Poyang lake
| Poyang lake | ||
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| Satellite image of Lake Poyang | ||
| Geographical location | Jiangxi Province , PR China | |
| Tributaries | Gan Jiang | |
| Drain | Gan Jiang | |
| Data | ||
| Coordinates | 29 ° 7 ' N , 116 ° 16' E | |
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| surface | 3 585 km² | |
| volume | 25 km³ | |
| Middle deep | 8 m | |
The Poyang Lake or Poyang Hu ( Chinese 鄱阳湖 , Pinyin Póyáng Hú ) in the Chinese province of Jiangxi is the largest freshwater lake in China . It is traversed by the Gan Jiang , a southern tributary of the Yangtze River.
The area of the lake is on average 3,585 km² with a volume of 25 km³. Its average depth is 8 meters. The water level fluctuates over the year by up to 20 m between the dry season and the monsoon . In the event of heavy precipitation events during the heavy monsoon rains, it acts as a retention basin (similar to the Dongting Lake ) and stores the high water peaks of the confluent tributaries and thus protects the downstream rivers on the Yangtze River from even more extreme floods by delaying the runoff. Dike breaches occur due to backwater, especially on the less heavily fortified tributaries, as natural flood plains are missing due to the increasingly heavy agricultural use. In total, the storage capacity secured by dikes is around 50 billion m³.
In the dry season its area shrinks to less than 1000 km² and the lake serves as winter quarters for countless water birds.
The naval battle on Lake Poyang took place there in 1363 , the outcome of which contributed to the later formation of the Ming Dynasty .
Individual evidence
- ↑ KING L. et al. 2001 in “Geographische Rundschau” 53 issue 10, p. 31; SHANKMAN & LIANG 2003, in: “Professional Geographer” 55 p. 434 f.
