Izvestiy TSIK Islands

The Izvestia - ZIK Islands (Russian Острова Известий ЦИК; transliteration Ostrowa Iswesti ZIK ) are in the far north of Russia in the Kara Sea. The islands belong to the region since 2007 Krasnoyarsk and are part of the nature reserve Bolshoi Arktitscheski Sapowednik, which covers a large part of the Kara Sea. The archipelago is located approximately 150 kilometers from the Siberian mainland, the nearest island group (Russian Острова Арктического института; Ostrowa Arktitscheskowo instituta; "islands of the Arctic Institute " ) is 45 kilometers away. The islands are up to occasional visitors and up to five -man crew of a polar station covered uninhabited and most of the time of year of snow. The nearest large settlement Dikson.

• 2.1 Location and Organization
• 2.2 Geological structure
• 2.3 Surface shape
• 2.4 climate
• 2.5 soils

History of exploration

The official discovery of the island group succeeded in 1932 during an expedition in Karameer by the crew of the Soviet ship Vladimir Rusanov. Various explorations followed, especially with surveying and meteorological and geographical- geological exploration, and 1953, a polar station was built on Troinoi (75 ° 57 '0 "N, 82 ° 57 ' 0" O75.9582.95 ), with still one maximum strength is occupied by five men. The station serves mainly meteorological purposes, is in its near a lighthouse.

After 1960, the focus of research shifted in the Kara Sea on biological and ecological issues. The Izvestia - ZIK Islands were part of the research program to explore the nature reserve Bolshoi Arktitscheski Sapowednik in the years 1991 to 1993 explored in a large-scale research campaign, among other things, they were examined for the first time thoroughly ornithology.

Naming

Are 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 [ ZIK ] i Petrogradskogo soweta rabotschich i soldatskich Deputatov; "Communications of the Central Executive Committee and the Petrograd Soviet of Workers 'and soldiers' Deputies " ) wore. Similarly, the designation of the Komsomolskaya Pravda - Islands to the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda has been made.

Geography

Location and structure

The archipelago consists of two larger and two smaller islands. The eastern and with nearly 102 km ² largest island is named Troinoi ( остров Тройной; ostrow Troinoi ); and rises at a length of just under 30 kilometers to 42 meters above the sea level. The other, located in the west of the archipelago 's main island Pologi ( Остров Пологий; Pologi Ostrow, Ostrow also Pologi Sergeeva ) reaches a height of 26 meters and is little more than 20 kilometers long. Both islands are running irregularly - oblong, about northwest-southeast shape. The other two islands, Klednikowa and Gawrilina, are synonymous with almost two and a half and four kilometers in length and are smaller four to six kilometers south of the main islands.

Geological structure

The subsoil is in the area of the islands of rocks of the Middle and Upper Proterozoic, which are crossed by numerous, up to two meters thick quartz veins. The islands are part of the so-called Kara Massif, which was not affected by spätvariszischen mountain building processes. The encountered on other islands in the Kara Sea rocks of the Cretaceous missing, the Proterozoic is directly covered by brown, often marshy and stone- rich clay, especially in the central area of the islands.

Surface shape

Especially Troinoi and Pologi - Sergeeva consist of gently sloping, dome-like massifs island with numerous rock formations and ribs in the country, which are connected by deeper, quaternary marine deposits. In the relief of the islands of the archipelago two higher-lying terrain stages can be distinguished with an average height of 35 to 40 meters and 16 to 23 meters of two low-lying: an older marine terrace 5 to 13 meters and a younger marine terrace of 2.5 m height. From the depths of the surrounding islands, the continental shelf of the Kara Sea can be deduced that the islands were connected at the time of the late Pleistocene Sartansk regression with the continent because the sea level was at that time more than 50 m below the present. The edges of the islands are furrowed by short, produced by melt-water drainage channels and small valleys. In the summer there are in the central part of the islands several shallow lakes of up to a hundred meters in diameter. Along the coast of Troinoi more, up to seven meters deep lakes are separated by gravel bars from the sea in the shallow marine deposits.

The islands were in the late ice age not under constant glacier area, previous glaciations of the late Pleistocene but they reach. So glacial deposits on all the islands of the archipelago, with the exception of Troinoi are common. Your most distinctive feature are numerous ridges, the erratic blocks of up to three meters in diameter have. One of these back is the site of a breeding colony of birds. The prevalence periglacial processes can be observed has only a slight erosion intensity result, so that wide and often strained, especially when shaped surface forms.

Climate

In winter prevail in the territory of the Kara Sea winds from southern directions alternately, in the summer from the north. On the Izvestia - ZIK Islands outweigh northeastern and eastern winds; rarely the wind comes from the west. It is rare windless, the stormiest it is in summer and autumn. The mean annual temperature is -12.2 ° C, the temperature varies between -50 ° C and 18 ° C.

In summer the archipelago receives the lowest rainfall of all the islands in the Kara Sea, as precipitation usually falls as drizzle. The annual rainfall is about 270-400 mm. After the short summer in June, July and August the snow returns in late August or early September. A closed winter snow cover is from mid to late September. Its thickness is greatly limited by the steady winds, and reached 45 to 50 cm, the highest values ​​among the islands of the Kara Sea.

Soils

The prevailing temperatures of permafrost produce numerous kryoturbate structures in suitable soils. In addition to ice crusts and bound by ice shelves here are some polygon soils and multiform Ice wedge formations mentioned. In the loamy soil layer Izvestia - ZIK Islands ice deposits were found that have emerged from and recrystallized 's Buried in the wake of ice and snow.

Large areas of the islands are covered with sharp-edged, to three -meters- stone blocks. Dune fields of different size make a small hilly relief in appropriate locations. Soil formations are restricted to stony skeletal soils. Often peaty humus, often gleyed soils that change with little humus, eluvial tundra soils. Widely used, these soils are in medal -shaped, stone ring-like structures in which a ring of vegetation surrounding a spot open bottom.

Vegetation

The vegetation of the islands is sparse and covers only a few percent of the island's land area. Are predominant hypnorum lichens as Rhizocarpon, Lecidea and Psoroma; besides some mosses and fungi, only a few higher plants occur. Apart from determining the rocky permafrost structures, the surface of the islands.

Fauna

Despite the adverse climate nest different kinds of seabirds on the islands, such as the brent goose (Branta bernicla ), the Ivory Gull ( Pagophila eburnea ), the red-throated diver (Gavia stellata ) and common eider (Somateria mollissima). Therefore, BirdLife International, the Izvestia - ZIK Islands from as Important Bird Area ( RU003 ).

Research expeditions were regular birth caves of polar bears, and already reported in the 1950s by Walrossfamilien on the islands. 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 Exemplaren.Polarfüchse visit the islands only during the winter hunting from November to January, their fixed quarters they have among other things on Novaya Zemlya, Taimyr in or on the Wrangel Island. In contrast to the neighboring islands Sverdrup and Russki there on the Izvestia - ZIK Islands no lemmings, reindeer groups (Rangifer tarandus ), however, were already observed on the islands.