Since 2017, more and more news about Snow Leopard, Leopard and Nature Watch Activities in Angsai Town, Zaduo County has been seen on the Internet. In 2018, I met Zeng Zhang, who is a professional wildlife guide in China. He has guided a French professional photography group to search snow leopards in Angsai for more than 2 years. He has seen snow leopards many times. In addition, he drives well and speaks English well.

        The probability of sighting snow leopards in Angsai is very high. It was reported that in a natural watch activity organized by Zaduo county and ShanShui Conservation Center in middle 2018, wildlife lovers saw 7 snow leopards in one day. So, I decided to participate in a natural watch activity of Angsai with Zeng Zhang in March 2019.

        I took flight from Chengdu to Yushu city at 2 p.m. on March 6, 2019, met Zhen Zhang at 4 o'clock at Yushu airport. We stayed in Yushu City for one night to purchase food, such as breakfast cereal, nuts, instant noodles, self-heating rice, etc. We left for Angsai at 8 a.m. on the 7^th of March. A weeks ago, Zaduo County suffered a snow disaster, and many wild animals were starved to death. Now the mountains along the road were still covered with thick snow. Tibetan fox is very good at catching pika in the snow. When this fox saw us stop the car, it ran away with the pika in his mouth.

        On the way, we met several groups of vultures, who were eating the bodies of dead animals on the roadside.

        We would stay at the home of the local herdsman guide Gamasusuonan. We call him Gasuo for short. His home is by the Lancang (Mekong) River. It is a very lively family with 8 brothers and sisters. 

        We put down our luggage at Gasuo's house, drove by Zeng Zhang, and Gasuo's father accompanied us to Reiqing (means enthusiasm) Village. We crossed a mountain pass. There is a mobile phone signal tower there and you can make phone calls and connect to the Internet. Half an hour after departure, we entered the boundary of Reiqing Village. It is called a village, but is actually a very large place with many valleys in different directions. 

        As soon as we entered a valley, we saw a musk deer standing still by the roadside for a few minutes. Musk deer is the main target of poaching. It is very valuable and has a fixed route of moving. It is difficult to see musk deer in other places of China. But they are very common here, indicating that animals are well protected in Angsai.

        The car moved slowly in the valley and passed by the home of a local guide named Caini. It is said that he is the best snow leopard guide in Angsai. Now he was in the Zaduo county and would come back in three days. There are some other herdsmen's houses. They have sold out their yaks and now live in Zaduo county. They are only back during the season of digging caterpillar fangi for about a month. The owner of the last herdsman's house at the end of the valley is Gelai. Everyone says that he is a very good man. The family has two daughters. One daughter had just given birth and was feeding the baby boy. The other daughter poured us milk tea and gave us highland barley cakes and other snacks. They are very friendly to visitors.Gelai's home is at the intersection of three valleys, which is the place where snow leopards are spotted frequently.  (In the next few days, we stayed in their house for a while almost every day. )    

        Gasuo's father stayed drinking tea at Gelai's house. Zeng Zhang and I continued to drive to the end of the valley. Then  we took camera, tripod and telescope and walked more than 100 meters in the ankle deep snow. At this moment, my blood oxygen saturation was only 73%.

        At the observation point, when I was still panting, Zeng Zhang rushed down the small slope to me and said "snow leopard, snow leopard". Looking through the Swarovski monocular, a snow leopard is half lying on the mountain. The snow leopard is very clear in 70x telescope which may be the best snow leopard viewing equipment in the world. I couldn't find the snow leopard when I changed to my camera. Zeng Zhang kept describing the orientation to me: on the left of the snow slope, under the big red stone, it was moving, now on the snow... He kept saying, shooting, and the shutter clicked. I just couldn't find the snow leopard from the camera lens. I knew this was a wonderful moment, so I couldn't let him stop to help me.

