The population of a rare snub-nosed monkey species in a southwest China nature reserve has nearly tripled over the past 26 years, Xie Hongfang, chief of the reserve's administration bureau, said on Monday.

The population of the Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys in the Baima Snow Mountain Nature Reserve has seen growth from 500 in 1983 to about 1,300 now with the steady improvement of the ecological environment and a poaching crackdown.

More than 60 percent of the Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys live in the 190,000 hectare Baima Snow Mountain Nature Reserve in Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan.

The monkey, on the country's top protection list, is one of the three types of endangered snub-nosed monkeys which make their home in southwest China - Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou. The Yunnan monkey currently has a population of about 2,000, mainly in Diqing and part of neighboring Tibet Autonomous Region.

"In recent years, the number of the Yunnan monkeys here has been increasing by some 30 to 40 every year," said He Xinming, a nature reserve clerk in the Weixi County.

He said currently he frequently saw the wild monkeys playing near a local township seat but they were rarely seen by visitors, even five years ago.

(Xinhua News Agency February 10, 2009)