Russia (bbabo.net), - Over the past ten years, the number of saigas - steppe antelopes, listed in the Red Book of the Astrakhan region, Russia and classified as a critically endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, has increased five times in the region to 12 thousand individuals.

The population is also expected to increase this year. According to the press service of nature management and environmental protection of the Astrakhan region, animals are bred in the Stepnoy nursery, and then released into the state nature reserve, located in the Limansky district, 180 kilometers from Astrakhan. The project is financed within the framework of the regional program "Biodiversity conservation and development of ecological tourism" of the national project "Ecology".

In 2021, three saigas were released from the nursery to the reserve. Now seven antelopes grow in the nursery, including two females, from which the offspring is expected in May.

The main threat to saigas is poachers. Thanks to inspectors and round-the-clock security, the territory of the reserve is free from poaching encroachments. In 2021, the World Wide Fund for Nature in Russia installed high-tech equipment near the watering hole, allowing you to see everything that happens in real time.

In addition, using the NextGIS system, state inspectors monitor the movements of herds and individuals on a daily basis, assessing the state of the population during the periods of rutting and mass birth of young animals. The information is entered into a database, which is then analyzed by specialists from the Institute of Ecology and Evolution named after V.I. A. Severtsov RAS in Moscow.

The saiga, or saiga, is the oldest representative of the so-called mammoth fauna, along with the woolly rhinoceros and the saber-toothed tiger. Illegal hunting of animals is due to interest in saiga horns due to the widespread belief in their healing properties - they are used to make a powder that is used in traditional medicine.

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