The Experiment
Trip Start
Mar 21, 2005
1
253
354
Trip End
Ongoing
The Celestial Mountains, Sarychat-Ertash Zapovednik,
Kyrgyzstan
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
A few years ago, during the summer, another group including a Western photographer with a long telephoto lens had been in the Eshegart cabin, Alexander recounted. Alexander continued his story and flailed his hands, showing surprise: someone cried "wolf!" and the photographer looked out the window far down the green grass of the Ertash Valley, but saw no wolf. Then he looked at the doorway and saw the wolf, a few feet away, looking a them: "Whoa! Wolf! Wolf!"
Clearly Sarychat-Ertash was a wild place, with many of its denizens less fearful of man than most other places, where they have been persecuted, hunted, killed, turned into coats and belts and medicinal products
Aleel and Askat Counting Ibex
. They were still very much wary, however, and--though curious--most still knew to run when they saw man, even though man lived here no longer.Fifteen years ago, the last shepherds left Sarychat-Ertash National Preserve. This was right after the USSR disintegrated. Perhaps the shepherds were collectively forced to graze these harsh lands to improve the productivity of the Soviet Union's Five Year Plans. Whatever the cause, they seem to have left voluntarily in 1992. They left behind their cabins for shelter, the surrounding ground a source of fuel after years of corraling large numbers of domestic animals around the cabins.
Three years later, a national reserve organization was established and rangers occupied the cabins, patrolling the park. But in 2000, even the rangers left the now uninhabited 720 square kilometers of core area. Sarychat-Ertash now had become an experiment on how wildlife could recover, if left alone.
The experiment was a success: the animals did recover. Their numbers increased year-over-year, based on Alexander's surveys of argali and ibex. With his hands, Alexander traced an upwards graph since the park was created
Alexander Filming Ibex
. Why the numbers increased isn't rocket science: without hundreds of competing domestic animals, the wild ungulates had plenty of grass to feed upon, to get fat, to produce more offspring successfully, to worry less about harassment and disturbance. This simplifies things but is one of the main reasons.Sarychat-Ertash was one of the few places in the extensive mountains of Asia--the Himalayas, the Celestials, the Hindu Kush, the Karakoram, the Hengduan, the Tibetan Plateau--where the grassland landscape was free of domestic animals and not overgrazed, where large amounts of grass remained during the winter months, allowing year-round resident argali and ibex to survive. Elsewhere, by October, even in national parks, grasslands are mostly denuded, the semi-nomadic herds gone for lower elevation pastures or fodder in their villages. Of course other examples exist but they are islands and the exception.
The cold had permeated the cabin overnight as the dung stove died and fingers of frost covered the windows. Outside the cabin, I filled a bucket with peat-like chunks of sheep dung, removed the large quantity of dung ash from the stove, added the new dung and a dash of benzene (a.k.a. kerosene). Soon the small cabin was toasty.
Argali Crossing the Frozen Ertash River, part I
A few hours later, we were surveying the lower Ertash valley and side valleys. The valley was almost snow-free, wide, and full of argali. Our first count was a herd of 122 Argali with 22 males followed by another herd of 77 argali with only 5 males. December was the time of the rut and the males were mating with the females of the herd, courtship rituals were occurring all around.
Continuing into a side canyon, 57 ibex were clinging to a ridge above us. This was snow leopard habitat and one of Alexander's snow leopard transects. If the wide valley below can be called the habitat of the argali and wolf, the rocky and narrow side valleys were home to the snow leopard and its principal food in the area: ibex.
Entering another snow leopard transect after counting dozens more ibex, the sun began to set as we climbed higher and further from our camp. "Normale," said Alexander, reassuring me that it was okay. Going back we would have to descend the steep valley, cross the icy river, bushwack through shrublands around the riverbanks, climb the ridge on the other side, and traverse a good chunk of grassland, all in the new moon darkness. Alexander showed me a stone corridor that hunters had used to funnel resident Snow Leopards into a snare
Argali Crossing the Frozen Ertash River, part II
. We also found part of an ibex skeleton, remains from a kill.The sun set, the temperature dropped, and we began to descend, sometimes walking our horses, as it was too dark and steep. Once across the river, under the dim light of stars behind a veil of clouds, we ducked under barely visible branches. Akeel knew the route best and led us forward through the thickets and up a ridge to the grasslands. Sparks from horseshoes on rocks and the glow of Sovereign cigarettes lit the darkness. Once on the grasslands, we were moving at high speeds into nothingness. I put my trust in Satan, whose mane was covered in sweat and whose leg fur was frozen.
The horses, with their thick fur, slept outside, perhaps hoping that the wolves wouldn't find them. Inside, we ate bread, pig fat covered in red pepper and salt, canned sardines, yak meat with rice, and ketchup. Ketchup was our vegetable, along with a little raw garlic and onion. This would be our regular dinner until the meat and rice ran out; then we ate instant noodles. Of course it all tasted good after a long day. "Omen," we said in thanksgiving as the meal ended, our hands together as if reading the Koran, then rising in an arc across the face, ending with palms together, as is the custom in Central Asia, whether you are Muslim, former Communist, or Orthodox Catholic
Argali Crossing the Frozen Ertash River, part IIII
. Our next cabin was at Koilu, a little more decrepit than Eshegart cabin and much colder as a bitter wind blew through the cracks. We arrived at dusk after seeing only a few ibex and argali today. As a team, with Akeel taking the lead with brusque toughness, we nailed tarps to drafty areas and the door to insulate a bit. Askat, seemingly checking my genetic fitness, asked me some questions that night, in Kyrgyz, with Alexander helping in Russian:
Do you have all your teeth?
Eight of my wisdom teeth were yanked.
Is my eyesight plus or minus?
Normale
Alexander showed me two different argali skulls, one from a Marco Polo Sheep, another from a Celestial Mountain Argali. The Marco Polo Sheep's horns pointed outwards and its face was more pointed. The Celestial Mountain Argali had a broad face, with horns further spaced apart on the skull
Argali in the Morning
. Whether these two skulls indicated two distinct subspecies was unknown as no one had tested their DNA. What was known is that these two distinct groups mixed here, at Sarychat-Ertash National Preserve. South of here was the Marco Polo Sheep, occupying the Pamirs or high elevation pastures and rolling hills of Tajikistan and southern Kyrgyzstan, the fringes of Karakoram National Park in Pakistan, the Wahkan Corridor in Afghanistan, and the Pamirs of China's westernmost frontier in Xinjiang. The Marco Polo sheep, described first it seems by the semi-mythical Marco Polo himself, is considered the most rare of all argali subspecies, with several thousand remaining. Conservation efforts of the Wildlife Conservation Society and other groups, led by George Shaller have protected areas, however, and populations have been rising based on their survey numbers.
North of here, stretching into China and Kazakhstan, was the range of the Celestial Mountain Argali. Less effort has focused on this group, perhaps because they don't have the name brand recognition; their numbers are unknown.
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