• The once-vibrant hills are now barren and dead.
• The stream has slowed to a trickle for three years.
• The Tsaikhir Valley is one of the world’s coldest areas, with winter temperatures below -50C.

Myagmar-Ochir is only 3, but he’s already ambitious.

He says, “I want to ride.” “Rope horses”

Myagmar-Ochir plays by a rocky brook 50 meters from his ger, a typical Mongolian yurt.

The child spends his days straddled on a wrought-iron bar, his pretend horse.

He whips the bar, willing it into a gallop, imitating his 29-year-old father, Octonbaatar, who lives in the Tsaikhir, a freezing, lonely valley 500 miles west of Mongolia’s capital, Ulaanbaatar.

They’re seasonal nomads. Octonbaatar’s family has relied on the stream that is now his son’s playground.

His wife, Chuluunchimeg, 30, and their three children migrate to this calm valley each autumn for the tall grass to feed their horses and yak and the regular flow of water in their private creek.

The stream has slowed to a trickle for three years, and the once-vibrant hills are now barren and dead.

Octonbaatar says, “We don’t get green summers anymore.” This year there’s less water.

He points to a snowy peak in the distance.

“[The mountain] was always snow-capped. Octonbaatar said it’s melting.

The Tsaikhir Valley is one of the world’s coldest areas, with winter temperatures below -50C (-58F), but its growing drought conditions, exacerbated by ever-warming summers, have locals wondering how long they can cling on. Myagmar-desire Ochir’s of following in his father’s footsteps is in jeopardy.

The Tsaikhir may be Mongolia’s climate front line, but its herders are not alone.

One-third of Mongolia’s three million people preserve nomadic customs tied to the land.

Droughts and intensifying dzuds, Mongolia’s winter storms, are disturbing historic rituals.

Many of Tsaikhir’s young boys and girls no longer see a future in the valley where they were raised. Instead, most have eyes on a career in the city, a trend that has swelled the Mongolian capital in recent years as herders flee nomadic life for the relative stability and modern comforts of Ulaanbaatar.

The significant shift in Tsaikhir’s terrain happened within a generation.

32-year-old valley herder Bayarkhuu.

Al Jazeera interviewed him after he won a horse-wrangling competition.

His boyhood was lush.

He recalled his boyhood while staring out over the brown terrain.

Summer droughts are the most evident indicator of climate change in the Tsaikhir, but the cultural effects are felt most in winter.

Each October, the valley’s families gather 2,000 horses for the winter. Families’ most valuable horses are safeguarded from the arctic by herding them together.

Three Tsaikhir men will guard the horses for five months.

In tough conditions, men camp with the animals and fire warning shots at wolves who follow the herd.

Protecting the winter herd is a risky coming-of-age ritual, but it’s also an honorable tradition that young men in the valley strive to engage in.

Shwara, 18, abandoned school at 14 to lead a nomadic existence. He’s longed for the winter herd’s protection.

“My friend told me following the winter herd would be beneficial for me physically and make me a better horseman,” he told Al Jazeera via a translation.

“I’m going. I want to herd.

The shifting climate may prevent Shwara from succeeding.

Batsehen, Tsaikhir’s 48-year-old governor, spoke to Al Jazeera while fundraising for a cancer patient.

“Every year, the winter herd would gather,” he continued. “But not since 2018.”

Batsehen: “We haven’t gathered the herd in three years.”

Due to droughts, there isn’t enough undergrowth to feed the herd in winter. Batsehen and other community leaders made the painful choice to cancel the winter herd in 2019, afraid they would irreversibly harm their meadows.

Since then, families have been left to protect their horses alone during winter, with catastrophic results.

Governor Batsehen: “One family lost 12 horses to wolves.”

Mongolia’s fragile economy has exacerbated the environmental threat to the Tsaikhir herders.

Mongolia’s economy has been handicapped by the isolation of its two major trading partners, war-torn Russia and zero-COVID China.

Many herder families survive by selling animal goods to China and Russia.

A domestic surplus of these products has cut prices, diminishing Tsaikhir revenues.

Bakhtur, the 22-year-old son of a herder, claimed the border closure drove down sheep wool prices.

The trade wars with China and Russia have hurt exotic exports.

Bahktur and his neighbors collected deer antlers. Before China closed its borders, Bakhtur sold antlers to Chinese traders for traditional medicine.

China’s border barriers have slashed demand for antlers.

“The deer horn is now just 20,000 Tugrik.”

President Ukhnaa Khurelsukh promoted Mongolia’s climate initiatives during COP27 in Egypt.

“Mongolia is one of the countries most hit by climate change,” the president stated, promoting the country’s ‘One Billion Tree’ drive to reverse years of deforestation and turn steppe land into a carbon sink.

Mongolia was among the emerging economies advocating for a ‘loss and damage fund — a compensation system agreed to after much negotiation that would reimburse developing nations susceptible to climate change.

Tsaikhir residents find comfort in the supernatural protection they feel their valley receives.

At the Tsaikhir’s entrance, two partially frozen monks are believed to be semi-alive.

Most local gers feature monk shrines, which Tsaikhir families think give good luck and protection.

“Someone brought a sick snake to Tsaikhir,” chuckled Governor Batsehen. “Snakes are kept away.”

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