         Half a minute later, the snow leopard disappeared. Zeng Zhang helped me use the camera to check the position. It turned out that the place I looked at was dozens of meters below. There were also red stones and snow. It's too difficult to describe the orientation in language in such a far and large scene. "The snow leopard is coming out again" Zeng Zhang shouted again. This time I saw it. It came up from the rocks, walked across the snow, turned over the snow ridge and disappeared. I took photos and videos. This is another snow leopard, Zeng Zhang told me.

        The snow leopard was more than 400 meters away from us. We thought they didn't go far away, so we decided to climb up to get closer. We took the camera, heavy tripod, went up for 200 meters, and searched the snow leopards behind a pile of rocks, but did not see them. We waited there until 6:30, and decided to go down to the foot of the slope. There Zeng Zhang saw the snow leopard again with the telescope. It was sitting at the top of the rocks, 600 meters away from us, 200 meters away from the earliest position. (These distances were later determined by laser rangefinder). Obviously, it saw us and deliberately stayed away from us.

        Very lucky! I saw two snow leopards on the first day. 

        Early the next morning, Gasuo drove his two wheel SUV to take us to look for the snow leopard. We went to the valley in the other direction, sat down at several herdsmen's houses, drank tea, inquired infoamtion about snow leopards. I remember some herdsmen's names: Sangzhou, Baima, Dawa, Asu... They were all very friendly, especially Sangzhou. Zeng Zhang said he was good and his information was reliable. Baima was responsible for insurance claims, and would know whose yak was killed by the snow leopard at the first time.Since these valleys have no names, we use the names of herdsmen to describe them, such as the valley of Gelai's house, the valley on the left of Gelai's house, the valley on the right of Gelai's house, the valley of Sangzhou's house, and the valley of Asu's house, etc.

         At noon, we ate self-heated rice by the river at the foot of a hillside. There was a large group of blue sheep on the slope.

         In the afternoon, We went to Gelai's house to rest a while, and then went to the place where I saw the snow leopard yesterday, no snow leopard. It was about  3 p.m., There was another valley next to Gelai's house.I called it the right valley of Gelai's house. Zeng decided to go there. The ice at the bottom of the valley was very flat. There was a layer of white snow several centimeters thick on the ice. Next to it were vertical rocks, The scenery was very beautiful. After driving for a while, we drove out of the river bed along a road on the hillside, and finally stopped at the corner of the hillside. The snow in front was very thick and the car couldn't pass. We were going to sleep in the car and look forward to more snow leopards coming out at dust. After closing my eyes for less than a minute, I heard Gasuo say "I seem to see a snow leopard". Then he looked through a telescope and said "Two". We opened the door and got out of the car at once. With his naked eyes, he confirmed two snow leopards lying on a ridge of 300 meters away. I quickly set up a tripod and started shooting. Seconds later, the two snow leopards stood up  and began to walk towards each other. They made out for a while and walked away from each other. They disappeared behind the ridge after a couple of minutes.

A snow leopard lies on the left.

Another snow leopard lies on the right.

Two snow leopards are walking to each other.

        Zeng Zhang didn't expect to see the snow leopard again so soon. The camera was in his backpack. When he set up the camera, the playing of the two leopards fighting had finished. He was very regret for not prepared in advance. We climbed up the hillside completely invisible to the snow leopard for more than 200 meters. We hid behind big rocks, Gasuo poked his head out to watch, the snow leopard was gone. We waited, and 10 minutes later, saw two leopards on the snow slope mountain hundreds of meters higher. It was snowing and foggy. Only Sony A9 could get focused. Snow leopard is very vigilant. We are more than 500 meters away from them now.

        I love the photo of snow leopards on the ridge very much. The interaction between the two snow leopards in front of the snow mountain background is obvious, which confirms the statement that the snow leopards act synchronously during the courtship period, that is, sitting and walking at the same time. This is the second time I saw a snow leopard in Angsai.

        We happily returned to Gasuo's home and made a wish to see the snow leopard every day.

