Buryatia Lake Baikal. General information about Baikal. Mysteries of Lake Baikal

- the most deep lake . Depth of Baikal about 1700 meters. In the world only one lake can be compared in depth with Lake Baikal. This lake Tanganyika in East Africa. Its depth is about 1400 meters. Depth Lake Baikal comparable to the depth of the Arctic Ocean, whose average depth is 1220 meters.

Baikal - the most big lake in Asia. Water surface area Lake Baikal more than 30 thousand square kilometers.

Lake Baikal water- its main value. Lake Baikal – the most large fresh water storage facility in the world. Baikal contains approximately one-fifth of the world's reserves.

Deepest Bay Lake Baikal- Barguzinsky. The depth of the Barguzinsky Bay is almost 1300 meters.

Most big bay Lake Baikal- Barguzinsky. The area of the bay is 725 square kilometers.

The youngest bay of Baikal– Proval Bay. Proval Bay was formed after a powerful earthquake in 1862. A part of the Selenga delta with an area of about 200 square kilometers went under water. This earthquake also caused the formation the youngest cape of Baikal- Cape Oblom.

Most big Island Lake Baikal- Olkhon. The island is located in the middle part Baikal and divides lake to the Big and Small Seas. The length of the island is 71 kilometers, the width reaches 12 kilometers.

At Cape Kotelnikovsky there are the most. Water temperature in mineral springs Cape Kotelnikovsky plus 81 degrees Celsius.

Basin of Lake Baikal – deepest continental depression. Bottom of Lake Baikal lies approximately 1200 meters below sea level.

Biggest influx Lake Baikal- Selenga River. The Selenga has a length of about 1000 kilometers. About half of all water that flows into lake, it is Selenga that brings.

The largest peninsula Lake Baikal- Holy Nose. The peninsula measures about 50 kilometers long and about 20 kilometers wide.

Depth of Lake Baikal

Baikal basin consists of three rather separate parts. The middle basin is the deepest. It is here that eastern shore Olkhon Islands depth of Lake Baikal reaches almost 1700 meters. Depth southern basin Lake Baikal approximately 1432 meters. Largest measured depth northern part Lake Baikal 890 meters. Average lake depth is also very large - more than 700 meters. The biggest depth Small Sea - near the northwestern coast of Olkhon Island. It is approximately 250 meters. The smallest depth in the open Baikal- about 30 meters. Northern and middle basins Lake Baikal divides the underwater Academic Ridge. Lake depth in these places it is about 260 meters. Between the middle and southern basins Lake Baikal The Selenginskaya jumper is located. The smallest depth there are 360 meters here.

Where is Baikal?

Baikal is located in the middle of Asia in the south Eastern Siberia between the Republic of Buryatia and the Irkutsk region Russian Federation. Close to lakes The cities of Irkutsk and Ulan-Ude are located.

Length, extent, width of Lake Baikal

Lake Baikal is a fracture in the earth's crust filled with water. Water in lake carry several hundred large and small streams. Lake Baikal stretches from south to northeast: length or length of Baikal about 640 kilometers. Greatest width of Baikal 80 kilometers. Small earthquakes constantly occur in the vicinity of the lake. Large ones happen occasionally. Shores Baikal moving away from each other at a rate of 2 centimeters per year – Baikal growing!

In southeastern Siberia on the border between Buryatia and Irkutsk region is the deepest freshwater lake in the world - Baikal.

Geography and hydrography

Has the shape of a crescent. Its length is about 630 km, its width ranges from 24 to 80 km. The surface area of the lake is just over 31.7 thousand square kilometers, which is comparable to the area of countries such as Denmark, Belgium or the Netherlands.
The lake is located in a giant bowl-basin, surrounded in the west by rocky ridges and in the east by gentle hills. The maximum depth of the lake is 1642 m, the average is 745 m.
Baikal is the most significant reservoir in the world in terms of fresh water reserves - 23.6 thousand cubic km. This lake is also the oldest on Earth. Its age, according to scientists, ranges from 25-30 million years. The most amazing thing is that the shores of the lake gradually diverge, expanding at a rate of 2 cm per year.
The lake is fed by about 350 rivers and streams (the data has not been updated since the end of the 19th century), the largest of which are the Upper Angara, Selenga, Barguzin, Sarma, Snezhnaya and Turka. Only 1 river flows from Baikal - the Angara.
The lake is located in a seismically active zone.

