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WONDERS OF NATURE
Ussuri region. Nature miracle
Anyone who decides to visit the jungle does not need to go to Africa in the footsteps of Livingston and Stanley. A real riot of vegetation, very reminiscent of a multi-tiered tropical forest, awaits him not in distant overseas countries on the banks of the Congo or Zambezi, but on our Russian soil, in the Ussuri Territory.
This wonderful world is located in the very south of the Russian Far East. Its boundaries in the north and west are the Amur with its tributary Ussuri, and in the south and east - the warm Sea of Japan. The vast territory of the Ussuri Territory (in area it is equal to Great Britain) accommodated the wooded mountains of the Sikhote-Alin ridge rising for two kilometers, and the wide swampy plains along the Amur and Ussuri, and the second largest lake in Siberia after Baikal - Khanka, and the most beautiful sea coast, whose rocky capes and islands resemble either Korea or New Zealand. In comparison with other picturesque and little-studied outlying regions of Russia: Altai, Taimyr, Chukotka or Sakhalin, the Ussuri Territory was clearly lucky for researchers. There were probably more of them here than in all the other above-mentioned regions combined. And besides, what researchers! Poyarkov and Khabarov, Przhevalsky and Arsenyev, Venyukov and Kropotkin, the botanist Komarov and the zoologist Shrenk, the navigators La Perouse and Nevelskoy, and many, many others. What is it that attracts travelers here? Why even today, having visited, for example, the Kedrovaya Pad Nature Reserve or Khanka Lake, you can’t get rid of the thought that you saw something unique, that this can’t actually be in nature, and only the hand of a magician could create such a miracle. The reason is that a rare combination of winds, currents, topography and water masses created a kind of climatic anomaly here, which made it possible for plants and animals of two different worlds: northern and southern, to meet and take root in the same territory. And as a result, a world has developed, the like of which cannot be found anywhere else on our planet. Here, taiga spruce and fir twine around lianas, including wild grapes and healing lemongrass. Moreover, one of the types of vines, actinidia, reaches a thickness of twenty centimeters! Here, Siberian larch grows next to the mighty Korean cedar, oaks and maples side by side with Manchurian walnut and cork tree (Amur velvet), and under the forest canopy you can find nondescript plants of the "root of life" - ginseng. On Lake Khanka, the sacred lotus grows next to the usual sedge and cattail. And the palm-shaped tropical bushes of prickly aralia are quite unusual for our eyes. The fauna of this extraordinary corner of the Earth is no less bizarre: here you can meet the inhabitants of the Siberian taiga - a brown bear, a wolverine, a wolf, an elk, a wild boar and a roe deer, a squirrel, a sable and a chipmunk, but at the same time the inhabitants of the south live - a tiger and a leopard, a Himalayan black bear and the raccoon dog, the spotted deer and the Manchurian wild cat, and even the native of India, the goral antelope. The world of birds is also strange here: next to the capercaillie and the eagle owl, you can meet the Japanese ibis and the Indian drongo bird, the crossbill coexists peacefully with the blue magpie, the partridge coexists with the brightly colored Chinese mandarin duck, the Korean pheasant with the bullfinch, and the polar white owl - with pelican and flamingo. Familiar to all Central Russian snakes and lizards share territory here with a huge, like a python, Schrenk snake and a soft-skinned turtle. By the way, Koreans living on the Ussuri have long kept Polozov in their homes instead of cats. There is no escape for mice from these snakes. There are especially many Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Indian settlers in the southern part of the region - near the Posiet Bay and in the Khanka lowland. At one time, the first scientist-researcher of the nature of these places, the great Przhevalsky, wrote that after the monotonous spaces of the northern taiga, the forests of the Ussuri valley and the water expanses of Lake Khanka literally amaze the traveler with a contrasting combination of the most unexpected plant and animal forms. Special mention should be made of Lake Khanka. Despite the huge area (4000 square kilometers), it is one of the smallest in Russia (on average 1-3 meters), and its well-heated waters in summer give shelter to thirty-three species of fish! Przhevalsky caught sixty-kilogram sturgeon here, and beluga, according to him, reached a weight of eight hundred kilograms in the lake! On the southwestern shore of the lake there is a village with the unusual name Kamen-Rybolov. Where did such a name come from? The fact is that not far from it, near the water, there is a low rock with an almost flat bowl-shaped top. When the northern winds bring up a steep wave, water splashes into the bowl on the rock along with lake fish. And when the wind subsides, the water leaves, seeping