Mezen river of the White Sea
Mezen is a river flowing in the territory of the Komi Republic and the Arkhangelsk region. The length of the Mezen River is 966 km, the area of the Mezen River drainage basin is 78,000 km².
The Mezen River originates on the western slopes of the Timan Ridge in the Komi Republic. The sources of the Mezen River are located at an altitude of 370 meters above sea level, at the Chetlas stone. Taking into account the height of the total fall (370 m) and the length of the river, we can safely say that the slope of the Mezen River is 0.383%. The name of the Mezen river has many variants of origin.
The Mezen River meanders incredibly. Making a bend, the river turns first to the west, and then turns to the north, the Mezen River flows towards the Arkhangelsk region. Flowing through the Arkhangelsk region, the Mezen River gradually turns north. After the merger of the Mezen and Vashka, it turns sharply to the north. In the very north, near the city, the Mezen flows into the Mezen Bay of the White Sea. Mezen Bay is one of the four largest bays of the White Sea, such as Kandalaksha Bay, Dvinskaya and Onega Bay. The Mezen Bay lies south of the Kanin Peninsula, its length is 105 kilometers, its width is 97, its depth ranges from 5 to 25 meters.
In the upper reaches of the Mezen, the banks are high and rocky; in the middle reaches, the Mezen is winding, with many riffles making navigation difficult. In the lower reaches, below the mouth of the Vashka River, the river bed is replete with shoals and riffles.
At the mouth of the Mezen, there are tides that spread up the river for 64 km, and the water can rise up to 6 m. At the mouth of the Mezen, the level of water rise is even higher, up to 10 m, so there is a project to build a tidal power station in the Mezen Bay, by 2020 of the year.
The Mezen River basin is rich in water resources - 15,187 tributaries replenish the Mezen. The main tributaries of the Mezen include 103 rivers, 53 of which are left tributaries, and, accordingly, 50 are right tributaries.
The largest tributaries of the Mezen include the Mezenskaya Pizhma and Sula, the Kyma and Pyoza, the Vashka and the Pyssa, the Us, the Bolshaya Loptyuga and the Irva. The longest tributary is the Vashka, 605 km long, the shortest, the Us, 102 km long. These are the main tributaries of the Mezen River. One of the tributaries is interesting for its bifurcation, or bifurcation of the channel. The Mezenskaya Pizhma (length 236 km), thanks to this phenomenon, flows into both the Pechora and the Mezen, and connects the Mezen with the Pechora water basin.
The Mezen River's food supply is mixed, with a predominance of snow. The average annual water flow is 886 m³/sec, the highest is 9530 m³/sec. Flood on the Mezen River in May - June, rain floods in summer and autumn. The Mezen freezes at the end of October - mid-November, the Mezen breaks up from the ice at the end of April - beginning of May.
Economic use of the Mezen River
The Mezen River is raftable. The complexity of the water route on the Mezen River is rated as the first category. Therefore, Mezen is ideal for rafting for beginners and inexperienced water tourists. Rafting on the Mezen River is possible both by kayaks and catamarans. As a rule, rafting routes begin in Komi, on the mountainous part of the river.
The Mezen is navigable for 201 km from the mouth, to the confluence of the Vashka River, and in the spring for 681 km to the Makar-Yb pier in the Udora region of the Komi Republic (in the 70s of the 20th century). In summer, when there is low water, movement along the Mezen is possible only on flat-bottomed “zyryanka” boats.
Along the vast Mezen valley there is a beautiful landscape - beautiful red steep banks covered with tracts of coniferous forest with rich vegetation and many animals. Coastal forests are rich in mushrooms and berries. In addition, the Mezen has always been famous for good fishing, especially at the mouth of the river. The village of Kizhma, located next to Mezen, is recognized as the most beautiful village in Russia. This provides the prerequisites for the development of tourism of various types - river rafting, fishing tourism, ecotourism, and some other types of tourism. In addition, there are great opportunities for harvesting non-timber forest resources - mushrooms, berries, medicinal herbs, and batch beekeeping. The development of fur farming may have great prospects.
If we restore the population of Mezen salmon, which was once one of the largest in the White Sea basin, then the fishing industry can also become a profitable industry and preserve a certain way of life for local residents in the Arkhangelsk region and the Komi Republic. Moreover, the bulk of the population, according to a survey conducted in 2014, has an income below the established subsistence level - 10.8 thousand rubles for the Komi Republic and 12.8 thousand rubles for the Arkhangelsk region, and fishing is not only a tribute to tradition, but also a way to survive. But for this, in addition to the fish protection measures themselves and measures for the reproduction of salmon, it is necessary to provide fish passage devices during the construction of the Mezen TPP. So that adult salmon could go into the Mezen River to spawn and juvenile salmon could float from the river to the sea. Only about 15 thousand people live in the Mezensky district; the development of all industries and the construction of the Mezen power station can radically change the social structure of the residents.
The territories along the Mezen River. The first settlements appeared on the Mezen only in the second half of the 14th century. The sparse population is explained not only by the harsh northern climate, but rather by the fact that the area of the Mezen River basin is, as it were, cut off from the rest of the world from the west by the powerful Northern Dvina River, and from the south by its largest tributary, the Vychegda River. Of the 80 small settlements located from the source to the mouth, the cities of Usogorsk and Mezen, as well as the village of Leshukonskoye, are relatively large. Communication routes with this region, as well as between its settlements, leave much to be desired. A railway line stretches from the Kotlas-Vorkuta highway to the city of Usogorsk.
