In this study, we studied the diversity of culturable low-temperature bacteria in three vertical climatic zones that included warm temperate, middle temperate and cold temperate zones distributed along the Mingyong glacier in northwest of Yunnan province. Using four different media, 37 513 bacterial isolates were obtained. According to the morphological characteristics of isolate colony, 391 bacterial trains form the isolates were identified. Among them, the strains coded No. 99, 78, 96 and 118 were cultured with LB, Organic, PSG and PYGV medium respectively. PYGV medium showed more effective than that of eutrophic LB and Organnic medium in bacteria isolation in this area, which indicated that oligotrophic medium should be suitable to isolate bacteria from the glacier region. Most of isolates were gram-negative bacilli according to the results of Gram staining and scanning electron microscopic observation; parts of dominant bacterial 16S rRNA sequences were sequenced and the phylogenetic trees were constructed as well. The studies have shown that the species of Pseudomonas, Yersinia and Flavobacterium were presence in all three vertical climatic zones in Mingyong glacier. Among them, Pseudomonas is the dominant population and occupies up to 35%, and Stenotrophomonas is a unique species distributed in cold temperate zone. Through studying the diversity of culturable low-temperature bacteria in Mingyong glacier, it would provide valuable information for the further study of microbial community in this special geographical environment as well as the reference for the understanding of how the microbial community of the glacier environment response to climate changes.