Poorly-known to the outside world, Mt. Dayao becomes a paradise for Yao People and many rare species of animals and plants like Chinese xenosaurs and Cathaya argyrophylla. The well-preserved indigenous Yao culture and heritage are capturing more attention from all over the world. It is an ideal place to see the diversified minority life of China; even the 52,000 populations here are subdivided into five different branches. And Mt. Dayao offers the fantastic view and base to watch the genera, which may disappear on the planet decades later.

Highlights of the region:

Mount Dayao

Located in Jinxiu Yao Autonomous County, 180 km to the south of Guilin, very few westerners know about the mountain in East Guangxi. It covers 2,500 square kilometers with an elevation from 1,000 to 2,000 meters. It is neither hot (aver. 24 degree Celsius) in summer nor cold (aver. 12 degree Celsius) in winter. There live endangered species like Chinese xenosaurs (crocodile-like lizard), Golden Kaiser-e-Hind butterflies (Teinopalpus Aureus), salamander, cathaya argyrophylla, absolutely a perfect place to see rare creatures in the world.

Mount Dayao is a Mecca for anthropologists and folklorists to study Yao people, which boasts five branches -- Pan, Chashan, Ao, Shanzi, and Hualan, with a population of about 150,000. Every year numerous festivals and ceremonies are held in downtown and villages. Well-dressed Yao people in their traditional costumes sing and dance to celebrate the events, like the "earth-drum dance" of the Ao Yao.

Chinese xenosaur

The little animal was first discovered by a group of teachers and students from Zhongshan University in 1929. In 1930, German zoologist E. Ahl categorized the animals as a brand-new genera and a unique species. He named it the Chinese xenosaur, meaning a crocodile-like lizard, and announced its existence to the world.

Mature Chinese xenosaurs are only 35 centimeters long. At first, they look like red-spotted lizards. The back of an adult Chinese xenosaur is black, and the belly is red or yellow with black spots. Chinese xenosaurs have a different system of sight. They have three eyes, two on both sides of the head, and one on the top of the head that looks like a white spot. In fact, the third eye on the top of the head is a layer of olive-shaped vision cells that sense the degree of light.

Different from oviparous crocodiles, Chinese xenosaurs are ovoviviparous, giving birth to babies after they hatch inside the body. A mature female Chinese xenosaur gets pregnant once a year and has 2 to 10 babies. The newborns are unbelievably small, usually weighing 2 grams. It seems that the mother Chinese xenosaur has no passion for her babies. She castes them aside and doesn't care for them. This might be one of the reasons why this species can't develop in large groups. According to estimates by specialists, there were some 2,500 Chinese xenosaurs in 1988. Unfortunately, there are only 660 Chinese xenosaurs today due to the damage to their environment caused by excessive logging.  

In April 2001, the Chinese government promoted the Mt. Dayao Nature Reserve in the Yao Autonomous County of Jinxiu to a state-level nature reserve to better protect the rare species of Chinese xenosaurs.

Golden Kaiser-e-Hind Butterfly (Teinopalpus Aureus)

The shapes of female and male Teinopalpus aureus are different. The body and wings of male butterflies are brown and are dotted with golden green spots. The butterfly is named after a golden green ribbon in the middle of the fore wings and a golden mark on the hind wings of them. It has an outstanding tail in the hind wings. Female butterflies have no golden green color. There is a pentagon white spot on its hind wings with thin and long tails. This kind of butterfly is endemic species of China. Because of the high rate sold in international market (USD20, 000-50, 000), many farmers were hired to catch these butterflies for economic reason, which made its number drop down drastically in recent years. It has been listed as the only butterfly under class I state protection in China. It distributes in Guangxi (Mount Dayao), Hainan, Yunnan and other southern provinces.

Cathaya argyrophylla

Evergreen tree of 24m tall, 40 (50) cm DBH with linear leaves. An endangered conifer with less than 4,000 individuals is restricted to four isolated distributional areas in subtropical mountains of China. Scientists found that C. argyrophylla possesses an overall low level of genetic variation. Particularly, there exists much lower genetic variation within populations in C. argyrophylla than in other coniferous species. Distributed mainly in Guangxi (Mount Dayao and Huaping), Sichuan and Guizhou, it grows on narrow mountain ridges of sharp slopes, top of solitary rocky mountains or in crevices of sheer precipices and overhanging rocks at altitudes of 940-1,870m. Fossils have been found in the Asia-Europe continental deposits of the Tertiary Period, so it is honored as the "Panda" in the plant kingdom.