        Before going to bed, I wanted to defecate. ZengZhang told me just go to the courtyard wall and release there. Just when I squatted down and turned off the headlights, there was a movement nearby. I turned on the headlights, saw a big Tibetan mastiff came to me with two eyes shining. It was frightening. It came slowly to me. I suddenly understood what it was going to do. I finished and went back to my room to sleep. The next morning, I took a look, as expected, that place was clean. Here, feces were handled by animals in a natural way.

        On the third day in Angsai, we repeated the arrangement of the previous day. Due to the snow yesterday afternoon, the ground was covered with a layer of white new snow. It was very beautiful!

        Just as expected, I found a line of clear snow leopard footprints beside the marrow raod. I followed the footprints and photographed the footprints from all angles.

        In the right valley of Gelai's house where a pair of snow leopards were found yesterday, ZengZhang climbed a hillside and observed with a telescope, I flew a drone near our car. About ten minutes later, Zeng ran down quickly. I knew he found snow leopard again. He said he saw a snow leopard far away walking through a snow slope and approached a group of blue sheep. The snow leopard was obvious and sure.

        We took gears and walked along the river bed to the direction of the snow leopard. The riverbed was covered by the snow with different depths. In some places, it was only ice and very slippery. We passed it carefully.

         After hundreds of meters walking, we saw a line of footprints of snow leopard on the snow surface, which was much more beautiful than the footprints seen earlier. There was another line of footprints across the river in one place, which was the footprints of another snow leopard. I photographed the intersection of these two lines of footprints.

        After walking about 1000 meters, Gasuo saw the snow leopard lying on the grass. He had seen us. I recorded a few as proof of seeing a snow leopard again. We continued. Gasuo walked in front with my camera. He turned a hill corner, set up the camera and started shooting.

        I caught up and saw the snow leopard walking away. It was more than 400 meters from us. I took some photos, but I thought it was too far away for any good ones . I began to take videos. Later, when I checked, no snow leopard. What a pity! It crossed the ridge in ten seconds.Snow leopard is very careful and smart! The distance at first sight is normally the nearest. This is the third sighting of snow leopard on this trip.

        On the 4th day, I got up early after a good sleep. After crossing the snow mountain pass, We went to valleys of Gelai's house first in the morning and found no snow leopard, turned back to valley of SangZhou's house and saw that there were vultures stopping on the nearby mountain to watch. I hoped that they had found the prey killed by the snow leopard and were waiting for a share. Seeing Sang Zhou, he had gone up the mountain to check for us. He found nothing and just came down.

         We drove on and went to other herdsmen's homes to check out if there were yaks killed by snow leopards. Baima said that there was a calf missing. He was not sure about the situation of the calf. He would tell us if there was any reliable information. 

         On our way back hours later, a van came. Baima got the news that a yak was killed by an animal near Asu's house. He's going to do an insurance survey and we could go together with him and have a look. The distance to Asu's house was a little far. It took more than 30 minutes on the snow road. We were very exciting in the car. If a snow leopard killed a yak, it would guard and eat for quite long period of time, usually several days. When Baima approached to make the insurance survey on the yak, the leopard would go away. At this moment, we could set up a hidden tent nearby and wait for the snow leopard to come back after Baima left. We dreamed to take a close-up picture of the snow leopard in such a circumstance.

        From the communication between Baima and Asu, we knew the yak was killed by wolves, not by the snow leopard. We decided to follow the Baima up the slope to see the scene of the dead yak. The site was not far away. It's more than 200 meters up a snow-covered gully. The dead yak was no longer at the killing site. Now there were only a few big pools of blood on the white ice and snow and the footprints of wolves. The owner of the yak dragged it down about 100 meters and covered it with branches. He was afraid that vultures would eat it up. 

        The Baima made the insurance on-site inspection, arranged the cattle on the snow ground, took photos, cut off the cattle tail, cuts off four cattle hoofs with an axe, put them in right position, and then took more photos。Zaduo county has a livestock insurance plan for herdsmen. Herdsmen pay little money to the insurance company. If the livestock is killed by snow leopards or other predators, they can be compensated, which can reduce the herdsmen's retaliation against snow leopards and other animals. This is one of the many things the local government does to protect wild animals.

