Pereyaslav or Kreminchuk, where the Dnieper Plain rises barely 50 m.
above sea-level. At the porohs the landscape on both sides is that of a
low rock-plateau. The picturesque rocks of the Dnieper banks, the
rapids and ledges of rock in the river bed, everywhere remind us that
here the Ukrainian Horst is crossed by the main stream of the Ukraine.
Not until we get down to the Zaporoze (land below the rapids) do we
find the genuine lowland character again—in the Pontian Steppe-plain.
The transition of the Dnieper Plain to the southern spurs of the
Central Russian Plateau is marked only by the rising of the valley
slopes of the tributaries of the Dnieper in this region. Beyond that,
the surface of the high bog, lying between the rivers, remains as flat
and level as on the Dnieper and below the 200 m. level. Moreover, the
spurs of the Central Russian elevation nowhere within Ukrainian
territory attain the level of 300 m. The spur between the Dnieper and
the Desna barely reaches a height of 230–240 m.; near the high Desna
bank, the spur between the Desna and the Sem barely 260 m. About the
sources of the Sem, Psiol and Donetz, the country attains a summit
height of 280 m.; between the upper Donetz and Don only 250–260 m. From
these highest regions the country declines imperceptibly but steadily
toward the southwest, south and southeast.
The general nature of the land in the region of the southern spur of
the Central Russian Plateau is entirely analogous to that of the
neighboring Dnieper Plain, except that the river valleys are more
deeply cut. The right valley-side descends to the river in a steep
slope, furrowed by water rifts. The broad, flat valley bottom is
occupied by river branches and old river beds, marshes and marsh
meadows, sand areas or dunes. The left bank rises very gently, and we
at last come upon the level, or at most slightly undulating surface of
the water-shed, between two rivers. It, in turn, declines suddenly to
the neighboring river and the succession of land-forms begins anew.
This monotony of landscape reminds one of the neighboring Great Russia.
The only variety is afforded here by the details of landscape, which
appear most numerous in this region of the Ukraine.
These are rain water-rifts (in Ukrainian balka, provallia, yaruha). In
this, and often in other plateau and plain lands of the Ukraine, they
become a terrible scourge. The heavy mantle of black soil, loess and
loam favors the formation of water-rifts as well as the loose chalk and
old tertiary strata (marl, sand, clay). The strenuous cutting down of
forest in the past century has given the final impulse to the formation
of such water clefts. In the loose soil, no longer held together by the
forests, the water-rifts grow and spread after every heavy rain with
terrible speed, and may, in a few years, reduce a wealthy farmer to the
beggar’s staff by transforming his most profitable black-soil fields
into a maze of deep, dry ravines. Only a national re-stocking of the
forests could bring the land relief. Especially in the neighborhood of
the high precipitous banks of the rivers, the water-rifts work their
mischief.
The glacial age had no particular significance for the surface
configuration of the Dnieper Plain and the adjacent plateau spurs. Only
in the north Chernihov country we find real traces of the glacier. The
large peninsulas which the southern limit of the glacial boulders forms
along the course of the Dnieper and the Don are by no means to be
regarded as traces of two great glacial tongues. The sand and loam
masses, with enclosed glacial boulders, which are found in the region
of these peninsulas, are of fluvio-glacial origin, and were deposited
by melted ice from the glacier on its way to the Black Sea. The
northern limit of the black soil region is not in the least affected by
these problematic glacial peninsulas.
After the glacial period, however, movements of the earth took place in
the entire Ukrainian plateau group. It rose considerably, and the
erosive action of the rivers began. At the point where the axis of the
Ukrainian horst cuts the Dnieper, we find this rise of ground also in
the Dnieper Plateau. The rapids of the Dnieper were formed at that
time, and, up to the present, the giant river has not succeeded in
leveling its falls.
That tectonic disturbances are not unknown to the Dnieper Plain we
learn from the occurrence of volcanic rock and displacement of the
strata near Isachki, not far from the city of Lokhvitzia, and on Mount
Pivikha, north of Kreminchuk. It seems that along the northeast border
of the Ukrainian horst a greatly disturbed area is hidden beneath more
recent flat-piled rock layers. Great disturbances of the magnetic force
of the earth seem to indicate the same.
The Dnieper Plain forms the last member in the northern plain district
of the Ukraine. The southern plain district which extends along the
northern banks of the Black Sea, from the delta of the Danube into the
Kuban region, has since ancient times borne the accepted name of the
Pontian Steppe-plain. Its old Ukrainian name is simply nis (lowland) or
dike pole (wild field). The steppe-land and the river district, to this
day, bear the famous name of Zaporoze (land below the rapids).
The Pontian steppe-plain is bounded on the north by the spurs of the
Bessarabian, Podolian, Dnieper and Donetz Plateaus. On the south, by
the sea-shore and the country at the foot of the Yaila Mountains, in
Crimea. Past the Danube deltas the steppe-plain merges into the exactly
similar steppe-plain on the Kuban.
The surface of the steppe-plain is exceptionally flat, slightly
undulating only at the northern border, where the transition to the
southern spurs of the Ukrainian plateau group proceeds imperceptibly.
Innumerable barrows (mohyla) are as characteristic of the landscape of
the Pontian Steppe-plain as the flat plate-shaped depressions of the
ground, with small temporary lakes, the swampy flat valleys and the
small salt marshes with their peculiar vegetation.
The many balkas, which divide the steppe-plain into innumerable low
plateaus, do not affect the grand uniformity of the steppe landscape
very much. As in the neighboring plateaus, they are cut in deep, but do
not become visible to the traveler until he comes directly upon them.
The pliocene steppe-lime which predominates in the entire steppe-plain,
covers the sarmatian and Mediterranean strata, and reveals the
crystalline substratum only in the west of the Dnieper in the
neighborhood of the Dnieper Plateau, and forms rocky cornices on the
slopes of the balkas. Lesser tectonic disturbances, in the shape of
anticlinals and synclinals, have affected these youngest tertiary
formations also. They are covered by a mantle of loess and black earth,
which becomes constantly thinner toward the south. The typical
chornozyom gives way, south of the parallel of Kherson, to the brown,
also very fertile steppe-soil, which is accompanied in long stretches,
however, by the saline earth. To the east of the Dnieper, at the
southern spurs of the Donetz Plateau, the crystalline substratum also
appears to a great extent, in banks of rock, in the midst of the
steppe-plain.
Only along the large streams of the steppe country does the nature of
the land change. Their valleys are broad and swampy, covered by the
so-called plavni. Interminable thickets of sedge and seeds, marsh
forest and meadows, together with innumerable river branches, old river
beds, and small lakes, make up a beautiful, fresh, verdant country in
the midst of the boundless steppe, whose vernal dress, resplendent with
blossoms, turns yellow and blackish-brown in summer and fall, from the
fierce glow of the sun.
STREAMS AND RIVERS OF THE UKRAINE
The Ukrainian rivers are genuinely typical of Eastern Europe. The great
uniformity of the surface configuration of the Ukraine is responsible
for the lack of that variety in its own river system which
characterizes the waters of Western and Central Europe. But the great
extent of the land does cause the Ukraine to have mountain, plateau and
lowland streams, so that it does not attain the degree of uniformity in
hydrographic conditions of Russia proper.
The Ukrainian river system concentrates in the Black Sea. From
northwest, north and east, the rivers of the Ukraine tend toward its
sea. Besides, the western boundary lines of the Ukraine lie on the
Baltic slope. There, in Podlakhia, in the Kholmshchina, on the San
River and in the Lemko country, the Ukrainian people has had its seats
since the dawn of its history. In most recent times Ukrainian
colonization has gained also parts of the Caspian slope on the Kuma and
Terek Rivers. But the region drained by the Black Sea surpasses both
the other regions so much in extent and in the size of its rivers, that
the Baltic and Caspian region of the Ukraine dwindle in comparison.
