Kolguyev Island

Kolgujew (Russian Колгуев ) is a Russian island in the eastern Barents Sea.

Geography

The 3495 km ² large island, which belongs to the autonomous district of the Nenets and around 75 km from the northeastern mainland of Europe is, is located northeast of the Kanin Peninsula, north of the Timanrückens and northwest of the eastern part of the North Russian lowlands. It rises up to 173 m above sea level and is divided mostly flat. The surrounding sea is very shallow and presented with its sandbanks long been a danger for shipping dar.

The climate of the island Kolgujew is rough and cool with long, cold winters ( January -10 to -15 ° C, often below -20 ° C) and short and cool summers ( July 4 to 6 ° C, 3 months above 0 ° C ). The vegetation is tundrenähnlich with a few shrubs and grasses; There are numerous lakes and marshes and a few rivers. Kolgujew is the breeding ground for the majority of Western European Bless, nuns and bean geese, who find here due to the many aquatic and marsh areas good living conditions. Mammals are rare on the island, few show foxes and arctic foxes.

The island is mainly inhabited by Nenets who live primarily on the reindeer husbandry. It also encouraged to Kolgujew since 1987 oil after 1982 on the east coast, the deposit Pestschanoosjorskoje had been discovered. The exploration work had already started in 1960s.

Towns

The only village on the island and seat of the Kolgujewski village Soviets Bugrino on the south coast with a population of 446, of which 416 ( 93%) Nenets. From there, a good 80 km long road leads across the island to only temporarily inhabited settlement Severny on the north coast.

Management

The island Kolgujew forms the municipality ( village soviet Kolgujewski ) within the Sapoljarny rajon the Autonomous Okrug of the Nenets.

History

Kolgujew is occupied long of Nenets. As the first explorers Hugh Willoughby three years later probably saw the island in 1553, and Stephen Borough ( 1525-1584 ). On August 20, 1580, two ships of the Muscovy Company ran off the island due, but could be refloated. In his attempt to sail the Northeast Passage, suffered the Dane Jens Munk in 1609 off the island of shipwrecked and could only reach the mainland with Emergency in the dinghy. In 1820 the Coast Kolgujews was mapped by several Russian expeditions, including Fyodor Petrovich Liitke.

The first scientists who explored the island in 1841 the botanist Franz Joseph Ruprecht and the physicist Aleksander Stepanovich Savelyev were ( 1820-1860 ). 1894 spent the Briton Aubyn Trevor - Battye ( 1855-1922 ) here several months with scientific and ethnographic studies. A Russian expedition led by botanist Sergei Alexandrovich Buturlin mapped in 1902 for the first time the interior of the island and explored the animal and plant world. During the Soviet era, the research station Severny was established in the 1930s on the northern tip of the island.