Sites - Important Bird Areas (IBAs)

Site description The IBA is situated in the south of the Ha Tien plain, a flat coastal plain, which is one of the last remaining extensive areas of seasonally inundated grassland in the Mekong Delta. The site is bisected by a network of canals and has some brackish water characteristics. In the south-west part of the site there is a small area of Melaleuca plantation. At the fringes of the site, the natural habitat has been converted into agricultural land, principally wet rice.

Populations of IBA trigger species

Habitats

Land use

Other biodiversity Silvered Langur Trachypithecus villosus is reported to occur in a neighbouring limestone area, to the east of the site. Some parts of this species' habitat have been designated for cement production (Tran Triet ed. 2001).

Management considerations The seasonally inundated grassland at the site is under severe and immediate threat of conversion to rice agriculture and forestry. Most of the large remaining grassland areas are currently earmarked for resettlement and agricultural conversion. However, the acid-suphate soils in the area make most of the plain insuitable for rice agriculture, and there is a real risk , therefore, that the last remaining areas of extensive seasonally inundated grassland in the Mekong Delta will be lost to provide marginal agricultural land.The Kien Luong is further threatened by plans for a major flood control canal that will bisect the site, leading to further fragmentation, changes in flooding regimes and subsequent deterioration of soil fertility through acidification. The construction of this canal is also likely to have serious impacts on the globally threatened large waterbirds found at the site by increasing levels of disturbance.

Protection status The site is included on a list of proposed national protected areas, which was submitted to the central government for approval in 2001.

Conservation response The Kien Luong area was proposed as a nature reserve by BirdLife and the Institute of Ecology and Biological Resources (IEBR), following their project to identify key sites for wetland conservatiom in the Mekong Delta. Kien Luong has been included on a proposed list of protected areas currently being prepared by FPD and FIPI.There are currently no conservation activities being implemented at Kien Luong.

Further web sources of information 

Site account from Directory of Important Bird Areas in Vietnam: key sites for conservation (Tordoff 2002)

References Birdlife International and the Forest Inventory and Planning Instutute (2001) Sourcebook of existing and proposed protected areas in Vietnam. Hanoi, Vietnam: BirdLife International Vietnam Programme and the Forest Inventory and Planning Institute.Buckton, S. T., Ngyuyen Cu, Nguyen Duc Tu and Ha Quy Quynh (1999) The conservation of key wetland sites in the Mekong delta. Hanoi: Birdlife International Vietnam programme.Nguyen Duc Tu, Nguyen Cu and Buckton, S. T. (2001) Wetlands and waterbirds in the Mekong Delta. OBC Bulletin 33: 30-33Tran Triet ed. (2001) Proceedings of the workshop: Conservation and utilization of biodiversity resources of the Ha Tien-Kien Luong wetlands, Kien Giang province. Rach Gia 17-19 June 2001. Ho Chi Minh City: College of Natural Sciences, Vietnam National University

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Recommended citation  BirdLife International (2013) Important Bird Areas factsheet: Kien Luong. Downloaded from http://www.birdlife.org on 20/06/2013

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