Nature has, therefore, turned the Ukrainian nation toward the south and
southeast to the Black Sea. But, at the same time, she has not denied
the Ukraine a convenient connection with the north and south of the
globe. The main European river divide is, perhaps, nowhere so flat and
so easy to cross as in Ukrainian territory. From the Dniester to the
San (bifurcation of the Vishnia creek near Rudki), from the Pripet to
the Buh and Niemen the passages are easy. Since ancient times portages
have existed here, and in modern times the Pripet has been connected
with the Buh and the Niemen by means of canals (King’s Canal and
Oginski Canal) which, however, are at present entirely antiquated and
almost useless. Besides, the widely branched water system of the
Dnieper outside the Ukraine affords easy passage to the Dvina (Beresina
Canal), Volga and Neva, in White Russian territory. Over these
waterways and the portages lying between them the old path of the
Northmen led from Scandinavia to Constantinople. This most important
aspect of the Ukrainian water system promises at some future time to
bear rich fruit, if the recently-formed plan to build a waterway for
navigation on a large scale, from the Baltic to the Black Sea,
utilizing the course of the Dnieper, should become a reality.
The Baltic watercourses of the Ukraine flow into the Vistula. Several
large Carpathian tributaries originate in Ukrainian territory. Here the
rapid Poprad carries the melted snow of the Tatra to the Dunayetz. The
source of the Visloka also lies in the Ukrainian Lemko country. The
last and largest Carpathian tributary of the Vistula belongs, in
three-fourths of its extent, to Ukrainian territory, namely, the
navigable San. It receives from the Carpathians the Vislok on the left
and the Vihor on the right. The other tributaries of the San on the
left side, the Vishnia, Sklo, Lubachivka and Tanva, come from the
sub-Carpathian country and the Rostoche Plateau.
All the Carpathian tributaries of the Vistula have only at their
sources the character of mountain streams, with swift currents, in
rocky river beds, lined by banks of water-worn material. Even in the
mountains their valleys become wide, covered with banks of pebbles,
sand and loam, and overgrown with willow-brush, and their falls
insignificant. In the sub-Carpathian country the banks become low and
sandy, the stream slow, and the water-level is very unsteady, owing to
the cutting down of forests in the country of the source. In spring,
when the snow melts in the mountains, and at the time of the early
summer rains, there are terrible floods; in dry summers the rivers
dwindle to almost insignificant proportions.
From the Rostoche the Vepr, navigable from Krasnostav down, flows thru
a broad, marshy valley, into the Vistula. The northern declivity of the
Podolian Plateau sends its largest river, the Buh, navigable from Sokal
on, down to the Vistula. This river is really a genuine lowland river.
Its valley is wide and flat, the river winds with its muddy bed thru
forest marshes, thickets of reeds and willow brush, now parting into a
dozen branches, now flowing in a wide bed, past fresh, green meadows
and dark forests. The same lowland character is a common quality of the
left-hand tributaries of the Buh, the Poltva, Rata, Solokia, Krna and
of the Luha on the right hand. The Mukhavetz, Lisna, Nurez and Narva,
on the other hand, are typical woodland streams, which roll their great
mass of water thru the forests of Podlakhia.
The Pontian Rivers of the Ukraine belong to the six great regions
drained respectively by the Danube, Dniester, Boh, Don and Kuban.
Of the great region drained by the Danube, only the Carpathian country
of the sources of the Theiss, Sereth, and Prut lie within Ukrainian
boundaries. The Theiss is formed by the junction of two source-rivers
near the Svidovez and the Chornohora, and collects all the rivers of
the Ukrainian country belonging to Hungary—the Visheva and Isa on the
left, the Torez, Talabor, Velika Rika, Bershava and Bodrochka, which
consists of five source-rivers (the Latoritzia, Uz, Laboretz, Tepla and
Ondava). All these rivers of the Hungarian-Ukrainian mountain country
break their difficult way in deep, picturesque passes, thru
forest-covered mountain chains. Innumerable rafts carry the trunks of
the fallen Carpathian giants into the treeless plains of Hungary. Here,
too, the rivers suddenly lose their mountain character; their currents
become sluggish, their waters turbid, their banks swampy.
Of the Sereth and its tributaries, the Sochava and Moldava, only the
sources belong to Ukrainian national territory. On the other hand, a
considerable part of the Prut country lies within it. The Prut River
rises at the Hoverla, where it forms a beautiful waterfall along the
crater walls. Then it flows in a picturesque defile toward the north,
forms another waterfall at Yaremche, then immediately leaves the
mountains, uniting in the sub-Carpathian hill-country with the roaring
Cheremosh, which also rises in two source-rivers on the slopes of the
Black Mountains and flows in a deeply-cut meandering valley thru the
beautiful Hutzul country. In the sub-Carpathian country the Prut has a
wide, flat valley, taken up in places by marsh meadows. The river winds
down the wide valley in countless twists, forms side branches and old
river beds, and reaches the Danube in the midst of liman-like lakes and
bogs, not far from the swampy delta. Outside of the mountains, the Prut
receives only insignificant tributaries of small volume. Between the
Danube and the Dniester we see only a few miserable little steppe
rivers, emptying into salty or bracken liman lakes (e.g., the Yalpukh
and the Kunduk Rivers).
The important Dniester River attains a length of over 1300 km., and
possesses the greatest variety of distinct sections of river of all the
Ukrainian streams. It originates in the High Beskid, near the village
of Vovche, as a very energetic, wild creek. In a defile it advances
into the sub-Carpathian hill-country, where it has deposited great
masses of rubble. The mountain stream changes rapidly into a lowland
stream and forms great swamps in the Dniester Plain, which, in
high-water time, are converted into large river lakes. From the left
bank, the Dniester here receives the muddy Vereshitza (from the
Rostoche), which forms many ponds, from Western Podolia, the Hnila
Lipa. All the remaining tributaries of this section of the Dnieper come
from the Carpathians, on the left the Strviazh (Strivihor), on the
right the Bistritza, the mighty meandering river Striy with the Opir,
and the Svicha (with the Misunka). All these rivers are mountain
streams, flow in beautiful defiles, and deposit great masses of rubble
on the verge of the Carpathians. Beginning at the delta of the Svicha,
the Dniester Plain becomes a wide, flat-bottomed valley, in which the
river flows along in great bends and receives the Limnitzia and both
the Bistritzas from the Carpathians. Near Nizniv the banks approach
each other very closely and the Dniester enters a yar (cañon), not
leaving its steep sides until near Tiraspol. The Podolian tributaries
of the Dniester on the left side, the Zolota Lipa, Stripa, Sereth,
Zbruch, Smotrich, Ushitza, Murakhva, Yahorlik, roll their turbid waters
in similar cañons toward the Dniester. The Bessarabian tributaries, on
the contrary, have wide, swampy valleys. All these plateau rivers are
slight in volume of water, altho some of them attain considerable
length. Only in the spring, when the snow-blanket melts, do their
waters overflow the banks. In summer the water-level becomes very low,
and the water of the early summer showers is stored up in the many
ponds, which are found in large numbers, in the country about the
sources of these rivers. All these plateau rivers are not even
navigable for rafts; even the little fishers’ boat can hardly find its
way along the muddy shoals.
In its cañons the Dniester River assumes all the characteristics of a
plateau river. Its waters generally take up the entire bottom of the
cañon, leaving very little space for the abodes of men. The incline of
the river is not uniform, but constitutes a series of slight steps.
Sections with rapid currents alternate with quiet depths. The small
brooks which come down the short lateral gorges of the Dniester cañons
bring great masses of loose stones and rubble into the river bed, as a
result of the reckless destruction of forests, and build constantly
growing cones of rubble, which the river must remove slowly and
laboriously. They also form dangerous shoals and hinder the development
of navigation on the Dniester. The river also forms regular rapids,
near Yampil, where a layer of granite stretches clear across the river.
For this reason the Dniester, tho navigable along a stretch of almost
800 km., has not become an important waterway. The navigation of the
Dniester, which becomes more active from Khotin on, is now on the wane.
Eight hundred years ago sea vessels were still able to reach the old
Ukrainian royal city of Halich.
The floods of the Dniester are famous. In the spring, when the snows
melt in the Carpathians, the Dniester Plain is converted into a great
river-lake. The Carpathian tributaries bring the main stream so much
water, that it cannot easily flow off thru the narrow cañon, and so,
floods the whole wide Dniester Valley for weeks. Then there is high
water even in the cañon of the Dniester, but it has little scope.