Water, flora and fauna

Baikal water, despite the difficult environmental situation in the region, remains today the cleanest in the world. It contains very few dissolved minerals, organic matter and a lot of oxygen. Its composition is practically distilled. This is the only body of water on the planet from which today you can drink water without purifying or boiling.
The water is so clear that in the spring, when the lake’s vegetation has not yet awakened, the bottom is clearly visible, as if through glass, at a depth of 40 m.
The lake owes its purity to a microscopic crustacean - the Baikal epishura. Maximum size 1 crustacean no more than 1.5 mm, they are endemic and live exclusively in the waters of Lake Baikal. They are the most important component of the lake's ecosystem. Over the course of a year, they pass the entire gigantic mass of lake water through themselves, filtering and purifying it.
The water temperature in the lake ranges from 0 to +20 degrees.
The lake itself is home to more than 2,600 species of plants and animals, almost all of which are endemic, i.e. are not found anywhere else in the world - seal, omul, golomyanka, Baikal sturgeon, whitefish, grayling, yellowwing and others.
The coastal zone is also extremely rich in a variety of flora and fauna - Siberian cedar, stilted trees, relict spruce trees, Barguzin sable, Olkhon vole, musk deer, Asian godwit and many other unique inhabitants.

Mysteries of Lake Baikal

The lake is a unique natural habitat in its characteristics. Not only Russian, but also American, European and Japanese scientists are at a loss when faced with unusual phenomena:
ice hills in the shape of hollow cones, characteristic only of Lake Baikal,
migrating huge dark rings, formed under the ice thickness,
Mirages are an optical illusion for which no satisfactory explanation has yet been found.

The most, the most...

Baikal is the most
deep,
full-flowing,
old,
clean,
significant for fresh water reserves
lake in the world.

Numerous scientific studies have been devoted to the problem of the origin of the word “Baikal,” which indicates a lack of clarity on this issue. There are about a dozen possible explanations for the origin of the name.

Among them, the most probable version is considered to be the origin of the name of the lake from the Turkic-speaking Bai-Kul - rich lake.

The Evenki name Lamu - Sea was used for several years by the first Russian explorers in the 17th century, then they switched to the Buryat Baigal, slightly softening the letter “g” by phonetic replacement. Quite often Baikal is called the sea, simply out of respect, for its violent temper, because the distant opposite shore is often hidden somewhere in the haze... At the same time, a distinction is made between the Small Sea and the Big Sea. The Small Sea is what is located between the northern coast of Olkhon and the mainland, everything else is the Big Sea.

Baikal water

Baikal water is unique and amazing, like Baikal itself. It is unusually transparent, clean and saturated with oxygen. In not so ancient times, it was considered healing, and diseases were treated with its help. In spring, the transparency of Baikal water, measured using a Secchi disk (a white disk with a diameter of 30 cm), is 40 m (for comparison, in the Sargasso Sea, which is considered the standard of transparency, this value is 65 m). Later, when massive algae blooms begin, the transparency of the water decreases, but in calm weather the bottom can be seen from a boat at a fairly decent depth.

Such high transparency is explained by the fact that Baikal water, thanks to the activity of living organisms living in it, is very weakly mineralized and close to distilled.

The volume of water in Baikal is about 23 thousand cubic kilometers, which is 20% of the world's and 90% of Russian fresh water reserves. Every year, the Baikal ecosystem reproduces about 60 cubic kilometers of clear, oxygenated water.

Age of Lake Baikal Usually in the literature the age of the lake is given as 20-25 million years. In fact, the question of the age of Baikal should be considered open, since the use of various methods for determining age gives values from 20-30 million to several tens of thousands of years. Apparently, the first assessment is closer to the truth - Baikal is indeed very ancient lake

. If we assume that Baikal is actually several tens of millions of years old, then it is the oldest lake on Earth. It is believed that Baikal arose as a result of tectonic forces. Tectonic processes also occur in

present time

, which manifests itself in increased seismicity in the Baikal region. Climate in the area of Lake Baikal., contained in Baikal, and its mountainous surroundings create an extraordinary microclimate. Baikal works as a large thermal stabilizer - in winter it is warmer on Baikal, and in summer it is a little cooler than, for example, in Irkutsk, which is located 70 km from the lake. The temperature difference is usually about 10 degrees.

