XINING — Qinghai Lake, China's largest inland saltwater lake, has spotted nearly 190,000 waterbirds, up 36.5 percent year-on-year, since Nov 24 when the lake's national nature reserve conducted its winter patrol.

Among the 30 bird varieties monitored in the reserve during the period, about 560 whooper swans, a wild species under second-class national protection in China, have visited the lake for wintering. According to the reserve's administration bureau, there are about 230 more than the number recorded during the same period last year.

Located in Northwest China's Qinghai province, the lake is a major transit point for migratory birds from Central Asia to India and East Asia to Australia. It also serves as an important winter home for waterbirds on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

Every year, whooper swans leave their breeding grounds and fly to Qinghai Lake for the winter from mid to late September. They do not leave the lake until the lake thaws around the end of March or early April the following year.