Near Tiraspol, the Dniester Valley widens out again. Swampy plavni
wilds extend on both sides of the river. In a beautiful, rapidly
growing delta, the Dniester empties into its liman, which it is slowly
filling in with its precipitates. Two narrow outlets (hirló) break thru
the bar of the liman and connect it with the sea.
Between the Dniester and the Boh, not one river finally empties into
the sea. Even the largest rivers of the region, the Little and Big
Kuyalnik and the Tilihul end their courses in limans, which are
entirely closed off by bars. The valleys of these coastal rivers are
narrow, becoming wider at last, when they are about to enter the
limans. The current is always slow and the water often evaporates
completely in the summer.
The Boh, falsely named the Southern Bug, is a real plateau river. It
rises in the village of Kupil, near the source of the Sbruch, on the
Austrian border, and flows as a typical Podolian mud-streamlet, in a
flat valley, covered with ponds and swamps. But, beginning at Mezibiz,
its bed becomes rocky, the valley slopes become high and keep
approaching each other. The Boh Valley gradually becomes a cañon-like
“yar,” altho it is at no point so deep as the Dniester Valley. The
granite-gneiss formations of the Ukrainian horst appear here as
picturesque shore rocks and slopes along the river and form innumerable
rapids (as, for example, Constantinivka) in the river bed. Stony beds
and narrow, rocky valleys are also found in the most important
tributaries of the Boh—the Sob, Siniukha, Inhul on the left; the Kodima
and Chichiclea on the right. All of them have little water, and in dry
summers only a chain of ponds marks the valley road of the river. The
main stream, too, has not much water, being unfit for navigation even
in the time of the spring floods. Only the last 130 kilometers of its
course, from Vosnesensk down, are navigable. At the entrance of the
Inhul the Boh begins to widen considerably, the current becomes slow,
and the depth at Mikolaiv sufficiently great to enable smaller sea
vessels to reach its harbor. Slowly widening, the river gradually turns
into the Buh liman, which has the winding outline of a river and unites
with the great liman of the Dnieper. The entire length of the Boh is
over 750 kilometers.
We now come to the main river of the Ukraine, the majestic Dnieper. To
the Ukrainian people the Dnieper bears the same significance as the
“Matushka Volga” to the Russians, the Vistula to the Poles, and the
Rhine to the Germans. The Dnieper is the sacred river of the Ukraine.
Like a divinity it was honored by the old Polans, the founders of the
ancient Ukrainian state of Kiev; Slavutitza was the name given it by
the Ukrainians of the monarchy. It was esteemed as a father and
provider by the brave Zaporog Cossacks, the champions of Ukrainian
liberty. For many centuries the Dnieper has played an important part in
the folk-lore and literature of the Ukraine, in traditions and
fairy-stories and folk-tales and in thousands of folk-songs; since
ancient times it has been sung by all Ukrainian poets, from the unknown
bard of the epic of Ihor, to the greatest of all Ukrainian poets, Taras
Shevchenko, and so on, down to the youngest generation of the poets of
the Ukraine. To them all, the Dnieper is the symbol of the Ukraine, of
its life, and of its past. Not without cause did Shevchenko ask to be
buried on the mountain shore of the Dnieper, “that I may see the
endless plains and the Dnieper and the crags of its banks and hear the
rushing of the Rushing One.” For no one is able to repeat the
impressions which fill the soul of every Ukrainian when he looks down
from this beautiful observation point of Shevchenko’s grave upon the
majestic river below. How many thoughts, then, arise about the
glorious, and yet so unspeakably sad, past of the Ukraine, about its
miserable present and the great future toward which the nation tends,
amid great difficulties, as does the Dnieper toward the Black Sea over
the porohs. And we do not wonder that the Dnieper has become the
national sanctuary of the Ukraine. With this river are connected all
the important events of the historical life of the Ukraine. The Dnieper
was the father of the ancient Ukrainian empire of Kiev; by way of the
Dnieper a higher culture made its way into the Ukraine; on the Dnieper
the Ukrainian Cossack element developed, which, after centuries of
subjugation, gave the Ukrainians a new government. The Dnieper River
has, since hoary antiquity, been the most important channel of
intercourse between the North and the South of Eastern Europe; it has
been the means of connecting the Ukraine with the sea and the cultural
realm of Southern Europe. Its present importance, despite the low grade
of culture in Eastern Europe, and despite Russian mismanagement, is
great, and is growing rapidly. And if in the future the river is made
accessible to sea-going vessels and becomes a road for large-scale
navigation, its significance may become almost incalculable.
The Dnieper is the third largest river in Europe, after the Volga and
the Danube. The length of its course is more than 2100 km. The region
it drains includes 527,000 sq. km., not much less than the whole of
France. Among the streams of the globe the Dnieper ranks thirty-second.
If the Dniester possesses some of the properties of a Central European
river, namely, mountainous country at its source and many mountain
tributaries; if the Boh is a genuine plateau river; the Dnieper, on the
other hand, is the real type of a river in Eastern Europe. It rises in
White Russia near the village of Clozove. A little swamp, which was
formerly a small lake, situated at a height of 256 m., forms the source
of the river. Because of this small height of the source, the Dnieper
has, as, in fact, all the Eastern European rivers have, a very
insignificant incline and an average speed of current of 0.4 m. per
second. The source of the Dnieper lies near the sources of the Dvina
and the Volga, as well as the source streams of the Neva.
Near its source the Dnieper is a small, muddy streamlet, which seeks
its way southward in a flat valley, three miles wide, between swamps
and moors. But quickly its volume increases, and, as near the source as
Dorogobuz, the river becomes navigable for smaller vessels. Here it
suddenly turns to the west, both valley slopes, but especially the left
one, become higher and steeper, the valley narrows down to ½ km. But
after a short stretch it becomes wide and swampy again at Smolensk. The
depth of the river is very irregular, the pools (plessa) attaining a
depth of 5 meters, the rapids often less than ½ meter. From Smolensk to
Orsha the Dnieper Valley again becomes hardly 1 kilometer wide, between
high banks. On the left bank picturesque, rocky precipices appear. At
Orsha the Dnieper turns to the south, retaining this direction as far
as Kiev. Down to Shclov the Dnieper Valley remains narrow, with steep
slopes, then it widens slowly but steadily. The depth of the river
reaches 10 meters, but many shoals, great morain boulders and broken
sandstone make navigation difficult. Below Mogilev the spurs of the
White Russian and Central Russian plateaus withdraw from the Dnieper
and show only on the left side. The river reaches the low plain of the
Polissye and flows in majestic turns thru swamps and meadows which are
dotted with old river beds. In this section of its course the Dnieper
receives the Druch and the voluminous, navigable Beresina on the right,
and the navigable Soz on the left. The Dnieper receives an especially
great amount of water from the Beresina. River navigation is doubled
below its entrance, mainly because of innumerable rafts which are
traveling to the treeless South Ukraine and the Black Sea from the
forests of White Russia.
From the mouth of the Soz numerous low islands appear in the bed of the
Dnieper. The river divides into numerous branches. The entire trough
lying between the Dnieper and the Pripet is a labyrinth of river
branches, lakes, old river beds, swamps and fens. Thru the Pripet the
volume of the Dnieper River increases twofold, and very seldom flows
along in a single bed.
The tributaries on the right side, the Teterev and the Irpen, bring the
Dnieper the first remembrances of the Ukrainian plateau country, and
soon its spurs appear on the right river bank. The Dnieper presses
against this bank and forms the picturesque precipices above which
glisten the gilded domes of the ancient churches of Kiev. Here the
Dnieper receives the largest of its tributaries on the left, the
navigable Desna. Thus the formation of the Dnieper River is completed,
its source-rivers, the Pripet, Beresina, the upper Dnieper, the Desna
and the Soz have united to build a majestic stream. Its normal average
width is 600–850 meters near Kiev. During the spring floods, however,
the width of the river exceeds 10 km.; from the high, right bank one
can barely see the woods of the left. All the islands, sand-banks,
swamps, meadows, river branches and old river beds disappear beneath an
interminable mass of yellowish water, rolling slowly toward the south.
Deep into the valleys of the tributary streams the high-water enters,
and receding, leaves behind a layer of fertile river mud. Not without
reason did Herodotus compare the Dnieper with the Nile.
