The Tigrovaya Balka, the Tiger Gully, lies in the far south of Tajikistan where the Vakhsh river runs down to meet the Panj and the Amu Darya, and it is an odd, lush corner in a dry country. The nature reserve protects tugay, the riverine forest of poplar, willow, tamarisk and wild olive that grows along the flood plains of Central Asian rivers, with thick reed beds and clearings of tall grass. It looks like a jungle, which is why it was called a gully of tigers. The Turan tiger, a relative of the Siberian tiger, lived here until the 1950s, when hunting and the clearing of reed land for cotton drove it to extinction.
What survives is rich in other wildlife. The Bukhara deer, or hangul, has been reintroduced here, and wild boar, golden jackals, jungle cats and pheasants live in the thickets, with big flocks of birds on the water in winter. The tugay forests are among the rarest ecosystems in the region, since most of them were cleared for farmland in the twentieth century, and the reserve is part of the wider effort to keep some of them.
The towns nearby, Shahritus and Dŭstí, are small, with shops and basic services, and the larger town of Kurgan-Tyube, also called Bokhtar, lies further north, with fuel, a bazaar and hotels. The area borders Afghanistan along the Panj, and a permit may be required for the border zone, so check with local authorities and travel companies before you go. The main road from Dushanbe south is paved but potholed, with trucks, donkeys and cotton wagons, and fuel is not always available, so carry extra.
Summers are very hot, regularly above forty degrees, with humidity near the river, so travel in spring or autumn. March and April are green and cool, with flowers on the plain, and October is warm and golden. Mosquitoes can be fierce near water. Eat plov, the rice dish cooked in a big cauldron, and drink green tea in a teahouse, and ask a local guide before you walk into the forest, because it is wild and the paths are unmarked.