Fawns are fed milk at the Sonam Dargye Station in Hoh Xil. [Photo by Wang Zhuangfei/China Daily]

Police charged with protecting the environment of Hoh Xil on the isolated Qinghai-Tibet Plateau encounter hardships and rewards. Liu Xiangrui reports.

They were elevated－in every sense. Zhan Jianglong and colleagues stayed up late to celebrate at an altitude approaching 4,600 meters. The police were delighted that Hoh Xil, where Zhan has spent two decades as an environmental-protection officer, was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage on July 8.

Zhan and his peers live and work in the Wudaoliang Protection Station operated by the Hoh Xil Nature Reserve Administration, which manages 45,000 square kilometers of isolated grassland on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

Zhan was among the first to join the administration after he retired from the army in 1997. It was then a relatively low-ranking department. But the work required a high level of devotion－in every way.

"I've come to better understand the area over the years," the 43-year-old says.

"I can't leave it now."

The native of Sichuan province's Mianyang says he'd only heard about Hoh Xil on TV before he arrived.

He recalls being stunned by the snowcaps and wildlife.

He also recalls the hardship.