Izvestia ZIK Islands
| Izvestia ZIK Islands | ||
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 Dashed line: the border of the Bolshoi Arktitscheski Sapovednik nature reserve |
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| Waters | Kara Sea | |
| Geographical location | 75 ° 55 ' N , 82 ° 17' E | |
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| Number of islands | 4th | |
| Main island | Troinoi | |
| Total land area | approx. 200 km² | |
| Residents | uninhabited | |
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The Izvestia ZIK Islands ( Russian Острова Известий ЦИК ; Transliteration Ostrowa Izvesti ZIK ) are located in the far north of Russia in the Kara Sea . The islands have belonged to the Krasnoyarsk Territory since 2007 and are part of the Bolshoi Arktitscheski Sapowednik Nature Reserve , which includes a large part of the Kara Sea. The archipelago is about 150 kilometers from the Siberian mainland, the nearest archipelago ( Russian Острова Арктического института ; Ostrowa Arktitscheskowo instituta ; " Islands of the Arctic Institute ") is 45 kilometers away. The islands are uninhabited except for occasional visitors and the crew of up to five people at a polar station and are covered in snow for most of the year. The next largest settlement is Dikson .
History of exploration
The archipelago was officially discovered in 1932 during an expedition in the Kara Sea by the crew of the Soviet ship Vladimir Russanow . Various explorations followed, mainly with surveying tasks and meteorological - geographical - geological exploration, and in 1953 a polar station was built on Troinoi ( 75 ° 57 ′ 0 ″ N , 82 ° 57 ′ 0 ″ E ), which to this day has a maximum strength of five Man is busy. The station is primarily used for meteorological purposes and there is a lighthouse nearby.
After 1960, the focus of research in the Kara Sea shifted to biological and ecological issues. The Izvestia ZIK Islands were explored as part of the research program for the exploration of the Bolshoi Arktitscheski Sapowednik nature reserve from 1991 to 1993 in a large-scale research campaign, including a thorough ornithological examination for the first time .
Naming
Named the islands after the newspaper Izvestia that from 1917 the title Известия Центрального Исполнительного Комитета [ЦИК] и Петроградского совета рабочих и солдатских депутатов ( transcribed Izvestia Zentralnogo Ispolnitelnogo Komiteta [CEC] i Petrogradskogo soweta rabotschich i soldatskich Deputatov , "Communications of the Central Executive Committee and the Petrograd Soviet of Workers 'and Soldiers' Deputies ”). The naming of the Komsomolskaya Pravda Islands after the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda is similar .
geography
Location and structure
The archipelago consists of two larger and two smaller islands. The eastern and largest island with an area of almost 102 km² bears the name Troinoi (остров Тройной; Ostrow Troinoi ); and rises to a length of just under 30 kilometers to 42 meters above sea level. The other, in the west of the archipelago, the main island Pologi (Остров Пологий; Ostrow Pologi , also Ostrow Pologi Sergejewa ) reaches a height of 26 meters and is little more than 20 kilometers long. Both islands are irregularly elongated, roughly northwest-southeast running shape. The other two islands, Klednikowa and Gawrilina, are significantly smaller at just under two and a half and four kilometers in length and are four to six kilometers south of the main islands.
Geological structure
In the area of the islands, the subsoil consists of rocks from the Middle and Upper Proterozoic , which are criss-crossed by numerous veins of quartz up to two meters thick . The islands are part of the so-called Kara massif , which was not affected by late Variscan orogeny processes . The chalk rocks found on other islands of the Kara Sea are missing, the Proterozoic is covered directly by brown, often boggy and stony clay , especially in the central area of the islands .
Surface shape
Troinoi and Pologi-Sergejewa in particular consist of gently sloping, dome-like island massifs with numerous rock formations and ribs in the inland, which are connected by deeper, quaternary sea deposits. In the relief of the islands of the archipelago, two higher terrain levels with an average height of 35 to 40 meters and 16 to 23 meters can be distinguished from two lower levels: an older sea terrace between 5 and 13 meters and a younger sea terrace 2.5 m high. From the depths of the Kara Sea shelf surrounding the islands, it can be deduced that the islands were connected to the continent at the time of the late Pistocene Sartansk regression , as the sea level at that time was more than 50 m below today's level. The edges of the islands are furrowed by short drainage channels and valleys created by meltwater. In summer there are several shallow lakes up to a hundred meters in diameter in the central part of the islands. Along the coast of Troinoi, several lakes up to seven meters deep are separated from the sea by gravel bars in the shallow sea deposits .
