August 26, 2020

Once a royal hunting preserve, is believed to host the biggest population of ibex and other mountain ungulates of the central Hindu Kush.

Beyond a crack in the Afghan mountains lies a lost world, the hunting grounds of King Mohammed Zahir Shah called Ajar Valley. If you drive into the western range of the Hindu Kush and pass beyond the district of Kahmard, you come across a forgotten cut called the Ajar Valley where the peaks around Ajar are lower than those of the eastern Hindu Kush but they appear to fall deeper.

It was the hunting reserve of King Mohammed Zahir Shah from 1952 until 1973 when he was deposed and went into exile in Italy. Ajar seems like a play on words. So don’t miss to explore the Valley Of The King – Ajar when you are in beautiful Bamyan.

Ajar valley, potentially a local tourist hot spot with its spectacular rocky canyons and wildlife, is however difficult to access, partly because of the occasional spillover of armed militants from neighbouring Sunni-dominated Kahmard district.

Ajar Valley within Bamyan Province (Jawzari in Ajar Valley had long been considered as the major habitat of ibex in Bamyan). In fact, back in the 1970s, WCS Scientist Chris Shank surveyed Ajar Valley and estimated a population of 5,000 individuals.

However, surveys conducted by WCS in 2006 placed the ibex population in Ajar Valley nearer to 100, a precipitous drop in numbers within the area.

Local people informed WCS that due to war and cessation of management at Ajar, ibex had been displaced to new areas including Koh-e-Kanthal in southern Samangan province, and the canyon southwest from Hazar Chishm.

This article need more information and will be updated soon!

Reference:
https://afghanistan.wcs.org/Additional-info/Mountain-Monarchs.aspx