New Barag Right Banner 新巴尔虎右旗

Setting and landscape

The banner government puts usable grassland at 20,500 square kilometres, 81.3 per cent of the banner. The Kherlen River (克鲁伦河) rises on the eastern slopes of the Khentii Mountains in Mongolia, crosses into China and flows east past the banner seat, Altan Emel (阿拉坦额莫勒镇), into Hulun Lake; about 206 of its 1,264 kilometres lie in China.

The banner government lists Hulun Lake (呼伦湖), also called Dalai Lake (达赉湖), as the largest lake in Inner Mongolia: 2,339 square kilometres of fresh water at 545.5 metres, a rift lake formed in the late Jurassic. It belongs to the Dalai Lake National Nature Reserve (达赉湖国家级自然保护区), where 303 bird species have been recorded, including red-crowned and Siberian cranes. Some 100 kilometres from Altan Emel, Buir Lake (贝尔湖) straddles the Mongolian border: of its 628.78 square kilometres only the north-western 40.26 are Chinese. It is fed mainly by the Halha River (哈拉哈河), and the Orshun River (乌尔逊河) links it from the north to Hulun Lake. Both names come from Mongolian words for the otter.

History

The banner government ties the Kherlen to the youth of Genghis Khan: the Tatars poisoned his father Yesugei (也速该) on its banks, and in the twelfth century the Khongirad (弘吉拉部), the people of his wife Börte (孛儿帖), lived from the lower Kherlen to Hulun Lake.

Dashi Pengsige Temple (达西朋斯格庙), known locally as the West Temple, stands 10 kilometres east of Altan Emel. This Tibetan Buddhist monastery was built in 1854; parts of it were badly damaged during the Cultural Revolution, it was restored in 1985, and it is now a key cultural relic protection unit of Inner Mongolia. Week-long temple fairs are held from the sixth day of the fourth and of the sixth lunar months.

Food and local products

Barag lamb rolls (巴尔虎羊肉卷) are the banner's specialty, made in two main kinds, from lamb and from mature sheep, and used for hotpot. On Buir Lake the catch of carp, catfish and whitefish goes into the Buir whole-fish banquet (贝尔全鱼宴).

Highlights

• Hulun Lake 呼伦湖: Listed by the banner government as Inner Mongolia's largest lake; part of the Dalai Lake National Nature Reserve.
• Buir Lake 贝尔湖: Border lake shared with Mongolia; only 40.26 square kilometres in its north-west are Chinese.
• Dashi Pengsige Temple 达西朋斯格庙: Tibetan Buddhist monastery built in 1854, 10 km east of Altan Emel; a regional key cultural relic protection unit.
• Barag lamb rolls 巴尔虎羊肉卷: Lamb and mutton rolls for hotpot, named by the banner government as a local specialty.