        The herdsman put the dead yak under the tree to see if there would be a snow leopard to eat. Herdsmen said that snow leopards would not eat prey killed by other animals, such as wolves. We continued to look for the snow leopard. Two hours later, we returned to the dead yak. There were many vultures and three wild dogs competing for the yak's body.

        It's almost 7 o'clock. I passed Caini's house and just saw his car there. Caini grew up in the most active place of the snow leopard. He knows the habits of the snow leopard very well and has strong eyesight. I sat at his house for a while and made an appointment with him to help us find the snow leopard tomorrow. Mrs. Caini's name is Cairong. She is an elegant Tibetan woman. They have four lovely children.We didn't see the snow leopard on the fourth day.

        On the morning of the 5th day, Caini joined us to look for snow leopards.We found a yak was wounded heavly. The footprints showed a group of wolves are the perpetrators.

         Then we got to a valley I hadn't been to. Gasuo drove wildly in the snow for fear of getting stuck in the snow. Gasuo said he knew the terrain under the snow and dared to drive like this. Getting off the vehecle, we walked a mile or so in the snow of different depths, and there was no snow leopard at the end of the valley. There was ice under the thin snow in several places, which was very slippery. I fell several times. At noon, we had lunch at Caini's house. CaiRong cooked beef with potatoes, like a genuine Sichuan food.

        After lunch, we went to Gelai's house. Yesterday, one of his bull yaks died and was placed on the roadside for scavengers. Now the huge bull has only a skeleton, and dozens of vultures and magpies are feasting.

        We went to the valleys of Galai’s house to search snow leopard, saw two lines of clear snow leopard footprints. It came down from the mountain on the left and went to the hillside on the right of the valley. It was almost certain that the two snow leopards we saw on the first day had turned back. Caini estimated that they would not go up the mountain immediately, but would turn to the right valley of Gelai's house.

        At the observation point in the left valley of Gelai's house, we saw a large group of neatly lined blue sheep. They were very nervous, looked around and didn't eat grass. Caini said it was a sign that a snow leopard might be nearby. Caini and Gasuo walked into the valley to look for it, but they didn't find the snow leopard. Then we drove to the right valley of Gelai's house. Shortly after entering the valley, we saw two lines of footprints. Caini's judgment about the two snow leopards was correct. We followed the footprints and walked carefully in the snow covered frozen riverbed. Suddenly Caini shouted something. Obviously, he found the snow leopard.

        Through the 70X Swarovski monocular, we could barely see the face of the snow leopard. It was a strong adult, on the top of the 250 meter high mountain, the straight distance may be more than 600 meters away. it watched us for a while, then jumped into the rubble from the top of the mound and walked to the left. Its coat was integrated in the rocks. I had to follow it through the lens, otherwise it would be very difficult to spot it again.

          It walked out of the rocks, through a snow slope, struggled in deep snow area, and finally disappeared in another prominent rock. This is the fourth time I saw a snow leopard in Angsai.

        We continued to track the two lines of footprints on the snow surface. Under a large rock block, the footprints were chaotic, with traces of sitting and lying. The two lines of footprints turned 90 degrees, crossed the river and went up the mountain, which was the side of the snow leopard we just saw. From the traces on the snow surface, Caini thought that the snow leopards had mated, and what we just saw was one of them.

        On our way home, we met Gelai driving his yaks home from the mountain. He told us that a snow leopard had just killed a blue sheep.  This was the news we eagerly looked forward to. It was getting late, and we decided to go up the mountain early the next morning.

        On the 6th day, the alarm clock was set at 6:00 a.m. We started up at 6:30, and planned to arrive at Caini's house at 7:00 a.m. Unexpectedly the mountain road froze at night. Gasuo had to put on the anti-skid chain to go up the mountain. We took Caini at 7:40 and headed for the place where the blue sheep was killed.

