U Minh Thuong National Park

A wetland is rarely the first thing anyone thinks of when planning a trip. Yet a wetland like this one shows why science and international organizations protect some ecosystems under special conventions.

U Minh Thượng National Park lies about 65 kilometers from Rạch Giá city. It is one of the two important peat swamp forests left in Vietnam. The other is U Minh Hạ. The ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity describes the two together as wetlands of the highest priority for conservation in the Mekong Delta. The place is not only beautiful. It is also rare.

The titles attached to U Minh Thượng say this more plainly than any description. In 2012 the park was recognized as an ASEAN Heritage Park. In 2015 it became the eighth Ramsar site in Vietnam, and site number 2,228 in the world. Ramsar is the name of an international convention for protecting wetlands. It is named for the city of Ramsar in Iran, where the convention was signed in 1971. Earlier still, from 2006, the U Minh Thượng area lay in the core of the Kiên Giang Biosphere Reserve, recognized by UNESCO. A biosphere reserve is a UNESCO-recognized area where nature is protected and the people living there keep working the land.

Wetlands matter enough to need international conventions, and most of the reason lies beneath the forest floor. Peat is a layer of organic matter built up over thousands of years from plant remains that never fully decayed. It holds water, nutrients and carbon. When peat is burned or dries out, it releases a very large amount of carbon into the atmosphere. That is why the forest fire of 2002 at U Minh Thượng is mentioned in many conservation documents.

As for the variety of life, the park records 32 mammal species and 186 bird species. It also records 39 amphibian species and 34 fish species. They include the hairy-nosed otter, the fishing cat, the spot-billed pelican and the già đẫy Java, all listed in the Red Books of Vietnam and of the world. This is no ordinary forest. It is home to some of the most strictly protected living things on the planet.

The canals run through tràm forest, and the water in them is usually a dark reddish brown, the mark of a peat swamp ecosystem. Floating water plants and water hyacinth line both banks. There is also a bird sanctuary. A bamboo bridge leads to an observation tower, and from there hundreds of waterbirds can be seen perching and taking wing. They are easily startled.

U Minh Thượng is a story of history as well. It is a nationally recognized historic site, once tied to the base of the fighters of Nguyễn Trung Trực and to the bases of the revolutionary forces in two periods of resistance, against the French and in the Vietnam War. The U Minh forest was more than an ecosystem. It was also a place that sheltered people in the years of war.

Where a boat turns into a quiet stretch of canal, the water is as dark as strong tea and the tràm trees on both banks stand perfectly still. Then, from the canopy, a cò trắng shoots up before anyone has seen where it came from. It is a moment that shows why this place is being kept for the next thousand years.