The Kulikalon Lakes, also spelt Kul-i Kalon, are a group of three glacial lakes, or

tarns A tarn (or corrie loch) is a proglacial mountain lake, pond or pool, formed in a cirque excavated by a glacier. A moraine may form a natural dam below a tarn. Etymology The word is derived from the Old Norse word ''tjörn'' ("a small mount ...

, in the

Zeravshan Mountains The Zeravshan; uz, Zeravshon, Зеравшон, زېرەۋشان; from Persian fa, , Zarâfšân – meaning "the spreader of gold" is a river in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, Central Asia. Its name, "spreader of gold" in Persian, refers to the ...

of south-western

Sughd Province Sughd Province ( tg, Вилояти Суғд, Viloyati Sughd, Sogdia Region , fa, ولایت سغد) is one of the four administrative divisions and one of the three provinces ( tg, вилоятҳо, viloyatho , fa, ولایت) that make up ...

in western

Tajikistan Tajikistan (, ; tg, Тоҷикистон, Tojikiston; russian: Таджикистан, Tadzhikistan), officially the Republic of Tajikistan ( tg, Ҷумҳурии Тоҷикистон, Jumhurii Tojikiston), is a landlocked country in Centr ...

. The lakes and their surrounds have been identified by

BirdLife International BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding ...

as an

Important Bird Area An Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) is an area identified using an internationally agreed set of criteria as being globally important for the conservation of bird populations. IBA was developed and sites are identified by BirdLife Int ...

(IBA).

Description

The lakes are 55 km south-east of the district centre of Panjakent. They lie in the Kulikalon

cirque A (; from the Latin word ') is an amphitheatre-like valley formed by glacial erosion. Alternative names for this landform are corrie (from Scottish Gaelic , meaning a pot or cauldron) and (; ). A cirque may also be a similarly shaped landform ...

among remnants of

juniper Junipers are coniferous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Juniperus'' () of the cypress family Cupressaceae. Depending on the taxonomy, between 50 and 67 species of junipers are widely distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere, from the Arcti ...

forest. They are fed by

meltwater Meltwater is water released by the melting of snow or ice, including glacial ice, tabular icebergs and ice shelves over oceans. Meltwater is often found in the ablation zone of glaciers, where the rate of snow cover is reducing. Meltwater can be ...

from the Chimtarga

glacier A glacier (; ) is a persistent body of dense ice that is constantly moving under its own weight. A glacier forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its Ablation#Glaciology, ablation over many years, often Century, centuries. It acquires dis ...

, with water levels peaking in summer, and are drained by the Artuch River. The middle part of the cirque is at an altitude of 2800 m above sea level with the adjacent mountains rising to 3000–3500 m. The area contains the largest remaining blocks of juniper forest in the western half of the Zeravshan Range, on the edge of the

Chimtarga The Zarafshan Range (russian: Зеравшанский хребет, ''Zeravšanskij hrebet''; tg, Зарафшон; uz, Zarafshon; also Zeravshan or Zarafshon; from Persian ''Zar-afshān'', meaning "the sprayer of gold") is a mountain rang ...

massif. The area around the lakes is used as

pasture Pasture (from the Latin ''pastus'', past participle of ''pascere'', "to feed") is land used for grazing. Pasture lands in the narrow sense are enclosed tracts of farmland, grazed by domesticated livestock, such as horses, cattle, sheep, or swine ...

Birds

The site was classified as an IBA because it supports significant numbers of the populations of various bird species, either as residents, or as breeding or passage migrants. These include Himalayan snowcocks,

saker falcon The saker falcon (''Falco cherrug'') is a large species of falcon. This species breeds from central Europe eastwards across the Palearctic to Manchuria. It is mainly migratory except in the southernmost parts of its range, wintering in Ethiopia ...

Himalayan vulture The Himalayan vulture (''Gyps himalayensis'') or Himalayan griffon vulture is an Old World vulture native to the Himalayas and the adjoining Tibetan Plateau. It is one of the two largest Old World vultures and true raptors. It is listed as Near T ...

s, solitary snipe,

yellow-billed chough The Alpine chough (), or yellow-billed chough (''Pyrrhocorax graculus'') is a bird in the crow family, one of only two species in the genus '' Pyrrhocorax''. Its two subspecies breed in high mountains from Spain eastwards through southern Europ ...

Hume's lark Hume's short-toed lark (''Calandrella acutirostris'') is a species of lark in the family Alaudidae. It is found in south-central Asia from Iran and Kazakhstan to China. Taxonomy and systematics The name commemorates the British naturalist Allan ...

s, sulphur-bellied warblers,

wallcreeper The wallcreeper (''Tichodroma muraria'') is a small passerine bird found throughout the high mountains of the Palearctic from southern Europe to central China. It is the only extant member of both the genus ''Tichodroma'' and the family Tichodr ...

s, white-winged redstarts, brown accentors,

water pipit The water pipit (''Anthus spinoletta'') is a small passerine bird which breeds in the mountains of Southern Europe and the Palearctic eastwards to China. It is a short-distance migrant; many birds move to lower altitudes or wet open lowlands i ...

s, crimson-winged finches and

white-winged grosbeak The white-winged grosbeak (''Mycerobas carnipes'') is a species of finch in the family Fringillidae. It is found in Afghanistan, Bhutan, China, India, Iran, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Its natural ...

References

Important Bird Areas of Tajikistan Lakes of Tajikistan Sughd Region {{Tajikistan-geo-stub