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nereis@ostech.ru |
| NATURE |  |
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       Both top soil and flora of Karelia were formed during post-glacial period. The wavy surface of the land keeps the traces of ancient mountains. Karelia is often called “A Stony Lake-Forest Land”, highlighting the leading elements of Landscape, beautiful combinations, created by countless lakes and rivers and the land in-between, covered with forests. Long time ago this land was populated with Finns and Karelians. We still can feel greatness, peace and rigorous beauty of these places. The majority of Karelia is covered with coniferous forests. The main conifer is pine, but you also can see fir-tree and larch. Pine is very valued for durable wood, which is widely used in the industry, but also it is much estimated for amazing clear air, because needles extract volatile oils and ozone. Deciduous trees are birch, asp and alder-tree. Karelian birch is registered in The Red Book; its wood has unique patterns and is used for the adornments. Among bushes you can find lots of cowberries, bilberries, cloudberries and cranberries. There are not so many grassy plants. Soil cover is represented with reindeer mosses, green mosses, heather and bearberries. The Karelian fauna is very luxuriant and multifarious. There are numerous squirrels and hares. Often you can meet brown bear, wolf, lynx, deer and elk. The fowl is also various: hazel-grouses, black-cock, partridge and wood-grouse. Among the waterfowl you will see lots of ducks and sandpipers. On the Whit Sea islands the ember-goose is nesting. Without any doubts the main attraction is the White Sea. Indented coastline with lots of bays, covered with taiga natural growth and undulating ground - these are the most descriptive pictures of the White Sea. Winter brings the totally different scenery: fishing boats, frozen in the shore, smoke, coming out from the chimneys in the village and clinking silence above the iced-covered bay. The White Sea fauna is related to temperate arctic one. The underwater world is also vivid and peculiar. The rocks are covered with soft corals, actinia and hydroids. In the cracks and between the stones one can see lots of starfish, crabs and shrimps, hermit crab. Fish is various as well: lancet fish, rock-fish, flounder, herring and cod. White whales, seals, Greenland seals, sea-hares abound the White Sea. Especially we would like to talk about white whale - the beauty of the White Sea. According to the Russian classification it is a dolphin, but European classification includes it to the whale’s class. In contrast to the dolphins - white whales have active (not accrete) neck-bones, that help it to turn its head easily. What you can do Diving, fishing, hunting (at hunting seasons), gather mushrooms and berries, have lots of sea and rivers boat trips.
Photos by Vladimir Gubanov (The nature of the White Sea)|>>>>> |