The floods generally occur but once a year—in the spring, when the
snows melt. In this respect the Dnieper differs from the Dniester and
is similar to all the other rivers of Eastern Europe. In the early
summer, at the time of the greatest precipitation in the Dnieper
country, small floods occur only occasionally, because the rain-water
is stored up in the many swamps and moors of the upper Dnieper country.
The spring high-water originates in the great masses of snow, which
remain lying all thru winter, melting and flowing off all at once in
the spring. After an ice-drift lasting 5–12 days, the high-water comes
and lasts a month and a half. It attains its highest level in the
middle of April; at this time the water stands at 3.2 meters above
normal at Mogilev, 2.2. meters at Kiev, 2.6 meters at Kreminchuk, 2
meters at Kherson, 0.3 meters at the delta. The spring floods are at
present becoming greater and more irregular, consequently more
dangerous, too, than they have been previously. The progressive
destruction of forests has contributed most to this condition.
From Kiev down, the Dnieper River turns in a flat curve to the
southeast and retains this direction as far as Katerinoslav. The right
bank remains steadily high, torn by gorges and crowned with rock
formations, with numerous niches, which betray former places of contact
of the river bends. The view, defended especially by Russian scholars,
that the mountain bank of the Dnieper, like that of all other Eastern
European rivers, originated thru the influence of the rotation of the
earth (Baer’s Law), notably does not apply to the Dnieper, for the
plain on the left very distinctly crosses over to the right shore at
three places; at the mouth of the Stuhna below Kiev, between the mouth
of the Ross and Cherkassi, and north of Chihirin. Recent movements of
the crust of the earth, by elevating the Dnieper Plateau in huge
sections, prepared the ground for the mountainous shores; the resulting
steep declivities were attacked and transformed by the river current,
aided by an effective simultaneous action of the winds.
The left bank of the river is very flat, taken up by swamps, lakes, old
river beds and wooded fens. Great wildernesses of reeds cover the
swampy banks of the numerous river arms. Great masses of sand brought
by the tributaries on the left side are thrown up by the steppe winds
and from dune landscapes in various places.
The tributaries of the Dnieper River in this section are of far less
importance than the above mentioned northern ones. From the right side
the river receives the plateau streams Stuhna, Ross and Tiasmin, from
the left the Trubez, the Supo, the Sula with the Udai, the Psiol with
the Khorol, and Holtva, Vorskla and Orel. All these rivers increase the
volume of the main stream only to a slight degree. The width of the
river at the point where it flows along in a single bed is regularly 1
km. on the average; at the narrowest part, to be sure, only 150 meters.
Where the river branches off into several forks, however, the complete
width, even at the time of low-water, is more than 4 km., at high-water
over 8 km. The depth of the river, too, is very changeable. The
tributaries on the left side bring great masses of sand to the main
river bed, forming great banks of sand, which slowly move downward and
cause great changeability of the depth. Over such banks of sand the
depth of the river is hardly 1½ meters, but attains a depth of 12
meters where the river flows in a narrow bed.
Between Kiev and Kreminchuk, the majestic character of the Dnieper
River is most apparent. The slight incline here causes a current of
only one-third the speed of the current of the Volga. With an
impressive calm the waters of the Dnieper flow along; it seems as tho
the mirror-like mass of water were motionless. But soon, above the
mouth of the Psiol, the speed of the current is suddenly tripled, so
that the steamboats must exert their entire force in the up-stream
trip. The low left bank begins slowly to rise; the river valley, up to
this point, wide almost beyond reach of the eye, becomes narrow, the
river forks and islands gradually disappear, and at the mouth of the
Samara both banks approach the stream with steep precipices. The
direction of the river becomes southerly and the section begins where
the Dnieper breaks thru the granite ledge of the Ukrainian horst, the
famous section of its rapids.
Here the Dnieper assumes all the characteristics of a plateau river.
The river valley becomes so narrow that at high-water the river spreads
over the entire valley bottom. The settlements take refuge on the
heights of the steep bank. The granite-gneiss sub-layer appears in
steep precipices and high picturesque rock formations on the valley
slopes. We are confronted with the same cañon-like valley on the
Dnieper, then, as on the Dniester in the Podolian Plateau. Yet there
are certain fundamental differences. The river valley is at most 100
meters deep, and the granite slopes do not form compact valley sides
such as we see in the yars of the Dniester. At every moment the steep
decline is broken by numerous gorges, picturesque foothills; and
jutting cliffs lend to the river landscape of the Dnieper Valley, at
this point, a variety unknown in the yar of the Dniester.
The section of the Dnieper River from the mouth of the Samara to Veliki
Luh, at the mouth of the Konca, forms a river country which is the only
one of its kind in Eastern Europe. It is the section of the Dnieper
rapids. The post-tertiary elevation of the Ukrainian horst, at this
point, has forced the river to dig its bed into the hard granite and
gneiss rocks. Despite great masses of water, the river has not
succeeded in equalizing its incline. For this reason, we find in its
bed innumerable rocky islands, ledges of rock, separate cliffs and
great boulders. In a wild, roaring torrent, the current beats against
these obstacles, creating deep pools and dangerous vortices. But not at
all places was the river destined to saw thru the obstacles in its way.
At many points solid ledges of rock lie right across the river. Its
mass of water falls down over these granite steps in immense
foam-wreathed billows and seethes about innumerable boulders, remains
of already parted ledges. The dull roaring and rumbling can be heard,
even by day, for several miles. These are the rapids of the Dnieper—the
“porohi” and “zabori.”
The porohi are not real waterfalls or cataracts; the incline of the
river in this section is 35 meters for a stretch of 75 km., and is,
therefore, too slight for regular falls. The greatest incline attained
within this stretch of river is 6%. Therefore, only the individual
branches of water between boulders form small falls, while the main
channel only shoots along down-stream in a long, foam-covered streak,
over the inclined surface of the ledges. In summer, the depth above the
rock ledges is barely 1½ meters, while in the spring even the highest
reefs of the rapids disappear beneath the masses of the high-water.
Still, the rapids of the Dnieper are even now a great hindrance to
navigation. Within the porohi section, steamboat navigation is
altogether impossible, and the smaller rowboats or sailboats can risk
it only during the spring floods, and then only the down-trip. Only the
rafts can pass thru the porohi at low-water time, altho with great
danger. The up-stream trip is almost impossible, even in the smallest
vessel, altho, at one time, everyone who desired to join the Zaporog
Cossacks was required to undertake this daring enterprise.
The Russian government has attempted, indeed, to make the rapids of the
river navigable, and has caused a navigable canal to be formed at each
fall, thru blasting of the rock ledges. But these canals have been
planned in so impractical and even faulty a manner that the river
pilots (lotzmani) still use the old “Cossack paths” to a great extent
(the Cosachi khody) to bring river boats and rafts thru the porohi.
The width of the river in the rapids section remains unchanged—1 to 1¾
kilometers. Only at its exit from the porohi, at the so-called Wolf’s
Throat (Vovche horlo), the river narrows down to 160 meters. The quiet
sections between separate rapids are usually very wide and as much as
30 meters deep.
Of genuine rapids (porohi), according to the pilots, who are direct
descendants of the Zaporog Cossacks, there are nine; of the larger
sabori (ledges of rock which do not obstruct the entire width of the
river), six. The first rapids below Katerinoslav are the Kaidac rapids
(Kaidazki porih), with four ledges of rock. Then follow the Yazeva
Sebora, the Little Sursky porih, with two ledges, the dangerous
Lokhanski porih with three ledges, and the Strilcha Sabora, with the
great rocks of Strilcha skela and Kamin Bohatir. The next rapids,
Svonez and the far-sounding Tiahinska Sabora, allow vessels easy
passage, but after passing thru the Dnieper the pilot must exert all
his strength. Even from the Svonez rapids on, one can hear the terrible
roaring and rumbling of the largest of the porohi, the Did
(grandfather) or Nenassitetz (insatiable). Masses of white foam cover
it completely, the water shoots down over the twelve ledges of rock
with the speed of an arrow. The vessel groans and creaks, but flies
thru the porih in three minutes, if it can only escape the dangerous
rock of Krutko or the terrible whirlpool of Peklo (the Hell). Or it may
happen that the ship is dashed to pieces in the Voronova Sabora, which
is full of dangerous reefs.