The islands were not under permanent glacial cover at the end of the Ice Age , but they did reach earlier glaciations of the late Pleistocene. Thus, glacial deposits spread throughout the islands of the archipelago except Troinoi. Their most noticeable feature are numerous ridges that have erratic blocks up to three meters in diameter. One of these ridges is the place of a breeding colony of birds. The predominance of periglacial processes results in only a low erosion intensity , so that above all broad-span and often trough-shaped surface shapes can be observed.
climate
In winter, winds from alternating southern directions prevail in the area of the Kara Sea, in summer from northern directions. On the Izvestia ZIK islands, northeasterly and easterly winds predominate; only rarely does the wind come from the west. There is seldom no wind, and it gets stormiest in summer and autumn. The mean annual temperature is -12.2 ° C, the temperature fluctuates between -50 ° C and +18 ° C.
In summer, the archipelago receives the lowest rainfall of all the islands in the Kara Sea, as rainfall mostly falls as drizzle. The annual rainfall is between 270 and 400 mm. After the short summer in June, July and August, the snow returns in late August or early September. A closed winter snow cover exists from mid to late September. Its thickness is severely limited by the steady winds, and at 45 to 50 cm, it reaches the highest values among the islands of the Kara Sea.
Floors
The prevailing permafrost temperatures create numerous cryoturbate structures in suitable soils . In addition to ice crusts and soils bound by ice, polygonal soils and diverse ice wedge formations should be mentioned here. In the loamy soil layer of the Izvestia ZIK islands, ice deposits were found that arose from buried and subsequently recrystallized ice and snow.
Large areas of the islands are covered by sharp-edged stone blocks measuring up to three meters. Dune fields of various sizes form a hilly relief in suitable places. Soil formations are limited to stony skeletal soils . Often there are peaty, humus- rich , often gullied soils that alternate with eluvial tundra soils that are not very humorous . These soils are widespread in medal-shaped , stone ring-like structures in which a wreath of vegetation surrounds a patch of open ground.
vegetation
The islands' vegetation is sparse and covers only a few percent of the island's area. Lichen such as Rhizocarpon , Lecidea and Psoroma hypnorum are predominant ; besides some mosses and fungi there are only a few higher plants . Apart from that, the stony permafrost structures determine the surface of the islands.
fauna
Despite the adverse climate, various species of seabirds nest on the islands, such as the brent goose ( Branta bernicla ), the ivory gull ( Pagophila eburnea ), the red-throated diver ( Gavia stellata ) and the eider ( Somateria mollissima ). BirdLife International therefore designates the Izvestia ZIK Islands as an Important Bird Area (RU003).
Research expeditions regularly found polar bear birth caves , and reported walrus families on the islands as early as the 1950s . Also ringed ( Phoca hispida ) and bearded seals ( Erignathus barbatus ) are regularly observed in the waters around the islands, as well as beluga whales ( Delphinapteris leucas ) in schools of several hundred copies. Arctic foxes only visit the islands for winter hunting between November and January; they have their roosts on Novaya Zemlya , in Taimyr or on Wrangel Island, among other places . In contrast to the neighboring islands of Sverdrup and Russki, there are no lemmings on the Izvestia ZIK islands , but groups of reindeer ( Rangifer tarandus ) have already been observed on the islands.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Great Arctic Nature Reserve: General Information ( Memento of the original from April 24, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ UNEP Islands (English)
- ↑ a b c Great Arctic State Nature Reserve: Physical and geographical conditions ( Memento of the original from April 24, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Great Arctic State Nature Reserve: Vegetation ( Memento of the original from November 17, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Izvestiy Tsik islands on the BirdLife International website, accessed January 14, 2013
- ↑ Great Arctic State Nature Reserve: Animal World ( Memento of the original from April 22, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ PS Tomkovich: Breeding conditions for waders in Russian Tundra At 1993 . ( pdf ).
literature
- Great Arctic State Nature Reserve: General data. Great Arctic State Nature Reserve, accessed on November 9, 2009 (Description of the Izvestia ZIK Islands ).
- The polar station of the Izvestia ZIK islands. www.sevmeteo.ru, accessed November 9, 2009 (Russian).
- G. Bangjord, R. Korshavn & V. Nikiforov: Fauna at Troynoy and Influence of Polar Stations on Nature Reserve. Izvestiya Tsik, Kara Sea, July 1994. Working report . In: Norwegian Ornithological Society Report . no. 3-1994, 1994 ( pdf, 6 MB ).
Web links
- Reference to the discovery of the archipelago (Russian).
- Entry at www.dic.academic.ru (Russian).
- Острова Известий ЦИК - 4K4I (AS-086) ( Ostrowa Iswesti ZIK - 4K4I (AS-086) ). Archived from the original on March 12, 2008 ; Retrieved on March 26, 2010 (Russian, expedition of a group of radio amateurs to the station on Troinoi 1991, with pictures of the station).