Loch Ness
- Water richest lake in the British Isles - Alleged sightings of a monster
Loch Ness [ ˌ lɒx nɛs ] ( Scottish Gaelic: Loch Nis [ lɔx nɪʃ ] ) is a freshwater lake in the Scottish Highlands. It is located about 10 kilometers south-west of Inverness in the Great Glen in the Council Area Highland. Measured at the water surface of 56.4 km ² is Loch Ness to Loch Lomond the second largest lake in Scotland. But he has because of its depth on by far the largest volume of water of all Scottish lochs.
Description
Loch Ness has the typical elongated shape of a lake during the Ice Age glacial origin. He is about 37 km long, but on average only 1.5 km wide. Towards the end of the Ice Age about 12,000 years ago, Loch Ness was probably still a bay. When freed from glacial land raised in Inverness, access to the sea was cut off.
The greatest depth of the lake is 754 feet ( 230 m). Measurements with a depth of 812 feet ( 247 m ) and 1068 feet ( 325 m) showed be attributed to disturbances of the sonar instruments and are considered unreliable. After Loch Morar (310 m) the Loch Ness making it the second deepest lake in the British Isles, but it has with the greatest mean depth 132 m. Unlike other Scottish hole of the largest part of the lake is very deep. In fact, accounted for almost half ( 47.7 %) of the area of the lake, a water depth of more than 500 feet (152 m). Just under 13.6% of the lake surface, the water is shallower than 100 feet ( 30 m ), while these areas relatively shallow depths at Loch Lomond 68 % and Loch Morar 42 % of water surface make.
Deposits of the River Foyers Loch Ness share about the middle into two deep basins. Each year, the deposits grow on the ground by an average of about one millimeter to. Bathymetric significantly still, the steep walls of the lake. Along parts of the lake reaches less than 50 feet (15 m) from the shore to a depth of 175 feet (53 m), which corresponds to a sloping at an angle of 75 ° slope.
Loch Ness is integrated since 1822 into the Caledonian Canal ( Caledonian Canal ). This was built as a link between the Atlantic coast and the North Sea coast, in order to achieve shorter transport times for industrial goods and to avoid the storm on the lake in the north of Scotland. For the construction of the canal, the water level has been raised artificially in the lake by about three meters, which is enlarged and length and width of the lake.
Apart from a small island in the delta of the River Foyers are no other natural islands in Loch Ness. In the southwest of the lake is Cherry Iceland, an approximately 4,000 -year-old artificial island (called Crannog ) from the Bronze Age. From Cherry Iceland today a mere fraction of its original scope is visible due to the artificially high water level. Another former Crannog - Dog Iceland - was completely flooded by raising the water level.
Flora and fauna of Loch Ness
Loch Ness is one of the richest fishing waters in Britain. The lake has, among others, salmon, eels, minnows, trout, pike and sticklebacks. How hole Oich and Loch Lochy Loch Ness from the sea serves immigrant Atlantic salmon in the fall as a spawning ground. 1982 three specimens of this species were caught in Loch Ness in about 220 feet of water - which is a depth record in British freshwater lakes. In 2000, the record catch of a 7.5 -pound trout succeeded.
In the woods around Loch Ness oak, ash, rowan, hazel and pine trees grow. Most oaks, however, were like in the early 19th century for the construction of the Caledonian Canal.
Sports events
Although Loch Ness is very cold even in the summer months, some swimmers have crossed the lake lengthwise (about 37 km). Record holder David Morgan: He made the easy route in 10 hours and 59 minutes and twice in 23 hours and 50 minutes. Deadly ended with a motor boat to break the then world speed record on water September 29, 1952, the trial of John Cobb, Loch Ness. Cobbs speedboat Crusader took off at a speed of more than 320 km / h from the water surface and shattered during re- collision.
Since 2002, takes place every year in the fall of the Loch Ness Marathon. He starts at Whitebridge and leads on a narrow road on the southeastern shore. After Dores the route leaves the lake towards Inverness. The last kilometer run only on the southeastern shore of the Ness along, then over a stone bridge in Inverness on the other side back to the Bught Park. 2011 took part in the marathon about 2500 active.
The Loch Ness Monster
For centuries persistent reports of sightings of a sea monster in Loch Ness, Nessie is called. Based on these reports, Loch Ness is a popular destination for tourists. Center of Nessie tourism Drumnadrochit. By allegedly present Loch Ness monster is the most famous of all Scottish lochs.
Others
Approximately 1700 meters northeast of the mouth of Foyers Loch Ness is located above the lake, the property Boleskine House. The building was occupied from 1899 to 1913 by the occultist Aleister Crowley. From the early 1970s until 1991 it belonged to the rock musicians Jimmy Page of the band Led Zeppelin and was also used for some scenes in the film The Song Remains the music seed.
On December 31, 1940 crashed a twin-engine bombers of the Royal Air Force Vickers Wellington type into the lake, where a crew member was killed. The wreckage of the plane was recovered from the lake in 1985, then restored and is on display in southern England Brooklands today at Brooklands Museum.