After the Did and the insignificant Kriva Sabora, comes the Vnuk
(grandchild) or Vovnih, whose four ledges, covered with great billows
and masses of foam, holds many hidden dangers for the sailor. But
“after overcoming the Grandfather and the Grandchild, don’t go to
sleep, for the Awakener will wake you”—meaning the next following Porih
Budilo (Awakener) which also is dangerous for ships. We then come past
the Tavolzanska Sabora, where the beautiful crag (Snieva skela) rises,
to the next to the last porih, Lishni (the Dispensable), with two
insignificant edges of rock, which offer but slight dangers. The last
porih, however, which bears the name of Vilni (free) or Hadiuchi
(serpent falls), is very dangerous for ships and rafts, for the channel
winds in serpentine twists thru the six ledges, and the pilot must
exercise all his skill in order to steer the ship entrusted to him
safely thru the dangerous channel. After this follows the narrow (160
m.) “Wolf’s-Throat” (Vovche horlo), with three great rocks; the small
Javlena Sabora, three dangerous “Robber Rocks” (Kameni Rosbiyniki), and
two granite precipices, Stovli (Pillars), and we come into the Zaporog
country (Zaporoze).
Here the Dnieper valley widens and numerous islands appear in the
stream. The upper ones, for example, Khortizia and Tomakivka, which
were once the site of the first Zaporog Sich, are high, rocky, and
overgrown with forest. Further south the steep left-hand valley slope
recedes far from the river and the so-called Veliki Luh begins. It is a
labyrinth of flat forest and reed-covered alluvial islands, river
branches, old river beds, lakes and swamps. Here were located the
hunting and fishing grounds of the Zaporog Cossacks; here was their
dwelling place, wonderfully fortified by nature and surrounded by an
inaccessible wilderness of forests and waters, and the center of their
military state; of the century-old oaks of the Veliki Luh, the Zaporogs
built their ships, in order to pay their daring visits to the lord of
Islam in his own capital. But the glorious days are past, the warlike
life and activity has disappeared, and strange colonists, whom the
Russian Government has sent here to settle, now occupy the ground on
which the second Ukrainian state originated.
From the many-branched mouth of the Konka (also named Kinska voda) the
Dnieper River turns toward the southwest, which direction it retains
until it disembogues into the sea. From this point on, the river
nowhere flows in a single bed; an enormous number of side arms branch
off from the main arm or unite with it. The broad river valley, whose
right bank continues to be high and rocky for a time, is taken up by
the plavni formation and winds like a broad band of freshly growing
verdure thru the steppe, which stretches out dry and golden-brown in
the hot midsummer. After receiving, as its last tributary, the
steppe-river Inhuletz, it empties with nine arms into its liman, below
Kherson. Of these arms only two are navigable for larger vessels, and
the immense Dnieper liman is at most only 6 meters deep. The river
brings down great masses of sand and mud, and fills up its liman so
rapidly that strenuous dredging is necessary, in order to make it
possible for small sea-vessels to reach the harbor of Kherson.
The Dnieper River brings the Black Sea, on the average, 2000 cu. m. of
water per second. It is navigable, even for large river boats, along a
stretch of 1900 km. The ice-cover lasts 100 days at Kiev; 80 days in
the lower part of its course.
The tributaries of the Dnieper are very numerous and important; their
total length is over 13,000 km. Of those on the right, the Pripet River
is the most important. It gathers in all the waters of the Polissye and
is the typical river of that district. Its length exceeds 650 km.
Rising in the northern spurs of the Volhynian Plateau, very close to
the course of the Buh, it immediately reaches the Polissian Plain and
becomes a navigable river over 50 m. wide and about 6 m. deep. In the
main axis of the Polissian basin the Pripet turns eastward and becomes
about 100 m. wide. The incline of the river is very slight, the number
of turns and river arms enormous. Between swampy woods and moors the
river forms labyrinths of delicate, intricate waterways and stagnant
pools. Near Mosir, where the river turns to the southeast, its width
reaches 450 m., its depth 10 m. Of quite the same type are the
tributaries of the Pripet: the Turia, Stokhod, Stir with the Ikva, the
Horin with the Sluch, the Ubort and the Uz on the right; the Pina,
Yassiolda, Sluch and Ptich on the left. All of them are navigable along
great stretches. The remaining right-hand tributaries of the Dnieper,
the Teterev and the Irpen, have the Polissian character only near their
mouth, otherwise they are purely plateau rivers with rocky beds. The
Teterev is able to transport rafts of logs, while the other rivers of
the Dnieper Plateau, as for example, the Ross (altho greater than the
Teterev) and the Tiasmin, are entirely unfit for navigation, as a
result of their rocky beds and their small volume in summer. The last
large Dnieper tributary, the steppe-river Inhuletz, altho barely 100
km. shorter than the Pripet, is, for the same reasons, only capable of
carrying logs in the last 150 km. of its much-twisted course.
Of the left-hand tributaries of the Dnieper only the northern ones
possess a sufficient volume of water to be navigable. The Soz, which is
550 kilometers in length, becomes as wide as 150 meters, and is
navigable for a stretch of nearly 360 kilometers. The Desna is the
longest of all the Dnieper tributaries (1000 km.). It rises near
Yelnia, on the Central Russian Plateau, and flows in a broad
symmetrical valley, which it floods in places every spring to the
extent of 10 kilometers. The normal width of the river at low-water is
160 meters; the depth is 6 meters. Despite many shallows and
sand-banks, the Desna is capable of bearing rafts along a stretch of
250 kilometers, and is navigable for 700 kilometers even for the larger
river boats. Of the Ukrainian tributaries of the Desna, the most
important is the Sem, which is 650 km. long and navigable for 500
kilometers.
All the other left-hand tributaries of the Dnieper flow in broad
valleys, with high right slopes and low left slopes, covered with
stagnant waters, marshy meadows and areas of sand. But, altho they all
look very imposing at the time of the spring floods, yet, neither the
Sula with its high wooded banks, nor the Psiol with its 670 km. of
length, neither the Vorscla flowing along between sandbanks and dunes,
nor the Orel sliding slowly along with its twisted course—none of these
have any significance for navigation. Only the steppe-river Samara,
flowing between granite banks, is capable of floating rafts along a
short stretch. There was a time, however, in which all these rivers
were navigable, even for ships of considerable size. Great old anchors
and wreckage of ships, which are found in the beds and banks of these
rivers, are sufficient proof of this fact. The cause of the present
condition may be sought in the destruction of forest in the drainage
country. The spring floods, increased from this cause, develop
considerable destructive activity, filling up the river bed with masses
of sand and mud, floating brushes and stumps of trees. The decreased
volume of water in the dry season, due to the drying up of the swamps
and springs, can not transport these deposits further, and the river
becomes unfit for any sort of navigation.
The Don (Din) is the fourth in the series of rivers of Europe. It is
over 1800 kilometers long, but the country it drains is smaller in area
by 100,000 square kilometers than that of the Dnieper. Hardly
one-fourth of the Don country belongs to the Ukraine, and even less of
its course. For this reason it was long considered as a border stream
of the Ukraine on the east, until the past century extended the
boundaries of Ukrainian territory into the Kuban region and to the
Caspian Sea.
The Don rises in Lake Ivan-Ozero, which has also an outlet to the Aka
on the Central Russian elevation of ground. Its valley is at first
deeply cut, its bed rocky. Then the valley widens and becomes
symmetrical, the left bank becomes flat and swampy, covered in places
by wide areas of sand. In the source region the direction of the river
is south as far as Korotniak, then the river turns to the southeast,
forms a sharp bend at the mouth of the Ilovla, approaching to within 60
km. of the Volga. Then the Don repeats on a small scale the direction
of the course of the Dnieper, turns toward the southwest, and
disembogues in thirty arms, of which only three are navigable and only
one accessible to sea-vessels, into the Sea of Azof. Its delta region
is very rich in fish and is growing very rapidly. The general volume of
the Don is twice as small as that of the Dnieper and is subject to many
vacillations. During the spring floods the water-level reaches 6–7 m.
above the normal and the river becomes as much as 10 km. wide. At the
time of low-water, on the other hand, the river, despite its width (in
the lower part of its course) of 200 to 400 m. and depths of 2–16 m.,
is full of sandbanks and shallows, so that navigation on the Don is but
slightly developed, altho more than 1300 km. of its course may be
considered fit for floating rafts of logs and 300 km. for ships. The
freezing-time lasts on the average 100 days.
