Lake Baikal – a miracle of Siberian nature. Photo

Truly amazing lake Baikal, which is one of the most amazing creations of nature.

It contains 20% of the total reserve of fresh water in the world. And yet, Baykal worth 236 trillion, if you count the utilitarian value of water in the lake.

Lake Baikal is so big that it is often mistaken for the sea.

1. This shaman — toe in the middle of the Western coast of Olkhon island on lake Baikal. Ends with a two-peaked rock, called the “Shaman-rock”. Circular panorama.

2. To get to lake Baikal in different ways. As a rule, wishing to visit it must first be sent to one of the nearby large cities: Irkutsk, Ulan-Ude or Severobaikalsk below there is more details to plan your route. Driving along the TRANS-Siberian railway between Irkutsk and Ulan-Ude, you can admire views of the lake, stretching right outside the window of the train.

3. The current value of the maximum depth of the lake — 1642 meters — was established in 1983. The average depth of the lake is also very big 744,4 m. It exceeds maximum depths of many very deep lakes. In addition to the lake on the Ground, only two lakes have a depth of over 1000 meters: Tanganyika (1470 m) and the Caspian sea (1025 m).

4. Shaman rock, one of nine relics of Asia (earlier it was called “stone temple”), became one of the most famous images of lake Baikal: no her image is no film or photo album about the lake-sea. The fact that the Cape Shamanka Rock juts out far into the lake, connecting with the beach only a low and narrow isthmus, has given the basis to attribute it to the capes “ostrovidova type”.

Water reserves in lake Baikal giant — 23 615 km3 (about 19 % of all world reserves of fresh lake water). The volume of water reserves Baikal is the second in the world among the lakes, second only to the Caspian sea, but in the latter the water is salty. In the lake more water than all the combined five Great lakes of North America (Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, Ontario), and 25 times greater than in Ladoga lake.

5. If all the water contained in lake Baikal, to divide into all citizens of Russia, each had about 166 thousand cubic meters of water, which is about 2773 railway tanks of 60 tons each.

6. Water surface area of lake Baikal — 31 722 km2 (excluding Islands), which is approximately equal to the area of such countries as Belgium or the Netherlands. By area, Baikal ranks seventh among the largest lakes in the world.

7. In the period of ice cover of Baikal freezes over completely, except for a small portion of the length of 15-20 km, located in the Angara. By the end of winter the thickness of ice on the lake reaches 1 meter, and in the bays — 1.5—2 meters.

8. During a hard frost cracks, which has the local name “wall cracks”, break the ice into separate fields.Through the cracks in the ice fish on the lake is dying from lack of oxygen. The Baikal ice, in addition, very transparent, and through it sunlight, so the water rapidly advancing planktonic algae that produce oxygen.

9. In Baikal there are about 2,600 species and subspecies of aquatic animals, of which more than half are endemic, ie found only here. 27 species of fish in the lake are found nowhere else.

10. The famous Baikal seal — one of three freshwater species of seal in the world. Endemic to the lake Baikal, that is, it lives only here. Included in the IUCN Red list as a species close to extinction.

On the lake has 27 Islands, almost all of them uninhabited. The largest of them — Olkhon (71 km long and 12 km wide, located almost in the center of the lake at its Western coast).

11. And it looks like the Baikal with the ISS.

12. Despite the fact that the lake Baikal UNESCO world heritage site, it is under threat from industrial and agricultural pollution. The most well-known polluter of lake Baikal is the Baikalsk pulp and paper mill.

But let’s not about sad. According to estimates by researcher the lake, Soviet and Russian geographer L. G. Batters, the utilitarian value of water in the lake is 236 trillion dollars.

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