A significant contribution to this effect is made by forests growing almost along the entire coast of Lake Baikal. The influence of Baikal is not limited to temperature regulation. Due to the fact that evaporation

cold water from the surface of the lake is very insignificant; clouds cannot form over Baikal. In addition, the air masses that bring clouds from land heat up when they pass over the coastal mountains, and the clouds dissipate. As a result, the sky over Lake Baikal is clear most of the time. This is also evidenced by the numbers: the number of hours of sunshine in the area of Olkhon Island is 2277 hours (for comparison - on the Riga seaside 1839, in Abastumani (Caucasus) - 1994). You should not think that the sun always shines over the lake - if you are unlucky, you can end up with one or even two weeks of disgusting rainy weather even in the sunniest place of Lake Baikal - on Olkhon, but this happens extremely rarely.

Average annual temperature

water on the surface of the lake +4°C. Near the coast in summer the temperature reaches +16-17°C, in shallow bays up to +22-23°C.

Wind and waves on Lake Baikal.

Where there is wind, there are, as you know, waves. Let me immediately note that the opposite is not true - a wave can occur even with complete calm. Waves on Baikal can reach a height of 4 meters.

Sometimes values of 5 and even 6 meters are given, but this is most likely an estimate “by eye”, which has a large error, usually towards overestimation. The height of 4 meters was obtained using instrumental measurements in the open sea.

The excitement is strongest in autumn and spring. In summer, strong waves on Lake Baikal are rare, and calm often occurs. Ichthyofauna of Baikal. Depending on their habitat conditions, fish can be divided into several groups.

Sturgeon, pike, burbot, ide, roach, dace, perch, and minnow occupy the coastal shallows and river deltas of Lake Baikal. Fish of Siberian mountain rivers: grayling, taimen, lenok inhabit small tributaries of the lake and its coastal zone. Omul, since ancient times considered a symbol of Baikal, inhabits its open and coastal part, whitefish, another

famous resident Baikal, inhabits only the coastal part. The most remarkable group of Baikal fish are gobies, of which there are 25 species. The most interesting of them are the golomyankas. This miracle of Lake Baikal is not found anywhere else in the world. Golomyanka is incredibly beautiful, shimmers blue and pink in the light, and if you leave it in the sun it will melt, leaving only bones and a greasy stain. It is the main and most numerous inhabitant of Lake Baikal, but rarely gets caught in fishermen’s nets. Its only enemy is the seal, for which it is the main food.

Baikal To preserve rare and endangered animals, there is a strict and complete ban on hunting, maximum conservation of habitat, creation of special nurseries,

national parks

, nature reserves and sanctuaries - a lake of tectonic origin located in the southern part of Eastern Siberia, on the border of the Republic of Buryatia and the Irkutsk region Baikal itself

Lake Baikal stretches from southwest to north for 636 kilometers. The width of the lake varies from 25 to 80 km. The water surface area is 31,722 km. sq. Length

coastline is 2100 km. Baikal is the deepest lake on earth - its maximum depth is 1642 meters. The lake has huge reserves of fresh water - 23,615 km. cubic meters, which is 20% of all world reserves. Area around Lake Baikal is surrounded on all sides by hills and-precipitous and rocky, while the eastern coast is flatter. 336 streams and rivers flow into the Lake. The largest tributaries: Upper Angara, Selenga, Turka, Barguzin, Sarma, Snezhnaya. Only one river flows out of the lake - the Angara. There are 27 islands on Baikal, the largest of the islands is Olkhon, which is 71 km long and 12 km wide, the largest peninsula is Svyatoy Nos

Climate

The huge water mass of Lake Baikal has a strong influence on the climate of the coastal area. Summers here are cooler, and winters, on the contrary, are milder. Spring comes 10-15 days later compared to surrounding areas, and sometimes lasts longer. The climate features are determined by the Baikal winds, which even have their own names - sarma, barguzin, kultuk, verkhovik.

When to go to Baikal

Characteristics

Briefly the main characteristics of Baikal

Length - 363 km.
Width - 79.5 km.
Area -31722 sq. km.
Volume - 23615 cubic meters. km.
The average depth is 744 meters.
The maximum depth is 1637 meters.
There are 27 islands on Lake Baikal.
29 fish species are endemic

Depth

Lake Baikal is the deepest in the world - 1637 meters, the depth was established in 1983. Moreover, the average depth is also very large - 744 meters. In 2002, these data were confirmed and a depth map was compiled.