Of the left-hand tributaries of the Don, the Voronizh, Bitiuh, Khoper,
Medveditza, and the Manich (famous, because of its bifurcation) are the
most important. Of the right-hand tributaries only one, the Donetz, is
important. Its entire course belongs to Ukrainian national territory.
It is 1000 km. long, and, in its southerly and then south-easterly
direction, entirely analogous to the Dnieper and the Don. The Donetz
flows in a broad valley and washes beautiful white cliffs along the
steep right bank, crowned with dark forests. The Donetz is capable of
floating rafts along a stretch of over 300 km., and is navigable for
200 km. more.
Of the steppe-rivers which tend toward the Sea of Azof from the east,
only the Yeia reaches its goal. All the rest end their courses in
lagoons.
The last great river of the Ukraine is the Kuban, 800 km. long. It
rises in the glaciers of the Elbrus and flows, a roaring mountain
stream, in a narrow and deep rocky defile. A great number of the
mountain streams of the northern Caucasus slope empty into the Kuban
and make it a stream of considerable volume. In the Stavropol hill
country the Kuban turns in a widely-drawn curve toward the west. Its
valley becomes broad and flat, covered with bogs, swampy forests and
wildernesses of reeds. From the left side it receives a number of
tributaries from the Caucasus, the most important being the Laba and
the Bila. In the midst of immense plavni, lakes and limans, the Kuban
forms its many-armed delta, which carries its waters partly to the
Black Sea, partly to the Sea of Azof, and embraces the peninsula of
Taman.
The Kuban always has a large volume, the floods coming in the early
summer, when the snow blanket of the Caucasus melts. Navigation is
greatly injured because of banks of sand and rubble, brush and
tree-stumps, but is, nevertheless, possible for a distance of over 350
km.
THE UKRAINIAN CLIMATE
The great uniformity of Eastern Europe, in respect to its morphology,
we find repeated in its climatic conditions. But, to the same extent
that the attentive investigator, upon close observation, finds several
independent morphological individualities within the Eastern European
low country, he will also observe important climatic differences in
this great half-continent.
The Central European climatic zone stops at the western borders of the
Ukraine. Similarly, the cool Eastern European continental climate,
which rules over all of White and Great Russia, embraces only
insignificant borderlands in the north of Ukrainian territory. The
Ukrainian climate assumes an entirely independent position. It is more
continental than that of Central Europe and differs from that of Great
Russia in its greater mildness. The Ukraine shares with France the
advantage that in its territory the direct transition from the
temperate climate of Eastern Europe to the Mediterranean climate of
Southern Europe takes place.
The thermal conditions of the Ukraine, despite its great size, are very
uniform. The yearly averages fluctuate between +6° and +9° C. Ternopil,
in Podolia, and Vovchansk, in the Kharkov country, have the same yearly
temperature of +6.3°, Pinsk +6.7°, Kiev and Kharkiv +6.8°, Lviv
(Lemberg) and Poltava +6.9°. The differences are confined within a
space of 1°C. Chernivtzi (Czernowitz) in the Bukowina, Yelisavet in the
Kherson region, and Luhan in the Donetz region have an annual
temperature of 7.6° or 7.7°, Katerinoslav on the Dnieper, Tahanroh on
the Sea of Azof, and Stavropol in the sub-Caucasus country 8.3° or
8.2°. This great coincidence of yearly averages in so widely separated
places is all the more surprising, since the mean temperature falls
considerably directly behind the borders of the Ukraine. Thus, Kursk
has only +5.2°, Voroniz +5.4°.
Not until we reach the southern borders of the Ukraine does the mean
temperature rise considerably. Odessa and Kishiniv have +9.8°, Mikolaiv
+9.7°, Simferopol +10.1°, Sevastopol +12.2°, Katerinodar +12.1°,
Novorossiysk +12°, Yalta +13.4° mean annual temperature. The last-named
place actually lies in the narrow belt of the Mediterranean climate, on
the southern slope of the Yaila Mountains.
Comparing the annual averages of the Ukraine with those of different
places in Western and Central Europe, the latter appear relatively much
higher. London, situated in the same geographical latitude as Kursk has
an annual temperature almost twice as high (+10.3°). London is on the
average even a little warmer than Simferopol, which actually lies 650
km. nearer the equator. Brussels lies a little more north than Kiev,
yet it is in the mean warmer than Odessa.
The cause of this unfavorable relation is the severe winter of the
Ukraine. The mean temperature of January is +3.5° in London, +2° in
Brussels, +1.2° in Frankfort a m., -1.2° in Prague, -3.3° in Cracow. In
the Ukraine the January means are much lower. Lemberg has -4.6°, Kiev
has -6.2°, Kharkiv -8.3°, Luhan -8°, Vovchansk -7.7°, Katerinoslav
-7.4°, etc. To be sure this is not remarkable when compared with the
January temperatures of even the south of Great Russia, where the
winter suggests polar conditions, but the antithesis to the winter
climate of Western and Central Europe is striking. Hammerfest, the
northernmost city of the earth, is one degree warmer than Kiev in
January and even a little warmer than Lemberg.
On the other hand, the summer of the Ukraine is even warmer than that
of Western and Central Europe. The July mean of London is +17.9° C., of
Brussels 18°, Lemberg the same, but Kiev has as much as 19.2°, Kharkiv
20.9°. The differences in the summer temperatures are much smaller,
however, than the differences in the winter temperatures—hence the
comparatively low annual mean in the Ukraine.
These figures clearly show the continental character of the Ukrainian
climate. The influences of the Atlantic Ocean, which still strongly
dominate the climate of Central Europe, become slight in the Ukraine.
Particularly, the southern part of the Ukraine is almost unaffected by
the mitigating influence of a nearby ocean, and the necessary result is
the low winter-temperatures. But the continental character of the
Ukrainian climate is, nevertheless, not so strongly marked as that of
the Russian or Siberian climate. Kamishin, Semipalatinsk,
Blagovieshchensk, situated on the same degree of latitude as Kiev, have
a January mean of -11.6°, 17.5° and -25.4°, and a July mean of +24.1°,
+22.2° and +21.3°, respectively. The influences of the Black Sea, altho
in general not great, are at least unmistakable in the coastal region
of the Ukraine.
The difference between the mean of the coldest and that of the warmest
month is slighter in the Ukraine than in Russia or Siberia, to be sure,
but it is, at any rate, considerable. Only in the Mediterranean climate
of Southern Crimea does the difference amount to as little as 20°. The
rest of Crimea, the sub-Caucasian country and the northwestern part of
the Ukraine as far as Kiev and Uman have a difference of 20°-25°,
Lemberg, for example, 22.6°, Pinsk 24°, Chernivtzi 25.1°, Kiev 25.2°.
On the other hand, the southern and the entire eastern part of the
Ukraine, especially east of the Dnieper, shows a considerable
difference, from 25° to 30°, as for example, Kiev 25.4°, Odessa and
Mikolaiv 26.3°, Poltava 27.3°, Kharkiv and Tahanroh over 29°, Luhan and
Katerinoslav 30.4°.
The winter appears severe in the entire Ukraine, with the exception of
Crimea and the sub-Caucasian country.
The January mean temperature of -4° to -8° then obtains in the entire
wide territory. Lemberg has -4.3°, Tarnopol -5.5°, Chernivtzi -5.1°,
Kiev -6.2°, Vovchansk -7.7°, Katerinoslav -7.4°, Mikolaiv -4.3°,
Tahanroh -6.7°, Luhan -8°. Even the southern lands of the Ukraine have
a low mean for January, for example, Odessa -3.7° (Kishiniv -3.5°),
while Kamenetz owes its exceptionally high mean, -3.3°, to its
sheltered location in a “yar.” The January isotherms run from northwest
to southeast in Ukrainian territory, in a wide curve, which becomes
increasingly flat toward the southeast. For this reason the cold in the
Ukraine grows in intensity not in a northern but in a northeastern
direction. The mean annual minimum almost everywhere exceeds -20°
(Lemberg -19.2°, Chernivtzi -21.1°, Tarnopol -23.4°, Kiev -23.2°,
Mikolaiv -21.4°, Luhan -28.4°). The absolute extremes attain very high
values. The absolute minimum amounts to -30° in Mikolaiv and Odessa,
-33.1° in Kiev, -34° in Ternopil, -35° in Lemberg and Czernowitz,
-40.8° in Luhan.
