Watch Your Yak

Eric Wagner is a graduate student in biology at the University of Washington. He reports from China, where a group of students and faculty from UW and Sichuan University is working to help create a management plan for a popular national park.

Officially, there are no yaks in the Jiuzhaigou National Nature Reserve. They haven't been allowed within park boundaries for several years now. Even so, when I stepped in a large pile of yak slop on the first day of a backpacking trip, I was not terribly surprised.

I was on the trip as part of Shengtai Yi ("Ecology 1"), along with Gus Jespersen, Erin Hagen, and Kimberly Sheldon. We're grad students at UW -- they in alpine, avian, and physiological ecology, respectively; I'm the estuarine ecologist of the group. (The estuaries at 13,000 feet being so amazing, after all.) Tom Hinckley was also with us. A professor of forest ecology at UW, he's perhaps the fittest sexagenarian I know.

We were paced by Andrew Scanlon, an Irish fellow working for the German government in a Chinese park. He, Erin, and Tom would hike in with us to lighten our early load of food and gear. Gus, Kimberly, and I would then continue into the backcountry for three or four more days.

Our trek would take us through the northeastern portion of the park, currently off-limits to visitors. That is about to change: the park plans to open an ecotourism trail next July. Most Chinese tourists, Andrew says, are content to "ride a bus, take a picture, buy a souvenir, and go home." This new attraction will take those who want to get off the bus and around the mountains on a guided trek.

Park managers want to pack in as many as 500 people per kilometer, which will no doubt have an impact on a place that some visitors are asked to pay more than 1,000 RMB (about $125) per day to see. Currently, the park doesn't have a standardized protocol to monitor the impacts of its visitors. Gus, Kimberly, and I were to hike the proposed trail, marking GPS waypoints and habitat boundaries. We would also document whatever plants and wildlife we could. When we returned, we would work with park staff to develop a rigorous monitoring protocol.

This area of the park is supposed to be uninhabited, but it wasn't long before signs started to appear. The yak poop, for instance, and the yaks themselves. Lean-tos surrounded by a debris field of plastic bottles. A large, temporarily abandoned hut on a slope.

According to park policy, none of this exists. But try telling that to the Tibetans who regularly use the mountain. Make sure to mention to the people scouring the hillside that collection of natural resources is not allowed, and that it's illegal to come into the park through unsanctioned entrances like the high ridge where we saw them.

As often happens with fieldwork, external forces changed our plans. Gus, Kimberly, and I had just hit the ridge one late afternoon when a couple of the Tibetans we'd seen spirited over to say hello. One looked to be in his mid-20s; the other couldn't have been more than 15. They flopped on the grass next to us, offered their disk of bread, and showed us the medicinal roots they had dug up that morning, stuffed in a cigarette pack. (Andrew later told me that a kilo of the root nets close to $200 -- a good monthly salary in this part of the country.)

They gestured at mountains that stretched for miles and flashed a thumbs-up. We nodded back. The view was indeed spectacular. Because our shared vocabulary consisted of "hello," "let's go," "bye," and "Jiuzhaigou," we focused on the last one, trying to tell them where we'd come from. I'm still not entirely certain, but I think they thought we were lost. "Jiuzhaigou!" they said, pointing over a mountain and grinning. We smiled back wanly -- we'd been hiking for six hours at high altitude and were tired. Of course, our new companions had been up both far longer and far higher.

A third Tibetan loped over, and they motioned for us to follow. They hiked fast, but their leisurely steps made it seem as if they were out for a casual stroll, which did little for morale. I was soon panting and heaving and showing especial interest in stopping to photograph a yellow flower.

Eventually, our companions decided we were going too slowly. They mimed for us to take off our packs, which they shouldered. They pointed down an impossibly steep slope. They would take us to their village, where we could camp and be fed, if we liked.

I'll be curious to see how the park and the Tibetans reconcile their disparate land ethics, or if they can. So far, the government has contented itself with paying the Tibetans up to 7,000 RMB a year to phase out their poaching practices -- a program that is expected to end next year.

But as I scrambled down the slope, watching the Tibetans carry my pack and chain-smoke and search for roots and still easily outstrip me, conservation wasn't my first concern. I'm growing more accustomed to these delicate contradictions -- between what I read and what I see, between what is said and what is stuck in the treads of my boot.