Trail Log 1995-1997 - Lamar at Colorado State University

Return to ship at 8.00 p.m.
Supper at 8.00 p.m, though we hardly needed more food.
Nova Video on Lake Baikal. Available at 1-800-255-9424
The rift is seven times deeper than the Grand Canyon, though mostly filled with sediments. There
are 50 factories that use the Selenga as a drain. The cellulose plant was built in 1966, and
produced the first demonstrations in Russia over an environmental issue.
Along the railroad, everywhere you look there are the ugly relics of development that has failed.
The Russians moving into Siberia, demanded a tribute, or tax, and were taking half a million fur
skins a year in the mid-1600's, which was 10% of the income of the Russian state.
June 25, Wednesday.
We made a visit to the Uskany Islands, and watched the seals from two locations for several hours.
There were several dozen of them and we had excellent viewing, walking, then toward the edge
of the water, crawling up for an overlook where they were sunning on rocks at the water's edge.
There is a much more lush ground cover here. Lots of ants on the island.
The Baikal seal is Phoca sibirica. There are seven species of seals. This is related to the ringed
seal (Phoca hispida) of the Arctic, possibly from a population coming down the Yenisey and Angara
Rivers, or on the Lena River (see earlier). It is only seal restricted to fresh water. They are
distributed all over the lake, but in open water. They can be underwater up to 40 minutes, or, in lab
experiments, over an hour. They eat especially two species of golymyanka and two species of
bullhead fish. They are hunted in autumn and spring. They keep air holes open in the winter.
They make a kind of lair in the ice and snow in which the young are born. The female suckles pups
1 1/2 to 3 months. There are one or two pups, one bigger than the other. Mating is underwater and
has never been observed. Nursing is above water.
There is danger from canine distemper, perhaps brought from the Norwegian sea by gulls. The
seals construct something of a house of ice, which makes them difficult to survey.
The number of new pups is counted each year by motorcycles. There are 100,000 seals, from one
to five years old, but 50% are not yet reproducing. They can live to 50 years. Satellite transmitters
were put on four of them.
There is an annual professional kill of 6,000, but there are private hunters as well. To get a license
you have to agree to sell the skin to the agency, for 100,000 rubles, or about $ 17 each. The fur
is largely used in the fashion market. It is not really all that warm a fur.
This seal has bigger eyes adapted for deeper diving, than other seals. The females outweigh the
males.
Aquilegia sibirica.
Arctostaphylos uva-ursi. Kinnikinnik. The same plant that is widespread in the Rocky Mountains!
Empetrum nigrum. The woody ground cover.
Pyrola asarifolia
Trientalis europaea, Woodland star, first seen in Finland.