Qualla: Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary

Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary: Introduction

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Between 2006 and 2007, survey teams working this stretch of the Mekong in Kratie province counted 683 species of plants, 223 native fish, 56 amphibians and reptiles, and at least eleven kinds of large mammal. During roughly the same years, engineers were sizing a wall eighteen kilometres long to be laid across the same river a short way downstream. Cambodia has spent two decades deciding which of those two futures this reach of the Mekong should have. In October 2018, with a signature on a sub-decree, it committed 50,093 hectares of it to the first.

Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary: What a Sub-decree Protects

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary covers 500.93 square kilometres of Sambor district, in eastern Cambodia's Kratie province, and it exists because of a single administrative act: Sub-decree No. 129, issued in October 2018 and administered by the Ministry of Environment. Neth Pheaktra, th...

Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary: The Twin Sanctuary and the Deer That Came Back

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The same batch of paperwork created a second reserve. Prek Prasab Wildlife Sanctuary, 12,770 hectares nearer the provincial capital, was established under Sub-decree No. 128 in the same month. The World Wide Fund for Nature, which had pushed for both, described the pair as suppor...

Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary: The Reach Where the Dolphins Are

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

This part of the Mekong is the last home of a freshwater population of Irrawaddy dolphins. In 2012 Cambodia designated a 180-kilometre stretch, running from eastern Kratie province up to the Laos border, as a limited fishing zone. As of 2024 about 105 dolphins survive along rough...

Sambor Wildlife Sanctuary: The Dam That Shares Its Name

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The sanctuary shares a name with a dam. The proposed Sambor Dam, rated at 2,600 megawatts, would run 18,002 metres across the Mekong at Prek Kampi district in Kratie and stand 56 metres high - the largest hydropower scheme ever seriously advanced for the lower mainstream. A Mekon...