The Ukrainian winter is far less variable than the Central European or
even the Russian. Only in the northwestern borderlands of the Ukraine
does a thaw, brought by the Atlantic winds, frequently appear. The
duration of the frost on the Pontian shore is at most two months, in
the Pontian steppe-plain and the southern spurs of the plateau groups
three months, in all the rest of the Ukraine three and a half. Only in
the northeastern borderlands of the Ukraine, located on the spurs of
the Central Russian elevation and the Donetz, does the frost period
extend over four months.
In Southern Ukraine the winter is followed directly by a sunny spring,
with dry east winds, which partly degenerate into sand-storms
(sukhovi). Everywhere else in the Ukraine wet, sloppy weather follows
the steps of the receding winter. Toward the northwest it continues
longer and longer. The sloppy weather of spring consists of a
constantly varying succession of frost, thaw, snowstorm, rain and
sunshine, ending in the southern part of the Ukraine usually in the
middle of April, in the northern and northwestern part at the end of
April or even at the beginning of May. The actual spring following
thereon is very short thruout the Ukraine and usually lasts three
weeks, except in the northwest, where it continues thru the entire
month of May. The mean April temperature is everywhere higher than the
annual mean (Lemberg +7.8°, Tarnopol and Kiev +6.9°, Czernowitz and
Odessa +8.6°, Luhan -8.1°). But the month of May is quite as warm as
July in England. On the other hand, we find May frosts in the entire
Ukraine as far as the shores of the Black Sea, altho they do not appear
so destructive here as in Russia proper.
The Ukrainian summer is everywhere marked by considerable heat. Only in
the northwest corner of the Ukraine (Rostoche, Pidlassye, Polissye,
Volhynia) is the summer moderately warm (Lemberg +19.1°, Ternopil
+18.7°, Pinsk +18°).
The July temperature of all the rest of the Ukraine is much higher than
this. The July isotherm of +20°, like all the July isotherms of the
Ukraine, runs in a northeast direction past the source of the Sbruch
and the mouth of the Pripet, and the further we advance from this line
towards the southeast, the hotter the summers we find. On the lower
Dniester and Dnieper the mean July temperature exceeds +23°. Following
are a number of July means: Czernowitz +20.1°, Kiev +19.2°, Vovchansk
+20.3°, Odessa +22.6°, Katerinoslav and Mikolaiv +23°, Luhan +22.4°,
Tahanroh +22.8°. The strongest degrees of heat are +37° to +43°, and
the mean annual maxima are +30.3° for Ternopil, +31.1° for Lemberg,
+32.7° for Czernowitz, +32.1° for Kiev, +35.2° for Mikolaiv, +35.5° for
Luhan. The duration of the heat period with temperatures of +20° and
over is two months southeast of a line which runs near Kishiniv,
Poltava and Kharkiv, one month southeast of the line of Mohiliv, Kaniv
and Kursk. The total duration of the summer is only in the northwest of
the Ukraine as short as three months; otherwise it is four, and on the
Black Sea even four and a half.
The autumn of the Ukraine is regularly very beautiful and comparatively
warm. The month of October has a mean of temperature higher than the
annual (Lemberg +8.5°, Ternopil +7.7°, Czernowitz +9°, Kiev +7.5°,
Vovchansk +7°, Katerinoslav +9.7°, Luhan +8.4°, Odessa +11°, Mikolaiv
+9.7°, Tahanroh +9.1°). But even in October the warm sunny days are
followed by night frosts. The moist autumnal weather which begins the
transition to winter lasts as much as two months in the northwest;
beyond that, one to one and a half months. The mean date of the
earliest frost is October 19th for Kiev, October 11th for Luhan,
October 28th for Micolaiv, and November 10th for Odessa.
A different position, climatically, is that of Crimea, the
sub-Caucasian country, as well as the mountain islands of the
Carpathians, the Yaila and the Caucasus. In the temperature conditions
of Crimea and the sub-Caucasus country, the influence of their
southerly location and the proximity of the sea is everywhere apparent.
The mean temperature is everywhere higher than +10° (Simferopol +10.1°,
Sevastopol +12.2°, Katerinodar +12.1°). The winter is short and
comparatively mild (January mean of Simferopol +0.8°, Sevastopol +1.8°,
Katerinodar +2.1°, Stavropol -4.7°), but very variable. The degrees of
frost are sometimes quite high (Sevastopol -16.9°, Stavropol -25.6° as
absolute minima), but the frost period is short (one to two months).
The spring begins in March with full force; in May follows the
five-months’ summer. The July means are very high, especially in the
sub-Caucasus country, the heat period lasting everywhere more than two
months. (July mean of Simferopol +28°, Sevastopol 33.1°, Stavropol
+20°, Katerinodar +25.3°). The long autumn also is very mild.
South of the Yaila and Caucasus Mountains, on the shore of the Black
Sea, lies a narrow strip of land which actually shows Mediterranean
climatic characteristics. The winter lasts less than a month and is
very mild (January mean of Yalta +3.5°, altho the absolute minimum is
-13°), and, as in Novorossiysk, cold, bora-like gusts of wind are
common in times of heavy cold. After a long spring follows a
six-months’ summer, which passes imperceptibly into a mild autumn.
The climate of the mountains of the Ukraine has been but little
investigated. In the entire Ukrainian territory there is not a single
meteorological observatory. The general characteristics of mountain
climate, its greater uniformity, the smaller difference between the
warmest and coldest months, the belated beginning of all the seasons,
etc., may be found in all the mountains of the Ukraine.
Only the climate of the Ukrainian Carpathians is somewhat better known.
The dreariest climate is that of the Beskyds and the Gorgani. The
five-months’ winter and long periods of sloppy weather in the spring
and in the fall encroach upon the short summer. The Chornohora chain,
despite the greater height of its peaks, upon which the snow in
sheltered places remains lying thru the entire summer, has a much
milder and pleasanter climate. The influence of the warm summer of the
adjacent plain regions limits the duration of the sloppy weather in
spring and autumn. For this reason, the mountain valleys have a short
but very beautiful spring, a warm summer, and a wonderful mild autumn.
The mountain pastures have in place of the summer only a three months’
spring.
In the Yaila Mountains, as a result of their small size and height, the
characteristics of typical mountain climate are lacking, but in the
Caucasus we find them in their highest development. The analogy to the
Alps is perfect, but the influence of the continental steppe climate of
the surrounding country is unmistakable, expressing itself in the
position of the various climatic regions, in the height of the snow
limit, in the development of the glacial covering, etc., very
distinctly and very differently than in the Alps, which are surrounded
by countries with a climate of a different kind.
We now come to the second group of climatic phenomena, pressure and
wind conditions. The Ukraine may, in this respect, be divided into two
great regions. The line of high pressure which separates these parts,
called by Voiekoff the great axis of Europe, extends from the bend of
the Volga, near Tsaritsin, over the porohi section of the Dnieper at
Katerinoslav to Kishinev. North of this line, west winds prevail,
bringing Atlantic air into Northern Ukraine. In the south, east winds
prevail, bearing the influences of the Asiatic steppe climate. This
wind divide is most distinct in winter. In the northern part of the
Ukraine we find chiefly west and southwest winds, which mitigate the
frosts and cause precipitations of rainfall; in the southern part dry,
cold east winds prevail, increasing the cold. Sometimes the east wind
increases to a snowstorm (metelitzia, fuga) which whirls up terrible
masses of snow, filling the air with snowflakes until absolutely
nothing can be seen, and causes terrific destruction. Herds of a
thousand head fall victim to its icy breath, even in the steppes of
Crimea, and woe to the traveler who is caught in a snowstorm in the
steppe.
