Ostrov Bolshevik: where is, the description, the history of the study

In the Arctic Ocean lies the archipelago of the Northern Earth. It consists of four large islands and many small ones. The article describes the second largest island of the archipelago - Bolshevik. It is the southern extremity of the Northern Earth, washed at once by two seas - Kara and Laptev. From the mainland it is separated by the Vilkitsky strait, and from the island of the October Revolution - the strait of Shokalsky.

Geographical information

Bolshevik Island has an area of 11 thousand 312 square meters. Kilometers, which is almost a third of the entire archipelago. Its highest point is at a level of 935 meters. The relief of the island is mostly flat with small hills, sometimes turning into elevations.

Coordinates of this territory: 78 degrees 36 minutes north latitude and 102 degrees 55 minutes east longitude. Now you know exactly where the Bolshevik is.

Its coastline is heavily indented, there are many bays. The most significant is the Gulf of Akhmatova, which almost 60 km cuts into the land. Also deeply penetrate into the interior of the island is the fjord of Telman and the Gulf of Mikoyan. Along the coastline there are many bays - Zhuravleva, Solnechnaya and others.

Bolshevik Island boasts a large number of rivers - Studenaya, Kamenka, Golysheva, steep and others, but there are few lakes here and they are all not large.

Climatic conditions

The climate here is arctic sea. The average annual temperature for many years kept at around -14 ... -16 ° C, while in winter it can drop to -40 ° C, in summer rarely rises above +5 ° C. Precipitation falls a little - up to 400 mm per year, mainly from June to August. Even in summer, the soil thaws only on the surface, a bit deeper (at a level of 12-15 centimeters), the ground was chained by permafrost. The area is over 3 thousand square meters. Kilometers (30% of the whole island) are covered by glaciers that never melt. The largest of them even received the names - Leningrad, Kropotkin, Mushketov.

Given the low temperature, frequent squalls and other unfavorable conditions, it becomes clear why the Bolshevik Island is uninhabited. The weather here is most bad for most of the year.

Flora and fauna

Despite the extremely harsh climate, Bolshevik Island still inhabited. A lot of birds nest on the hills. Basically it's silvery and pink gulls, guillemots, ordinary kittiwakes, burgomasters, and also rare species such as peregrine falcon, sea-tailed gull and white gull.

On the island, rookeries of walruses and seals are arranged. Sometimes you can find reindeer, lemmings, wolves and Arctic foxes. But the owner of this island, like the whole archipelago, is a polar bear. Excavations have shown that about 25 thousand years ago mammoths lived here.

According to biologists, there are about 65 species of plants growing on the Bolshevik, that is, an extremely meager vegetation on the island. Here, mosses and lichens survive, covering the rocks with almost a continuous cover, as well as the polar willow. Rare flowers are found - polar poppy, crochet, saxifrage, turquoise, large-fruited amphibia, bluegrass shortened, saxifrage drooping, confused twig and some other species. From the cereals on the island grow pike sisaya and foxtail alpine.

The main characteristic of the local flora is the strong sparseness of the vegetation cover, the main cause of which is stony and crushed stone for the plains and hills of the island, which is described in the article.

The adjacent shallow islets

Within a radius of several kilometers from the Bolshevik lies more than 20 small islands. The most significant of them is called Superfluous. The rest - Low, Forgotten, Athletic, Wedge, Sharp, Close, Sea and a few more - have a small area. All of them are united by hilly-plain stony relief, severe climatic conditions, poor fauna and extremely poor flora.

How to explore Bolshevik Island

Reviews of the polar explorers about this land are negative. They are accustomed to the difficult conditions of life and work, but this island causes everyone to be dejected by their unimaginative landscape, the gloomy sky, the leaden waves, with power beating against the shore.

The history of the development of the island, as well as of the entire Northern Land, is a bright, full of true heroism page in the whole range of geographical discoveries. The discoverers of the island are members of the hydrographical expedition of BA Vilkitsky, who first came to the Bolshevik shore in 1913. The most detailed study and detailed description of this land was made in 1930-1932 during the expedition of the Institute for the Study of the North. Its members were scientists Urvantsev NN, Khodov VV, Ushakov GA. And Zhuravlev SP

In 1979-1983 gold placers were found on this land. In 1992, Bolshevik Island was visited by an ecological expedition of five scientists, whose main task was to determine the level of contamination with pesticides of the Northern Earth.

An important event for ornithology occurred in 1992, when the capture and ringing of a white gull was made on the island for further study of this species.

In total, there are 3 polar stations on the island - 1 active (Baranova Cape) and 2 closed ones (Sunny and Sandy).