I loved the little moment which the image captures.
Had I been in front of the mother and daughter – and thereby made my presence intrusive – the moment simply would not have happened…at that moment, at least.
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This post’s subtitle owes an apology to Wendy Carlos.
(Wendy, who was originally named Walter, is most famous for her 1968 LP “Switched-on Bach”).
This post includes a musical bonus; like the featured image, it involves Tibetan Buddhism…but not J.S. Bach.
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This post’s Tibetan Plateau location is higher and wilder than was true of #8 in this series.
The Chang Tang – also rendered into English as “Changtang” – is a very harsh environment, mostly grasslands at more than 4,000 metres above sea level, punctuated by mountains.
Much of it is protected in one of the world’s largest national parks, but climate change’s impact – here, mostly negative – is proving particularly extreme, rapid.
Goa – or Tibetan Gazelle – live here in still-considerable, but declining numbers.
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Dead yaks reputedly provide rather more than half of the food eaten by Gyps himalayensis, but many members of Homo sapiens have also been devoured.
“Live” humans, fear not!
These very large raptors are scavengers, not hunters.
For countless human generations – via so-called “Tibetan Sky Burials”, in which religious rites are meticulously conducted, but the recently-deceased are not buried – Himalayan Griffon Vultures have done high-altitude humans a valuable service.
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Meet Mustela altai.
Asia’s Mountain Weasel, or Altai Weasel is an absolute carnivore whose preferred habitat is 3,500 metres+ above sea level.
On October 12, 2019 my beloved and I had an uncommonly close encounter with one, on his or her “moving day”.
This occurred in a very pleasant valley, just off and below the Tibetan Plateau proper, but – at circa 3, 800 metres – still within this species’ allegedly-preferred altitude range.
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Kathryn Schulz’s superb essay is called What Do We Hope to Find When We Look for a Snow Leopard?
Although not primarily about snow leopards, it particularly refers to a 1978 “classic” – Peter Matthiessen’s The Snow Leopard – and to a recently-published book by a Parisian who also pursued an ardent desire to encounter a snow leopard, on “the roof of the world”.
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On 22 October 2019, in the northeastern part of the Tibetan Plateau in Qinghai, China, I met an obviously-ambitious sheep-owner.
Clearly, he was “improving” his flock, probably with help from Australia.
Some of his sheep greatly surprised me – very evidently, some of their “bloodlines” were merino.
The prosperous grazier’s mask was entirely appropriate to his dusty task.
However, wearing it would have been expressly forbidden in some other places/contexts, even in the much more open/democratic land of Oz…
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The featured bird is very tiny, very hardy.
“His” valley’s sparsely vegetated floor – the “low ground”, locally – all sits within 200 metres either side of 4000 metres above sea level.
If transplanted to the Tibetan Plateau, New Zealand’s highest peak would fail to reach this valley’s lowest point.
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…what does he/it look like?
The featured image offers a Tibetan Plateau answer.
In the White House – depending on one’s particular perspective – the result is “entirely different”, or, in essence, “much the same”…
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Meet Ochotona gloveri – Glover’s pika.
This mostly-solitary herbivore is a high altitude specialist, to whom temperatures north of 26 Celsius could prove fatal.
Glover’s pikas live on and near to the Tibetan Plateau, mostly on/in steep rockfaces.
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