Shizhu

Tujia Tujia may refer to: *the Tujia people *the Tujia language The Tujia language (Northern Tujia: Bifzivsar, ; Southern Tujia: Mongrzzirhof, ; ) is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken natively by the Tujia people in Hunan Province, China. It is unclassif ...

Autonomous County (), or Shizhu County for short, is located in southeastern

Chongqing Chongqing ( or ; ; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), Postal Romanization, alternately romanized as Chungking (), is a Direct-administered municipalities of China, municipality in Southwes ...

, China. It is south of the Yangtze River, and borders the Chongqing divisions of Pengshui County to the south, Fengdu County to the southwest,

Zhong County Zhong County or Zhongxian () is a county of Chongqing Municipality, China. The Shibaozhai Temple, which is endangered by the rising waters caused by the Three Gorges Dam, is located there. Zhong County has two Yangtze River crossings: the Zhong ...

to the northwest and Wanzhou District to the north; to the east, it borders the Hubei county-level city of Lichuan. It's in the center zone of Three Gorges Reservoir Region, and the only autonomous county which designated for only one of ethnic minorities in this region. ( Chongqing Municipality has four counties that designated for ethnic minorities but because the other three counties are designated for more than one of ethnic minorities, this autonomous county is only one which is designated for only one of ethnic minorities)

Name

Shizhu literally means "''Stone Pillars''", which is named after two big human-like natural stone pillars standing on Wanshou Mountain. The two stone pillars were once a loving couple in a native ''"

Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetim ...

''" style love story. To fight against

feudal Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was the combination of the legal, economic, military, cultural and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe between the 9th and 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a wa ...

oppression of free love, they died together tragically, and turned into two stone pillars standing face-to-face on Wanshou Mountain, never to be apart again.

Geography

Area: Population: 510,000 County seat: Nanbin Town() Geographic coordinates: 29°39′-30°32′ North, 107°59′-108°34′, East Shizhu County covers with 856,200 mu park and farm land. By the end of 1992, the population of Shizhu County had increased up to 462,100, of whom 424,900 are the rural residents of Shizhu County. The existing capital of the County is Nanbin Town which will not be involved in the submersion of the water storage of the reservoir region of the

Three Gorges Project The Three Gorges Dam is a hydroelectricity, hydroelectric gravity dam that spans the Yangtze River by the town of Sandouping, in Yiling District, Yichang, Hubei province, central China, downstream of the Three Gorges. The Three Gorges Dam has ...

. Shizhu County is located in the subtropical monsoon zone with the clear seasons. It is warm and wet with enough rain.

Climate

Resources

The forests cover 10.97% of the total area of Shizhu County. There are many precious varieties of trees in the forests, such as metasequoias,

tricuspid tree The tricuspid valve, or right atrioventricular valve, is on the right dorsal side of the mammalian heart, at the superior portion of the right ventricle. The function of the valve is to allow blood to flow from the right atrium to the right vent ...

ormosia fir ''Ormosia'' is a genus of legumes (family Fabaceae). The more than 100 living species, mostly trees or large shrubs, are distributed throughout the tropical regions of the world, some extending into temperate zones, especially in East Asia. A fe ...

s and

ginkgos ''Ginkgo'' is a genus of non-flowering seed plants. The scientific name is also used as the English name. The order to which it belongs, Ginkgoales, first appeared in the Permian, 270 million years ago, and is now the only living genus within t ...

. There are also more than 50 varieties of trees in the territories of the county for production purposes, such as

tung tree ''Vernicia fordii'', usually known as the tung tree (, ''tóng'') is a species of flowering plant in the spurge family native to southern China, Myanmar, and northern Vietnam. It is a small to medium-sized deciduous tree growing to 20 m tall, wit ...

s and

mulberries ''Morus'', a genus of flowering plants in the family Moraceae, consists of diverse species of deciduous trees commonly known as mulberries, growing wild and under cultivation in many temperate world regions. Generally, the genus has 64 identif ...

. In addition, there are more than 170 varieties of wild animals in the forests of the county such as tigers,

leopard The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant species in the genus '' Panthera'', a member of the cat family, Felidae. It occurs in a wide range in sub-Saharan Africa, in some parts of Western and Central Asia, Southern Russia, a ...

otter Otters are carnivorous mammals in the subfamily Lutrinae. The 13 extant otter species are all semiaquatic, aquatic, or marine, with diets based on fish and invertebrates. Lutrinae is a branch of the Mustelidae family, which also includes wea ...

s and wild boars. One can also see more than 10 varieties of

edible mushroom Edible mushrooms are the fleshy and edible fruit bodies of several species of macrofungi (fungi which bear fruiting structures that are large enough to be seen with the naked eye). They can appear either below ground (hypogeous) or above ground ...

s, such as xianggu mushrooms, edible fungus and zhusun mushrooms. In addition, there are various Chinese medical herbs such as '' Coptis chinensis'' and ''

Gastrodia elata ''Gastrodia elata'' is a saprophytic perennial herb in the family Orchidaceae. It is found in Nepal, Bhutan, India, Japan, North Korea, Siberia, Taiwan, and China. Description The orchid has an 8–12 centimeters long elliptical underground rhiz ...

''. Shizhu County is particularly famous for ''Coptis chinensis'' and the Chinese people usually call it the home town of ''Coptis chinensis''. More than 20 varieties of ores have been found in Shizhu County, such as coal, natural gas, copper, iron, silver, cadmium, lead, gold and

barite Baryte, barite or barytes ( or ) is a mineral consisting of barium sulfate ( Ba S O4). Baryte is generally white or colorless, and is the main source of the element barium. The ''baryte group'' consists of baryte, celestine (strontium sulfate), ...

Three Gorges Reservoir Region

4 townships, 26 villages and 16 fabrication/ ore-mining enterprises have been/ will have been involved in the submersion of the reservoir water storage of the

. Shizhu County is involved in the submersion of the reservoir water storage of the

as follows. · The emigrants living below the water level of the reservoir storage of the Three Gorges Project are 8,400 in Shizhu County; · The houses/ buildings with the total construction area of 329,700 m² have been/ will have been submerged; · 6900 mu citrus and farm land has been/ will have been submerged, representing 4.59% of the total area of citrus and farm land in Shizhu County; · highways have been/ will have been submerged; · The relocation compensation investment is 272 million RMB yuan.

References

External links

The official website of Shizhu Tujia Autonomous County
(in Chinese) {{authority control County-level divisions of Chongqing Tujia autonomous counties