Animal life is not rich along this road with its traffic. Ducks, geese, pigeons, partridges, eagles, vultures and a good many small birds are seen; the kyangs and Pantholops antelopes appeared only north of the continental water-parting; wild yaks were said never to be seen along this road.
The flora is high-alpine on both sides of the crest; at some places in the Mu-chu valley and along the lower course of the Targo-tsangpo there is some bush-vegetation. Near Govo the junipers are as big as small trees and much more common than lower down. On the Chang-tang plains one hardly sees anything else than scanty grass.
The population as all over Tibet is scanty, but the Mü-chu valley is the best populated of all the Transhimalayan valleys I have seen. The Shang-chu and Ki-chu valleys certainly have a much more numerous population. Several ruins in the lower part of the Mü-chu valley give the impression of a greater population in olden times. The first is seen on the little ridge Chikchung-chang near Chaga, which may have been a fort. Going up the Dok-chu and Mü-chu, the road passes a good many villages, all of them very small and consisting of a few stone huts. Kao is the first, a little west of Chaga. Changra has only 2 or 3 huts and is situated in the mouth of a northern tributary of the Dok-chu. Tangna has i o huts. Labrang is a house of some religious or administrative importance, and Jo a village, both near Tangna. Samde-dupta is a small monastery in the Dupta valley. Going from south to north we find: Cho-gora, Tashi-gang with only one hut, Mondho, Sanga, Kachen, Sangdo, Machung. Se-nakpo, Saukpa, Gunsa-gompa, a small nunnery, Chamda and Tanglo; maul walls and prayer cairns are very common. At Chagri-gapo there are beautiful Buddha sculptures on a granite rock. Then follow Doglo and Lingö. Some of the inhabitants of Lingö go in summer northwards with their flocks 6 or 7 days to Targo-largäp; thus even here the agriculture is insufficient, and the natives semi-nomads. But agriculture is carried on the whole way up to Govo. The next village is Sankar-sumdo; at Chisu some mills are worked in irrigation channels. Kaupeva; Gunda-tamo is a nunnery near the Kabu valley, and Do a village in the Taka valley. At Tong there is a good deal of cultivation; Tong-lova-gensang and Tene are villages of Tong, and Lung-gandän-gompa its monastery. Tong has 25 families, cultivating barley and peas and some wheat; to the district of Tong belong the following villages: Kabu with 7 families, Do with 3, Kanin with 6, Tina with 3, Tso with 15 and Hlalung with 3 families. Dupta is a nunnery, Lingbo a village near Ghe. The village of Ghe has 18 houses and cultivates barley, peas and some wheat. Tangma is the next. All these villages are situated in the mouths of side-valleys, the brooks of which irrigate their fields. Then comes Sanak, and higher up in its valley, Sanak-pu. Chenda is in the Chepu valley, in the upper part of which there are some tents. The village of Shavo or Shao was now uninhabited. At Dera, some cultivation; a party of merchants had pitched their black tents here for a few days. At Kampa in the Dera valley some poplar trees still thrive. Ship, Tinga and
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