The area of Baikal is equal to the area of three countries - Denmark, Belgium, and the Netherlands.
Baikal is the deepest lake on earth
The lake contains 19% of the world's fresh water

Almost in the center of the huge continent of Eurasia there is a narrow blue crescent - Lake Baikal. In the Baikal mountain region, surrounded on all sides by high ridges, it stretches over 636 kilometers in length and up to 80 kilometers in width. The area of Baikal is equal to Belgium with its almost 10 million population, many cities and industrial centers, highways and railways.

IN Baikal 336 permanent rivers and streams flow into the lake, while half of the volume of water entering the lake comes from the Selenga. The only river that flows out of Baikal is the Angara.

The area of the lake's water surface is 31,470 square kilometers. The maximum depth reaches 1637 m, the average - 730 m.

In order to understand the enormity of Baikal’s water body, imagine that the Angara, which annually removes 60.9 km3 of water from the lake, would need 387 years of continuous work to drain its bowl. Provided, of course, that during this time not a liter of water gets into it and not a drop evaporates from its surface.

Undoubtedly, Baikal - deepest lake in the world. Not everyone knows that the second contender in the world for this title, the African Lake Tanganyika, lags behind the leader by as much as 200 meters. There are 30 islands on Baikal, the largest is Olkhon Island.

The question of the age of Lake Baikal should be considered open. Usually the literature gives a figure of 20-25 million years. However, the use of various age determination methods gives values from 20-30 million to several tens of thousands of years. But, if we assume that the traditional point of view is correct, then Baikal can be considered the oldest lake on Earth.

BAIKAL WATER

Baikal water unique and amazing, like Baikal itself. She's extraordinary
transparent, clean and oxygenated. In not so long ago, it was considered healing, and illnesses were treated with its help.

In spring, the transparency of Baikal water is as much as 40 meters! This is explained by the fact that Baikal water, thanks to the activity of living organisms living in it, is very
slightly mineralized and close to distilled.

The volume of water in Baikal reaches about 23 thousand cubic kilometers, which is 20% of the world's and 90% of Russian fresh water reserves. There is more water in Baikal than in all five Great American Lakes combined - they only reached a total of 22,725 km3. Every year, the Baikal ecosystem reproduces about 60 cubic kilometers of clear, oxygenated water.

INHABITANTS OF BAIKAL

The exclusivity of many physical and geographical features of the lake was the reason
the extraordinary diversity of its flora and fauna. And in this regard, it has no equal among the fresh water bodies of the world.

The lake is home to 52 species of fish of several families.:

sturgeon (Baikal sturgeon),
salmon (Davatchan, taimen, lenok, Baikal omul - endemic fish, whitefish),
grayling (Siberian grayling),
pike,
carp,
loaches,
catfish,
cod,
perch,
sculpin gobies,
Golomyanka

The food pyramid of the lake ecosystem is crowned by a typical marine mammal - the seal,
or Baikal seal. The Baikal seal is the only representative of mammals in the lake. For almost the whole year
it lives in water, and in the fall it forms mass haulouts on the rocky shores of the lake.

The life of many animals characteristic of Lake Baikal is inextricably linked not only with the lake itself, but also with its coast. Gulls, mergansers, goldeneyes, scoters, scorches, white-tailed eagles, ospreys and many other bird species nest on the shores of the lake and on its islands.

Also remarkable is such an integral part of the life of the great lake as the mass emergence of brown bears on the shores, entirely due to the peculiarities of the nature of Lake Baikal.

In the mountain taiga of the Baikal region there is a musk deer - the smallest deer on the globe.

The diversity of the organic world of Baikal is amazing, but its originality is no less phenomenal. Many animals and plants living in the lake are not found in any other body of water globe. Baikal has 848 species of endemic animals (about 60%) and 133 species of endemic plants (15%).

BAIKAL FOR TOURISTS

Today, everything connected with Baikal arouses genuine interest not only in our country, but also abroad. Over the past decade, Baikal has become a magnet for many tourists. Relatively well preserved nature
lakes and seas, rapidly developing infrastructure - hotels, roads, proximity to transport interchanges - give reason to believe that in the future the tourist flow to the shores of Lake Baikal will only increase.

Come to Lake Baikal! Admire its beauty and purity of water, feel the almost mystical
the energy that the sacred sea gives to everyone who comes to its shore.

Based on materials from the article “Unique Baikal”, prepared by Valentina Ivanovna Galkina, Honored Worker of Culture of Russia, head of the exhibition of the Baikal Museum of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences.

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