[Photo by Zou Hong/China Daily]

Improved environment

The improved environment has been conducive to the birth of animals previously thought to be extinct. One of these is the fine-scaled fish, which inhabits the chilly waters of plateau lakes.

Among the flora is a yellow flower the locals dry in the sun to make a medicine for treating inflammation of the throat, and a purple flower that outsiders often mistake for lavender. In northern Saihanba is a stretch of land filled with that little purple flower. Right beside it is a tree, about 20 meters tall and known, very matter of factly, as The Tree. Locals reckon that just before the national forest was founded in 1962 Liu Kun, an official of the State Forestry Administration, came to do ground research and saw that tree.

"At the time, the tree was estimated to be 150 years old," said Chen Zhiqing, a member of the forest's management. "The sight of that old tree, standing solitarily on the sandy ground, convinced him that a forest could be built here."

If the estimates are right, that tree has long since blown out the candles on its 200th birthday, and it still continues to enjoy relative solitude. But all around it forests have appeared.

Liu died in 2013 and asked that his ashes be scattered in the forest.

"People come here to escape the summer heat, and to be awed by the green 'ocean' around them," Chen said. "What few realize is that the way this beauty has been created is infinitely more inspiring than the beauty itself."