With a long and narrow body, the Ailao Mountain. crosses the middle of Yunnan diagonally. Located at the juncture of the Yungui Plateau and the Hengduan Mountains, and that of two large natural geographical regions, the Ailao Mountain becomes a divide between the eastern and western landform types. The climate at the Ailao Mountain belongs to the kind in a transitional belt between the central subtropical and south subtropical zones. The high body of the mountain has the obvious feature of mountainous vertical climate. The Ailao Mountain Nature Reserve was founded here in 1986with an area of 50,360 hectares including about 36.000 hectares of forests.

Composing rare subtropical rain forests, the middle mountain subtropical humid broadleaf evergreen forests are the backbone of the Reserve.With humid climate. heavy cloud and fog, the Reserve harbours abundant biotic resources, including about 1,500 species of gymnosperms and angiosperms, 409 species of birds and beasts, thus becoming a rare mine of biotic species. 14 species of plants such as tetracentraceae, wild litchi, etc. are under the key national protection.

The Reserve also houses a variety of wild animals.There are 86 species of mammals (including black gibbon, short—tailed monkey, lynx, felis cat, golden cat, clouded leopard, etc. ) and 323 species of birds (including 260 species of resident birds, green peacock and mandarin duck ). Harbouring 55 species of babbling thrushs amounting to 42 percent of China's total number of the kind. the Reserve is a veritable home of babbling thrush.