Have you ever seen a panda walking in heavy snow? Or two golden snub-nosed monkeys locked in a hug? Infrared cameras have recently captured these rare sights in the Baishuijiang area of the Giant Panda National Park in northwest China's Gansu Province.

Covering about 2,600 square kilometers, the Baishuijiang area of the Giant Panda National Park is rich in rare and endangered species, with 20 species under national Class-I protection.

As part of efforts to better protect wildlife, staff members aim to install 600 infrared cameras over an area of 300 square kilometers of virgin forests in three months.

"In order to make sure cameras can work properly, we will put the solar panels as far south as possible to help them receive sunlight for a long time," said Ren Jingcheng, deputy head of Rangshuihe Protection Station of Baishuijiang Area of Giant Panda National Park.

Local authorities have continuously optimized their monitoring system, AI species identification technology, and real-time infrared camera transmission technology in recent years, which has greatly increased the exposure rate of wild animals.

"So far, we have captured the images of giant pandas, takins, golden snub-nosed monkeys and golden cats. Thanks to the high density and wide coverage of infrared cameras, many wild animals living in the forest were also filmed," said He Liwen, director of Giant Panda Management Office of Baishuijiang area of Giant Panda National Park.

In 2017, China started piloting the giant panda park. Last year, China officially designated the first group of five national parks, including the Giant Panda National Park.

Looking ahead, the next-generation of information technologies such as remote sensing, 5G, cloud computing and big data will be used in the Giant Panda National Park to build a space-air-ground integrated monitoring system and provide more and higher quality image data to the public.

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