CHINA’S WILD WEST - Wildlife Conservation in China: Preserving the Habitat of China's Wild West - page 40

families (which had increased to twelve by the year 2004), most of whom were related
by descent or marriage, managed yaks on commonly grazed pastures, as well as a small
(less than 200) flock of sheep. All animals were owned by individual families and marked
to allow identification. Wool was sheared and brought to market annually in the county
seat of Nangqian, but other than the buying and selling of live animals, I observed no
commercial use of yaks. Yaks were used for milk, for meat and hides, and for transport
of camps (which were moved within an approximately five-kilometer radius every six
to eight weeks).
Each family had a permanent, if crude, winter home made of locally available wood,
rock, and mud, which formed an accessible base even during summer and autumn grazing
periods (when families lived in yak-hair tents). Families supplemented their income by
collecting and selling the fungus Cordyceps sinensis ( dongchong xiacao , used in Chinese
medicine) during spring (although by 2004 family members involved in this trade were
traveling more than fifty kilometers to other locations within Nangqian County on collect-
ing expeditions). They supplemented their diet with parsnips grown locally, with barley
purchased from Tibetan agriculturalists living a few hundred meters lower in elevation
where it was grown, and with tea and vegetables purchased in the county town. Families
typically donated most income above their subsistence needs to the monastery, and kept
very little for purchases or savings.
During my approximately six months spent in Baizha during the autumns of 1988-90,
I gained a general understanding of the type and condition of forage species. When I
returned in June 2004, the condition of vegetation appeared largely unchanged from that
of the late 1980s. Trees and shrubs appeared to be in similar locations and densities to
the earlier period. Grasses appeared to be grazed moderately heavily, but not beyond their
capacity to absorb: they appeared similar in species composition, height, and vigor to
what I had observed fifteen years before. The numbers of yaks, sheep, and horses were
similar to those seen during the earlier period. (Fissioning from younger family members
having offspring of their own had led to the establishment of new families and thus new
livestock herds, but most pastoralists told me that they kept fewer yaks in 2004 than during
the late 1980s, so the total number of yaks may not have changed much.) Although many
old trees had been lost due to a combination of logging (which had now effectively been
halted) and naturally occurring fires, some very old trees remained. Importantly, I noted
regeneration of both juniper and spruce in appropriate locations. Grazing and trampling
appeared to have reduced ground cover and led to species loss only in the immediate
vicinity of permanent winter houses and temporary pastoral encampments. In sum, the
grazing/grassland system appeared to have remained stable during a fifteen-year period.
There was little evidence of “overgrazing,” and few places could objectively be labeled
“degraded.” 59
Fifth Brigade at Gouli
In Gouli, Stipa grasslands begin to cover south-facing slopes at an elevation of about
4,000 m. By 2006, these palatable grasses had been removed near encampments, along