Kong Karls Land
King Karl Land (Norwegian: Kong Karls Land ) is the name for a small archipelago southeast of the island of North Country and north-east of the island in the Edgeøya belonging to Norway Svalbard archipelago in the North Atlantic. The group consists of three large and several smaller islands. One of the larger islands from west to east: Svenskøya (136 km ²), Kongsøya (191 km ²) and Abeløya (13 km ²). All the islands are uninhabited.
Climate
As on the entire Svalbard archipelago, the climate of the high latitude is accordingly hocharktisch. Bring the West Spitsbergen Current (the last northern tip of the Gulf Stream ) along the western coast of Svalbard for arctic conditions still relatively high temperatures and lots of precipitation, the cold Ostspitzbergenstrom King Karl Land with its cold water and ice climatically firm grip has. Even in summer the islands are due to the ice conditions can not be achieved always.
Geology
The island is composed mainly of flat-lying sediments (sandstone, siltstone, and mudstone ) from the Upper Triassic to Lower Cretaceous and from basaltic intrusions. As a local specialty, there has been in the Lower Cretaceous intrusions in addition to the well volcanism at the surface, so that there are tuff and different flow structures.
Landscape
All the islands in King Karl Land, there are wide coastal plains; the small, eastern Abeløya is completely flat. On Svenskoeya Kongsøya and there are a few mountains with wide flat summit plateau between 200 and 300 m altitude. The highest point is Retziusfjellet on Kongsøya with 320 m. King Karl Land is practically unglaciated. Only on Kongsøya there are some permanent Firnflecken.
Flora and Fauna
The tundra is on the islands out of the barren polar desert, where mosses and lichens can be better made than flowering plants. Ivory gulls and kittiwakes are quite common, the great biological importance of the islands lies in the very high density of polar bear maternity roosts. In the winter, partially lined a birth cave to the other. King Karl Land, therefore, is of great importance to the survival of polar bears.
History
Probably King Karl Land was sighted for the first time in the early 17th century and called Wiches country. However, this discovery was soon forgotten again. Mid-19th century the islands were frequently sighted from the west and 1859 succeeded the Norwegian Erik Eriksen, the first landing on Svenskøya. 1870 named Theodor Heuglin the islands after King Charles I of Württemberg. A group led by zoologist Willy Kükenthal research trip the Bremen Geographical Society in 1889 tried several times to reach the island group and established the first card are listed on some of the islands. 1898, the islands were visited by the German scientific Helgoland expedition under the leadership of Fritz zoologist Fritz Schaudinn and Romans, which had been organized by Theodor Lerner. Immediately after the Helgoland expedition visited Swedish researchers, led by Alfred Gabriel Nathorst with the ship Antarctic Kong Karls Land and held from 04 to August 17, 1898 there on to geological, biological and topographically to document the island. In 1908, there was once a winter of six trappers on Svenskøya.
The Northeast Svalbard Nature Reserve
King Karl Land is part of the company founded in 1973 Northeast Svalbard Nature Reserve. There is an all-year ban from the islands or to approach them to less than 500 m on the water or in the air. The Sysselmann may grant exemptions. However, this is done only in exceptional cases. [Note 1]