Cold desert

Also called: Trans-Himalayan cold desert, Cold desert of Ladakh · Topic: Structure and Physiography of India: Himalayas, Plains, Peninsula, Coasts and Islands · NCERT: Class 6, Ch 3 "Landforms and Life"; Class 7, Ch 1 "Geographical Diversity of India"; Class 11, Ch 2 "Structure and Physiography"; Class 11, Ch 4 "Climate"; Class 11, Ch 6 "Natural Hazards and Disasters: Causes, Consequences and Management"

Meaning

A cold desert is a high, dry region where very little rain or snow falls and winters are freezing. In India, Ladakh and Lahaul-Spiti (Himachal Pradesh) are cold deserts. They lie in the rain shadow of the Greater Himalaya, get less than about 10 cm of rain a year, and have winters below −30°C.

It matters because it shows how a mountain wall can block the monsoon and make one side dry. It is also in the news because of the Cold Desert Biosphere Reserve (2025) and the Ramsar wetlands of Ladakh [2][4].

Explanation

How it forms: the rain shadow

• The Greater Himalaya blocks the monsoon.
• The monsoon winds blow in from the south and hit the Greater Himalaya.
• The wind is pushed up. Rising air cools, its water vapour condenses, and it rains on the side facing the wind (the windward side).

• By the time the air crosses over to Ladakh, it has very little water left.

• Result: the sheltered side gets almost no rain. This dry side is called the rain shadow (the dry side of a mountain, away from the wind).

• Height makes it cold. The land is very high, and air gets colder as you go higher. So the region is both dry and freezing.

Climate: dry and freezing

• Rain: less than about 10 cm a year (NCERT: Class 11, Climate).
• Cold: winter temperatures fall below −30°C.
• Drass (Ladakh) reaches about −45°C.
• Plants: very few. Plants cannot grow well when there is so little water and such bitter cold.

Relief and land

• Position: the cold desert lies between the Greater Himalaya and the Karakoram, in the Kashmir or North-western Himalaya.
• Ranges: the Karakoram, Ladakh and Zaskar ranges.
• "Moonland": the land is bare, made of worn-down (eroded) sand and clay.
• These sediments were first laid down on the floor of an old ocean, the Tethys Sea.

• They were pushed up when the Himalayas formed.

• Lakes with no outlet: high lakes such as Pangong Tso are salty.

• When a lake has no river flowing out, it loses water only by evaporation (water turning into vapour), and salts are left behind.

Life in the cold desert

• Herding: people keep yaks and goats.

• Yaks give milk, wool and dung (dried and burnt as fuel), and they carry loads.

• Farming: people grow barley and peas in small green patches (oases) watered by glacier melt [2].

• Animals: snow leopard, ibex and Tibetan antelope. Lahaul-Spiti also has blue sheep and the Himalayan wolf [2].
• Culture (Ladakh): Buddhist monasteries, and the Losar (new year) and Hemis festivals.

Where it occurs

• Ladakh: now a Union Territory [4]. It lies between the Greater Himalaya and the Karakoram.
• Drass: one of the coldest places in the region, at about −45°C.
• Pangong Tso: a salty lake.
• Tsomoriri: a Ramsar site at 4,595 m. It has no outflow, so its water is fresh to brackish (slightly salty) [5].

• Tso Kar Wetland Complex (Changthang, above 4,500 m): India's 42nd Ramsar site (December 2020) and the second Ramsar site in Ladakh. It has the freshwater Startsapuk Tso and the hypersaline (very salty) Tso Kar [4][6].

• Lahaul-Spiti (Himachal Pradesh): home of the Cold Desert Biosphere Reserve.

• Added to UNESCO's World Network of Biosphere Reserves on 27 September 2025. It is India's 13th UNESCO biosphere reserve [2][3].
• Height: 3,300–6,600 m [2].
• Parts: Pin Valley National Park, and the Kibber and Chandratal Wildlife Sanctuaries [2].

Don't confuse with

• Hot desert (Thar, Rajasthan): both are dry, but the Thar is a low, hot sandy desert. A cold desert is dry because it is high and in a rain shadow, and its winters are freezing.
• Kashmir valley: it is also in the North-western Himalaya, but it lies south of the Greater Himalaya, between it and the Pir Panjal. It has lakes (Dal, Wular) and karewas used to grow saffron. The cold desert lies north of the Greater Himalaya.
• Cold Desert Biosphere Reserve vs Ladakh: the 2025 UNESCO biosphere reserve is in Lahaul-Spiti (Himachal Pradesh), not in Ladakh [2].
• Windward side: the rainy side of a mountain that faces the moist wind. The cold desert is on the leeward (rain shadow) side of the Greater Himalaya.

Prelims Hooks

• India's cold desert is Ladakh and Lahaul-Spiti. It is dry because it lies in the rain shadow of the Greater Himalaya.
• Rain under about 10 cm a year. Winters fall below −30°C, and Drass reaches about −45°C.
• Cold Desert Biosphere Reserve: in Lahaul-Spiti, Himachal Pradesh. India's 13th UNESCO biosphere reserve (2025). It includes Pin Valley NP and the Kibber and Chandratal WLS [2][3].
• Tso Kar became India's 42nd Ramsar site (2020): freshwater Startsapuk Tso plus hypersaline Tso Kar [4][6]. Tsomoriri is a Ramsar site at 4,595 m [5].
• Trap: Pangong Tso is a salty lake, not a freshwater one.
• The "moonland" landscape of Ladakh is made of Tethys Sea sediments pushed up when the Himalayas formed.

Mains Points

• Relief controls climate (GS-I):
• The Greater Himalaya stops the monsoon winds.
• So Ladakh and Lahaul-Spiti get under about 10 cm of rain and have winters below −30°C.

• This is a clear example of how a mountain barrier makes a rain shadow desert.

• Living with scarcity (GS-I):

• People survive by keeping yaks and goats and growing barley in small oases fed by glacier water.

• Shortage of water is the main problem of the region. Life depends on snow and glacier melt.

• Protecting fragile high-altitude ecosystems (GS-III):

• The Cold Desert Biosphere Reserve (UNESCO, 2025) protects the snow leopard, Himalayan ibex, blue sheep and Himalayan wolf [2].
• The Ramsar wetlands of Ladakh (Tso Kar, Tsomoriri) protect rare high, dry wetlands [4][5].
• Conservation here has to support local herding and farming too.

Related concepts

• Purvachal
• Hindukush and Sulaiman ranges

Read more

• Regional divisions of the Himalayas and the cold desert of Ladakh