16,000 Dead Pigs, 1,000 Dead Ducks Found Floating in Chinese Rivers

There's definitely something in the water in China, and you're not going to like it. Chinese authorities discovered 1,000 dead ducks in a Sichuan river Tuesday, in addition to the 16,000 dead pigs already found in a Shanghai river recently. 

Locals began reporting sightings of large quantities of dead ducks in the Nanhe river in Pengshan county China in the last few days, environmental department officials said, according to the BBC. The dead ducks don't pose a health risk to locals and livestock because the river isn't a source for drinking water like the Huangpu river where the thousands of dead pigs were found. The Chinese government has yet to offer a clear explanation for the dead ducks, or pigs. 

In an interview with China National Radio Sunday, Liang Weidong, a deputy director in Pengshan's publicity department, said that authorities found more than 50 "woven bags" in the river that held about 1,000 duck carcasses. The cause of death for the animals was a mystery, officials said, as some of the ducks were decomposed. Liang said that available evidence suggested the dead ducks flowed into the area from upstream, and weren't locally dumped. 

Earlier in the month, over 5,000 dead pigs - many of them diseased - were discovered in the Huangpu river, the major drinking water supply for 23 million people in China. That total has since ballooned to 16,000, according to the Huffington Post.

Environmental experts say that while the practice of dumping dead animals in the river is illegal, it still happens routinely throughout China. 

"This is obviously threatening the local water resources,'' said Ma Jun, a prominent environmental expert, The Times reported. "Usually, we see dead livestock in the river during the flooding season, but this a different case and the numbers are large.''

Some of the dead pigs officials found were infected with porcine circovirus (PCV) virus, said an official statement from the Shanghai Agriculture Committee. The disease doesn't present an infection threat to human health or drinking water, the organization added.

The Shanghai region has experienced an abnormally high amount of pig deaths in recent months, with about 20,000 dying in the last two months alone, according to Jiaxing Daily. The deaths were most likely due to cramped living conditions, the newspaper said.

The Chinese government announced it was "basically finished" with removing the dead pigs from the Huangpu river in a statement Sunday. 

While news is just now spreading of the horrific finds, locals are all too aware of dead animals, and other mass pollution in China's rivers. Roughly 40 percent of China's rivers have been deemed "seriously polluted," according to a recent report from Voice of America, which may be why the Chinese government claims to have made clean drinking water a priority. Beijing has invested $850 billion in a decade-long plan to improve its water supply system, according to Reuters.