Wild Walnut Valley Scenic Area

Wild Walnut Valley Scenic Area

Wild Walnut Valley Scenic Area is a national AAAA-level tourist attraction and a national water conservancy scenic area.

Wild Walnut Valley Scenic Area[1] is located 13 kilometers east of Gongliu County and is a national AAAA-level tourist attraction as well as the site of the Autonomous Region’s Wild Walnut Nature Reserve. It gets its name from the vast area of wild walnut forests—rare in the world and unique to China—that grow here. The wild walnut is a tertiary relict species, rare in the world, unique to Asia, and extremely precious.

The Wild Walnut Valley Eco-Tourism Park Scenic Area is situated in the Ishgeliq Mountain range in the southeastern part of Gongliu County, Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture. It stretches 3.2 kilometers from east to west and 4.7 kilometers from north to south, covering a total area of 1,214 hectares. It is 12 kilometers from the county seat and is classified as an autonomous region-level nature reserve. The valley consists of a main gully, an eastern gully, and a western gully, and contains over 10,000 mature wild walnut trees spread across an area of 44.67 hectares.

The wild walnut is a tertiary relict species, rare in the world, unique to Asia, and extremely precious.

The Kazakh name for Wild Walnut Valley is “Jianggadesayi.” This precious nature reserve[span]

is located deep within the dense forests of the southeastern part of Gongliu County in the Ili River Valley of China’s Xinjiang region. It is

a mountain valley that is surrounded on three sides and open to the west. This geographical formation helps shield it from the dry heat coming from the west, east, and south, as well as the cold from the north, while allowing the moist air from the west to nourish the area. As a result, it creates a natural environment distinct from desert conditions, which is favorable for the growth of grassland vegetation and trees. Due to the relatively minor impact of glaciers during the Quaternary period, the tertiary-era mixed coniferous and broadleaf forests and broadleaf deciduous forests have been preserved here.

The wild walnut forests growing in this area represent one of the most important germplasm resource tree species among the tertiary relict species.

The name “Tertiary” means “the third derived period.” It is a geological time period name and is the oldest period of the Cenozoic Era, beginning 65 million years ago and lasting approximately 63 million years. During the Tertiary period, angiosperms flourished immensely. Although conifers still held significant importance, other angiosperms tended to decline. Ferns also greatly diminished and were mostly confined to warmer regions. In Gongliu County, Xinjiang, however, we can witness this precious species firsthand in the Wild Walnut Valley Nature Reserve, and we can even taste the highly nutritious wild walnuts. This is truly nothing short of a miracle.