural Township, Tainan County
Tel: (06) 780-0511
Hours: 9:00-18:00
Brine Swimming Pool: 5:00-21:00 |
Black-faced Spoonbill Refuge, Mangrove Conservation Area
 |
|
A wave of the head, a stretch of the legs--the black-faced guests who have flown so far to be here love the natural, unpolluted environment of Chiku, so follow in their footsteps if you want to feast your eyes on Chiku's natural beauty! (courtesy of Chiku Farmers Association) |
In September or October each year the black-faced spoonbills--nicknamed "black-faced dancers" in Taiwan on account of the distinctive way they flip fish into the air when feeding--fly 2000 km from their breeding grounds around the Korean peninsula to spend the winter at Taiwan's Tsengwen River estuary, or in Hong Kong or Vietnam. They fly north again in April or May.
The undisturbed natural environment of the Tsengwen estuary, and the abundant tilapia and crucian carp of Chiku's vast fish farms, provide the spoonbills with a suitable overwintering habitat. Bird observation cabins have been set up 1000 meters away from the spot in the middle of the estuary where the spoonbills rest. Only 700-plus black-faced spoonbills now survive in the world, but over 500 have been recorded together at this spot. The estuary also has many other regular avian visitors, including great egrets, little egrets, grey-tailed tattlers and green-winged teal. A powerful telescope is needed to view the birds. During the birdwatching season there are full-time guides on hand to explain the migratory birds"natural history.
Another feature of Chiku's rich natural environment not to be missed is the rare single-species forest of grey mangrove (Avicennia marina) in the mangrove conservation area at the mouth of the Chiku Creek. The forest is home to thousands of egrets and black-crowned night herons, which live here throughout the year. Every evening as the egrets return to their nests, the night herons start looking for food, and fiddler crabs and mudskippers show themselves on the soft mudflats. As the glow of the sunset envelopes the Chiku Creek, the curtain is just rising on the stage of life!
<<Back
| Home
|