The only highway connecting the vast northern region of the Mezen River with the rest of the world is the Arkhangelsk - Mezen highway, passing through the settlements of Belgorodsky, Pinega, and Sovpolye. According to legend, the Arkhangelsk-Mezen road took 300 years to build, but was completed only in 2008. Asphalt pavement exists only on a small initial section of the Arkhangelsk-Belgorodsky highway. Then, all the way to the final destination, there is a dirt road, sometimes of very poor quality. Those who traveled along it believe that this 8-hour journey is difficult to forget, given the beauty of the area and the quality of the surface.
45 km from the mouth are the villages of Kamenka and the village of Mezen, where the Mezen seaport is also located, mainly specializing in timber transshipment.
The only bridge across the Mezen River is located near the village of Usogorsk. The bridge was built in 1971-1974. There are powerful, but not year-round, ferry crossings on the Mezen River and its tributaries. They stop their work for quite long off-season periods, mainly from October to January, that is, until the moment when ice crossings are established on the river.
Ecology of the Mezen River
The Mezen Bay of the White Sea has the most opaque water, since the Mezen River is quite muddy, although due to the sparsely populated shores, the anthropogenic factor here is relatively low, and the Mezen is recognized as the cleanest in Europe among large rivers flowing directly into the sea.
Nevertheless, the man made a mess even in this wilderness. Both the unfavorable social situation (lack of well-paid work) in the villages scattered along the banks of the Mezen and the unwise deforestation in the territory of the Udorsky municipality are to blame for this. These cuttings led to a change in surface runoff, which, in turn, resulted in sand washing and overgrowing of the riverbed with aquatic vegetation. As a result, wintering pits and spawning grounds for Atlantic salmon are disappearing. And salmon are significantly reducing their population in the Mezen River. All of the above leads to an increase in the number of predators in the river - pike and perch, which also reduces the number of salmon. Since pike and perch largely eat young salmon that slide into the sea. And overfishing of salmon by both foreign fishermen at sea and the local population casts doubt on the ability to restore the salmon population in the Mezen River and its tributaries without taking drastic measures. Although, with the right approach, salmon and forests could become a source of wealth for the local population for many more generations.
A great danger to the ecology of the river are the mineral deposits in its basin, which are still poorly developed.
The richness of flora and fauna of the Mezen River
The Mezen River basin is forested - 80% of its territory is covered with green spaces, mostly coniferous forests. The richness and diversity of flora and fauna is explained by the large length of the river - magnificent tall coniferous forests grow in the south, sparse communities of mosses and lichens grow in the north, while in the valley of the Mezen basin a total of 1,300 plant species grow (without lichens). Rich fauna There are more than 400 species of vertebrates in this region, and there are even more invertebrates. The wild subspecies of reindeer is listed in the Red Book. The fox is depicted in the center of the coat of arms of the Mezen region. Arctic fox, wolverine, wolf, hare, muskrat, squirrels are the most numerous representatives of the fauna of the Mezen basin. The huge number of birds in this region allows for commercial hunting of black grouse, wood grouse, hazel grouse, ducks and geese. The following species of birds are protected: eider and swan, falcons (gyrfalcon and peregrine falcon), barnacle goose and osprey, golden eagle and white-tailed eagle.
Fish of the Mezen River
31 species of fish from 14 families live in the waters of the Mezen River. These are mainly rudd, bream, bleak, ide, dace, lake and common minnows, roach, gudgeon, silver and gold crucian carp. Salmon, or Atlantic salmon, whitefish, peled, and nelma are found in large quantities. Sterlet, Siberian and Pacific lampreys, smelts, and European vendace are extremely rare. New fish, such as pink salmon, also appear in the Mezen River. There are references to the catching of individual specimens of brown trout.
Spawning run of salmon in the river. The Mezen River begins in May-June with the collapse of ice and ends with the onset of ice remaining The first to enter the river is the icing, the course of which overlaps with the course of the closure. In July there is a mass movement of Tinda males, maturing according to the summer type. From the second half of August until freeze-up, there is autumn fish, which also includes leaf fall.
Naturally, despite the huge presence of other fish species, it is mainly valuable species that suffer from uncontrolled illegal fishing. Thus, salmon stocks have decreased significantly. The local population knows well when salmon comes to spawn and actively catches it. Purposefully catching the largest fish and not giving it a chance to spawn again. Therefore, there are very few large salmon in the Mezen River. According to estimates in 2015, the population caught 4,700 pieces of salmon or 151 quintals; for comparison, the quota for catch in the White Sea for the entire Arkhangelsk region for industrial, recreational and sports catch of salmon is 172.4 quintals, and for the Mezen River only 30 quintals. How It is easy to notice that overfishing of salmon by the population significantly undermines its stocks in the Mezen River.
However, in addition to salmon, fishermen also catch pink salmon - in 2015, 48 tons of pink salmon and 5 tons of salmon were caught in the Mezen region, which once again shows how the number of the Mezen salmon stock has fallen.
The number of pike and perch in the Mezen River has increased significantly; they dominate the catches. Other fish species that live in Mezen in sufficient quantities include European grayling and roach. There are a lot of ide and bream, dace and burbot, river flounder and lamprey here. All types of fish, including predators pike and perch, are objects of both legal and unauthorized catching.