into the cracks of the rock, and the inhabitants of the village can only collect the fish that the Stone Fisherman has caught for them. In addition to living miracles, the Ussuri Territory is also famous for the treasures of its bowels. It is considered the third in Russia (after the Urals and Transbaikalia) pantry of semi-precious stones. Rock crystal, amethyst and morion, garnets and tourmalines are found in the Sikhote-Alin mountains. And the Tetyukhin skarns striking with amazing ring patterns are not found anywhere else in the world, except for the local Dalnegorsky mine. An unforgettable impression remains from sailing on a ship along the coast of the Ussuri Territory. Severe black cliffs, composed of basalt, breaking right into the sea, are replaced by cozy bays with cascades of rivers flowing into them, rocky islands with bird colonies - wooded capes with huge cedars towering above the green massif of the taiga. Even the names of these places on the map fascinate with their poetry and unusualness: Zerkalnaya Bay and the Cape of Four Rocks, the village of Chernoruche and the Svetlovodnaya River, Askold Island and Kievka Bay, Nakhodka Bay and the port of Bolshoy Kamen ... The warmest of our seas - the Sea of Japan - and in its depths hides many wonders, which you will not find equal in the Black, Azov, or Caspian Seas. No wonder it was here, in Peter the Great Bay, that Russia's first marine reserve was formed. The place for it was not chosen by chance. This area is distinguished by a special variety of flora and fauna. More than 800 species of algae, at least 2000 marine invertebrates and almost 300 species of fish live here. Among the inhabitants of the reserve are tiny, fractions of a millimeter, crustaceans, and almost half a meter in diameter jellyfish, miniature diatoms and huge leaves of seaweed - bonfires 1,5 meters long and up to half a meter wide. Nearby, long ribbons of sea kale sway - kelp and lettuce-like plates of ulva. But most of all in the bay of shellfish. These are oysters and mussels, scallops and sea cucumbers, octopuses, squids and cuttlefish. The fertility of mollusks is amazing. So, one female mussel spawns 50-70 million eggs per year. Considering that mussels live for a hundred years or more, then, therefore, one female produces up to five billion of her own kind in her life! There are many at the bottom of Peter the Great Bay and starfish. The largest of them - a half-meter distolasteria - from afar attracts the attention of a scuba diver with its yellowish-white coloring on a black background. But there are no less purple-red lysastrozems, and blue with scarlet spots of patiria, and sunflower-like multi-beam stars - sunflowers. Enough at the bottom and sponges, and brown moss-like bryozoans, and sea acorns. Sea urchins and hermit crabs crawl right there. Grass shrimps graze in the thickets of sea grass - phyllospadix - these amazing creatures that change sex throughout their lives. Until the age of two, they all belong to the male sex, and then turn into females, spawn and carefully bear it for six months on their abdominal legs. The water in the bay varies in composition and temperature. Near the mouths of the rivers, it is fresher than at the borders of the open sea, and near the surface it is noticeably warmer than at depth. Therefore, a variety of fish species are found here: at the top, heat-loving (mackerel, saury, sardine, anchovy, ivasi), and closer to the bottom - cold-water, arctic species (cod, saffron cod, capelin, herring, halibut and others). Exotic aliens also swim into the bay: swordfish, sailboat, flying fish and even a formidable shark - hammerhead fish. There are not many marine mammals in the reserve. Dolphins rush through the waters of the bay in cheerful flocks, clumsy seals rest on coastal islets, sometimes small local whales - minke whales salute with fountains. Occasionally you can also see seals and sea lions in the bay. And on the sea islands - the kingdom of birds. Up to 50 birds live in the bird markets of the reserve: guillemots, cormorants, guillemots, loons and puffins. But most of all black-tailed gulls - almost forty thousand! Herons, waders, Steller's sea eagles and white-tailed eagles also live on the islands. True, the incredible abundance of marine life in Peter the Great Bay has its drawbacks. Sometimes the beaches in Vladivostok have to be closed due to the invasion of poisonous jellyfish, which approach the shores in millions, so that the water resembles thick jelly. But this doesn't happen very often. On the island of Popov, closest to Vladivostok, where the estate of the reserve is located, a museum of marine nature has been set up. Leaving the museum and returning by boat to the Golden Horn - the city bay of Vladivostok, one involuntarily wonders what is more striking: the unique land world of the Ussuri Territory or the richness and diversity of the underwater kingdom off the coast of the Sea of Japan. But, regardless of the answer to this question, everyone who has been here dreams of returning here again. Author: B.Wagner
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