Because the bedrock is primarily chalk and marl, the landform reflects extensive erosion out from the center of the ridge, with undulating and hilly terrain and numerous interconnected ravines and gullies.

[1] Khvalysky is in the Pontic–Caspian steppe ecoregion, a band of grasslands and occasional forest that stretches from the middle of Ukraine to the Ural Mountains.

This climate is characterized by large swings in temperature, both diurnally and seasonally, with mild summers and cold, snowy winters.

[7] Because Khvalynsky borders many ecological zones - forest, semi-arid steppe, the Volga, mountain, meadows, and stream valleys - it has a complex variety of habitats.

Among reptiles are the common European adder (vipera berus), and indicator of complex habitat.

[2] The forest-forming trees are predominantly oak (40%), linden (30%) and pine (21%), with many lesser species, including remnants of orchards on some of the edge slopes.

There is a museum of everyday peasant life, "Derevenskoe Podvorye” (“Village Farmstead”), a chapel and sacred springs.