Our World

Lake Baikal

For the Russian people Lake Baikal is a natural treasure. Baikal is an immense and breathtaking area of physical beauty. Baikal holds 20% of the earth's fresh water and harbors more native species of plants and animals than any other lake in the world. For it's home to 50 species of fish and the world's only fresh water seal. Lake Baikal hosts 1085 species of plants and 1550 species of animals.

Baikal's volume, at 23,600 km3, is greater than any other fresh water lake. If you were to drain Lake Baikal, it would take the Great Lakes of the United States: Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario to refill the empty basin. At 1,620 meters, nearly a mile deep, it is without doubt the world's deepest lake. Baikal is about 560,000 km2. Of the 336 rivers and streams flowing into Baikal, only one, the Angara, flows out from it. At different times, researchers have counted varying numbers of tributaries, up to 544 depending on the amount of precipitation during the year.

This 30 million-yr. old lake is so huge that locals call it sea. This "sea" is rapidly growing with the average rate of 2 cm (0.8 in) per year. Baikal is considered to be a future ocean; in several million years there’s expected that there will be a new great ocean all over Asia and Baikal is a starting point for this ocean. Baikal is one of the cleanest surface water reservoirs on earth and you can drink water right from the lake. The water is cleaned by the unique microorganisms, which cleans the 50 meters deep slice of water surface three times a year.

Lake Baikal

posted by Anonymous @ 5/02/2006 06:25:00 PM