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Old Man of the Mountains

One man's determination has helped rescue giant pandas, Marco Polo sheep and snow leopards, among other charismatic species.

The Chang Tang in northern Tibet is a frigid, wind-swept plateau cut through with giant lakes and gorges. Its winters are so cold that evenings must be spent huddled around dung-burning stoves, and truckers warm their engines in the mornings with blowtorches. Twice the area of California, sparsely inhabited and until recently inaccessible to all but a handful of foreigners, the Chang Tang is "a vision of totemic loneliness, of space, silence, and desolation," writes biologist George Schaller, who means this as praise. For nearly 30 years, Mr. Schaller hasn't been able to resist the place, which, despite its...

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