Axilixi Jiucaiping Plateau 阿西里西韭菜坪

About Axilixi Jiucaiping Plateau

The scenic area covers 80 square kilometres between about 2,300 and 2,777 metres, and the Bijie municipal government gives its main summit as 2,777 metres and describes it as the fifth-highest peak in Guizhou. Its main body is a high tableland of more than one hundred thousand mu grown over with wild Chinese chives, for which the municipal government records the epithet 'home of the Chinese wild chive, duoxingjiu'. The same page states that the area was awarded a Guizhou provincial 4A tourist-area designation in August 2017.

The chive flowers open from July and reach full bloom in August and September, when the ridges turn purple. Because cloud and mist sit over Da Jiucaiping through the year, the flowering ground is known locally as the flower sea above the clouds, and summer mean temperatures in the 2,000-metre zone are given as 17.8 to 22.4 degrees Celsius. The municipal page records that Da Jiucaiping and the neighbouring Xiao Jiucaiping together make up Wumeng Shan Jiucaiping, which it treats as the benchmark site for the Axilixi index of mountain summer-resort tourism and which appeared on a national listing of ten summer-cool mountains in 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2017 and 2018. The plateau is protected under the Bijie municipal regulations for the Jiucaiping scenic area; a 2023 Xingfa township work plan assigns villages responsibility for grazing damage to its vegetation and provides for fencing and signage in the core zone.

That 2023 plan was issued jointly for Jiucaiping and for the Axilixi grassland scenic area, and it keeps the two problems it addresses separate: damage to the chive vegetation by grazing livestock at Jiucaiping, and unauthorised digging of peat moss on the grassland.

What to look for

• The chive tableland itself, more than one hundred thousand mu of wild Chinese chives forming the main body of the scenic area
• The full bloom in August and September, when the municipal government describes the ridges as turning into a purple sea; flowering starts in July
• The 2,777-metre main summit, which the Bijie municipal government gives as the fifth-highest peak in Guizhou
• The cloud and mist that sit over Da Jiucaiping and give the flowering plateau its local name, the flower sea above the clouds

Location & getting there

Getting to Axilixi Jiucaiping Plateau

Confirm the road and activity operator, weather and return transport. Stay on permitted routes and do not treat open land as unrestricted access.

• Search for 阿西里西韭菜坪 with 毕节市 and 赫章县.