Medog County, located in the southeast of Tibet and lower reaches of the Yarlung Zangbo River with an average altitude of 1200 meters, the lowest elevation of 115 meters, is a county approved to establish in April 2015 under the jurisdiction of Linzhi City, Tibet Autonomous Region. With an area of 31394.67 square kilometers, an area of 20 thousand acres of arable land and 32 million acres of forest area, Medog County has jurisdiction over1 town, 7 countries and 60 villages as of 2011. The inhabitants of Medog County are mainly Monba and Ihoba people. What’s more, the main section of the Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon is within the territory of this county.
Medog County is in the south of the Himalayas, adjacent to India, bearing the meaning of “hidden lotus” for the word “Medog” means “flower” in Tibetan language. Medog County belongs to the subtropical humid climate in east of the Himalayas with the distribution of tropical rainforest. Medog County is the lowest place as per altitude on this Tibetan Plateau, but with the best environment. The weather here is also the most moderate with the most abundant rainfall and the most completed ecological preservation. Compared with other regions of Tibet, within the territory of Medog County has an excellent weather condition such as the season there seemed like spring all the year round. There are more than 3000 kinds of advanced plants alone in Medog County, about 10 kinds of bamboo plants and over 80 kinds of wild orchids.
Entering Medog County, just within a few hours will be able to appreciate the rich and colorful natural landscape in different poses and with different expressions ranging from high mountain frigid zone to tropical rain forest, enjoying the reputation of “Xishuangbanna of Tibet”. Chieftain Liu Zanting of Manchu troops who came here to stabilize the border area and give peace to the country at the end of the Qing Dynasty has a deep feeling about it and said such words about Medog “forest filled with thousands of miles, flowers and trees all over the mountains and wisteria bridge, indeed a land of idyllic beauty”, which made an essence of the description about the subtropical rainforest of alpine canyon in Medog County.
Medog is named as ‘‘Boyu Pema Koe” in Tibetan Buddhist scripture. According to legend, when Guru Rinpoche was invited to visit the holy mountains by Tubo King Trisong Detsen in the 9th century, he found this place is like a lotus in full bloom, has the imagery of holy land. Thereupon, he decided to practice dharma. The average altitude of Medog County is about 1200 meters. Both the Namjagbarwa and Gallabailei are the highest two peaks of East Himalayan Mountains, with its terrain declined sharply from north to south. Namjagbarwa reaches up to 7756 meters on the north while on its south is down to only a few hundred meters. This place is surrounded by mountains and bears the shape of lotus. The well-known Yarlung Zangbo River roared out in the two peaks and split the awesome abysses at a depth of more than 5000 meters, forming the world’s deepest, longest and most precipitous canyon-Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon in the world.
What’ more, Medog County also contains a lot of natural resources such as water resource, soil resource, plant resource and animal resource. Owing to the Yarlung Zangbo River, Medog County is extremely rich in water resources, natural hydropower reserves reaching over 6880 kilowatts. A place in the Yarlung Zangbo River bend, the hydropower accounted for two-thirds of the whole hydropower and one tenth of the national hydropower reserves. The precipitation of Medog County is abundant, and the cut capacity on the surface is dense, and its water system developed vigorous. The major passes in East Himalayan have small lakes in the general area of below 500 square meters. Medog County has been reputed as “natural museum of various plant types”, containing a wide variety of plants and complex structure of vegetation with obvious vertical band. Besides, the county covers a whole area of 34 thousand square kilometers and abundant plant and animal resources.