        We started climbing at about 8 o'clock, with our photographic equipments and camouflage tents. Walking and observing. Caini spotted the snow leopards after climbing more than 300 meters. It was a pair, more than 200 meters away. They should have found us long ago and left the body of the blue sheep which  was only more than 100 meters away from us. It's 8:35. We set up a tent and waited for the snow leopards to come back fot their food.

        Caini and Gasuo went down the mountain, deliberately moving noisily, hoping to make the snow leopard feel that all people went down the mountain. Sure enough, after they left, the two snow leopards were more active. They were a mother and son. The mother leopard came down and took a large piece of meat and brought it to her cub. Finally, the two snow leopards crossed the ridge in two routes at 10:20.

          The snow leopard walked over the ridge, and the blue sheep watched the snow leopard leaving

        Zeng Zhang and me waited in the tent to see whether the snow leopard would come back or whether there were other animals such as wolves to come to the carcase.  No animals came until 3 pm. Gosuo climbed up to meet us and took all gears down the mountain. I looked at the data in Garmin watch. We walked vertically 150m up and down. This is the fifth snow leopard I saw in Angsai.

        On the 7th day, the last day of this trip, I got up at 7:30 in the morning and started at 8:30. I made a long phone call at the mountain pass, then picked up Caini at 9:30. We chose to go to the valley Sangzhou's house, because we hadn't seen snow leopards ever in this direction. We saw a car stuck in the snow on the road. Gasuo knew the driver well  and went up to help.

        There were a lot of vultures circling over the hillside.  ZengZhang checked that direction with monocular and  said again: "Snow Leopard". A snow leopard was eating a blue sheep up the hill. Then Caini spotted another snow leopard walking up the very high mountain. A few minutes later, it climbed over the top of the mountain and disappeared in sight. 

                The snow leopard and the dead blue sheep bodies were more than 400 meters away from us. We decided to get closer to about 200 meters to take a picture of the snow leopard eating. We climbed up from the place where the snow leopard could not see for 25 minutes, reached behind a pile of big rocks, set up a hidden tent first, and then looked at the snow leopard in the tent. The snow leopard had left and vultures were eating. 

         We think the leopards were full, because one has left before we came to this place. Our vehicle was parked on the road. It could be seen by the snow leopard. Is it smart enough to judge that we went up from the place it could not see? Does this assumption overestimate the snow leopard？

        We normally got up at about 7:30 and started up at 8:30. This is not a very good schedule. We should arrive at the observation point just after dawn (7:30). Snow leopard is more active in the morning. If a kill in night happened, the leopard may not be full at early morning. In addition, it is less likely snow leopard to be disturbed by other people in early morning. This is the sixth time I saw snow leopards in Angsai.

        That evening, on the way back to Gasuo’s house, we saw someone was taking photos by the roadside. It should be shooting snow leopard. We were a little late. Only Gasuo saw the snow leopard, but we didn't have chance to take any pictures. The photographer is one of the three herder students of Xi Zhinong, a famous wildlife photographer in China, named Chiding. They found the snow leopard on the mountain after hearing  leopard call. After a while, we also heard the roar from behind the mountain. Chiding showed me the photos and videos in his mobile phone. Some of them are very close and very good. I wish I could have pictures like that.

      This was the last day I stay in Angsai. We met snow leopard 7 times in 7 days, photographed 6 times, heard voice once, total 11 snow leopards, photographed 10. According to my knowledge, Angsai should be the place with the highest sighing opportunity of snow leopards in the world, and it also becomes one of my favorite wildlife watching places.

     Angsai Nature Watch Activities is open to domestic and foreign tourists. For details and contact information, please see the website: www.valleyofthecats.org

         Attached  some photos of Angsai's winter landscape and persons on this trip

Typical environment loved by snow leopard

Zeng Zhang was talking with a herder to inquire snow leopard information.

Caini

Zeng Zhang and Gasuo

Zeng Zhang, Gasuo and his sisters

Caini,Gasuo and herdsmen

Zeng Zhang, Gasuo and Caini

Zeng Zhang and me

I kneel on ice to observe. 

More blog will come...