In November and December, in Southern Ukraine, moist, warm south winds
frequently come up from the Pontus. But the absolute balance is on the
side of the freezing east winds, to which is to be ascribed the severe
winter climate of Southern Ukraine. The northern half of the Ukraine as
a rule, is seldom reached by the east winds, the northwestern corner
very seldom. Their occasional appearance is accompanied by heavy frosts
with fair weather.
In the spring, east and south winds blow, especially over Southern
Ukraine. They often change to heavy sand-storms (sukhovi) very harmful
to the crops, which carry clouds of sand, with which they form
miniature dunes as high as 30 cm. The east and south winds, at such
times, penetrate even into Northern Ukraine, altho with the exception
of the northwest corner.
In the summer, on the other hand, the west, northwest, and southwest
winds hold a decided balance over the east winds, even in Southern
Ukraine. They bring moist Atlantic air and rain into the entire land
and mitigate the heat. The occasional east winds increase the heat and
bring periods of drought, but usually not until August, when they are
rather frequent. In September all the winds are weak thruout the
Ukraine, with high pressure. That is why the fall is so beautiful too.
Then, in October and November, follows the gradual transition to the
winter wind conditions.
The third group of atmospheric phenomena, humidity and precipitation,
possesses the same great uniformity in Ukrainian territory as the other
two elements of the climate. The humidity of the air in the Ukraine is
in general slight. It is greatest in the forest-covered partly swampy
West and Northwest. Toward the southeast the humidity in the Ukraine
constantly decreases. Fogs appear seldom and are only light, so that
the antithesis to Western and Central Europe, as well as Russia, is
striking. The light night and morning fogs which appear, especially in
the latter part of summer and in the fall, only contribute to the
beautification of the landscape, by flooding the depressions of land
like a sea. Cloud-formation is much slighter in the Ukraine than in
Western or Central Europe, or in Russia proper, the dreary Muscovite
country. The greatest number of clouded days occurs in the western and
northwestern part of the Ukraine; toward the southeast and east the
number of such days dwindles continuously. The least amount of cloudy
weather occurs in the month of August. In September and October the
increase is very slight. November and December are much cloudier and
January is most cloudy all over the Ukraine. After that the cloudy
weather lessens considerably at first, then slowly, until August.
The atmospheric precipitations in the Ukraine are in general
insignificant, except in the Carpathian and Caucasus regions. The
Ukraine has less rainfall than Central or Western Europe. The Atlantic
Ocean, the most important source of the precipitations in Europe, lies
far distant, and the cyclonal systems on their way east drop their
collected moisture upon Western and Central Europe. For the Ukraine,
and particularly for the eastern part of it, there is, therefore, very
little left. In this connection the Black Sea has only a local
significance, and the evaporation of water from the rivers, lakes and
swamps, from the plants and the ground, is hardly worth considering,
except as it happens in the summer.
The great amounts of precipitation are to be found in the mountains of
the Ukraine, where rising currents of air help along the condensation
of the water vapor. Even in the Low Beskid the precipitation exceeds
1000 mm. (Yasliska 1170 mm.), in the Gorgani and Chornohora we find in
large areas, especially on the southern slope, a precipitation of over
1200 mm., in a few places 1400 mm. (Kobiletzka Polana 1377 mm., Bradula
1419 mm.). The amount of precipitation is still large in the entire
Pidhirye, but at only a short distance it decreases considerably.
Lemberg has only 735 mm. of rainfall, the southern part of the Rostoche
as much as 900 mm. in places, since the western edges act like chains
of mountains to the west winds. But Czernowitz, near as it is, has only
619 mm. and the Podolia on the Dniester still less. The Khotin lying in
the yar of this river has only 300 mm., which best illustrates the
significance of local conditions. At a greater distance from the curve
of the Carpathians the amount of precipitation shows a slow but regular
decrease toward the southeast. Only in the northern part of the
Rostoche and the northwestern part of Podolia does the amount of
precipitation attain 600 mm., while further toward the south and east a
wide zone stretches out with only 500–600 mm. (Pinsk 581 mm., Kiev 534
mm., Uman 546 mm., Poltava 532 mm.). Another wide zone, which extends
from the mouth of the Dniester to the bend of the Don, has a
precipitation of between 400 and 500 mm. (Kharkiv 465 mm., Katerinoslav
475 mm., Kishinev 471 mm., Yelisavet 444 mm., Odessa 408 mm.). The next
narrow zone of the Pontian and Crimean steppe has a precipitation of
less than 400 mm. (Mikolaiv 360 mm., Sevastopol 386 mm., Luhan 379
mm.), a corner of Crimea on the peninsula of Tarkhankut has even barely
more than 200 mm.
The Yaila Mountain Range is too small to have any marked influence on
the increase in the amount of precipitation. Yalta has only 508 mm.
precipitation. On the other hand, the influence of the Caucasus is very
great. The sub-Caucasus Kuban region, to be sure, has only 400–500 mm.
precipitation, Stavropol 720 mm., Novorossysk 691 mm. However, the
amount of precipitation on the southwestern side of the Caucasus
Mountains increases uncommonly. At the borders of Ukrainian territory,
Sochi has not less than 2071 mm.
From this account we see clearly enough that, in comparison with
Central and Western Europe, the Ukraine is rather poor in rainfall,
especially in the southeast. But the distribution of the precipitations
among the seasons is so favorable that most of them fall at the time
they are most needed, namely, in the early part of summer. The entire
Ukraine lies within the area of the summer rains, only the narrow strip
of the south coast of Crimea and the Caucasus are within the area of
the winter rains.
The reason of the preponderance of the summer rains lies in the western
and northwestern Atlantic winds, which, in that season, have easy
access far into the southeastern part of the Ukraine. These winds bring
so much moisture into the Ukraine that almost two-thirds of the annual
rainfall belongs to May, June and July. The month with the greatest
amount of precipitation for the entire Ukraine is June. Only the
Polissye, Northwestern Volhynia and the western part of the Kiev
territory show the heaviest precipitation in July, since, in these
regions of forests and swamps, evaporation is heaviest at this time of
greatest heat.
The summer rains of the Ukraine differ from those of Central or Western
Europe in their heaviness. Only in the Western Ukraine are the summer
rains of the type of gentle rains that are uniform for an entire
country; in the south and east they appear as cloudbursts in heavy
showers. In Samashcani, in Bessarabia, there have been times when 200
mm. of rain fell in a single day, in Korovintzi in the Poltava region,
5 mm. in one minute. In the Pontian steppes all rain falls in the form
of heavy showers. The water flows off quickly and evaporates rapidly,
before it is able to thoroughly saturate the ground.
Electric discharges and hailstorms occur in close connection with the
summer rains, most frequently in June, less so in July and in May. They
usually come from the southwest in the afternoon hours. Most of these
storms originate in the Carpathian Mountains and reach Volhynia and
Kiev, but do not cross the Dnieper. The Caucasus, too, has very many
storms. Hailstorms are most frequent in Galicia and Volhynia and the
western part of the Kiev regions; very rare in the southeast.
In August the amount of rainfall slowly decreases; in September and
October still more, and so it continues until December. January is the
month of least rainfall for the entire Ukraine (only one-fourth of the
June figure), and this circumstance is of particularly great
significance for the southern and eastern parts of the Ukraine. For
this reason the cover of snow in the Ukraine is much less than in
Central Europe or Muscovy, besides which, it is often disturbed by
snowstorms. The slight snow-cover melts down quickly in the spring,
without saturating the soil well, and without requiring much warmth.
This explains the rapid rise of heat in the Ukrainian spring.
From January until the end of April the amount of rainfall again grows
slowly but steadily, reaching its maximum in June.
The southern part of Crimea and the Caucasian shore have just the
opposite annual distribution of the precipitations. Under the influence
of the moist Pontian winds, the greatest amount of rain falls in
December and January, while the spring and summer have very little
rain. These characteristics of the Mediterranean climate, the rainy
winter after the dry summer, are all the more striking, since the
opposite condition prevails on the other side of the Yaila and Caucasus
Mountains.
From this account of the Ukrainian climate we see that this climate
retains an entirely independent position as against that of Central
Europe or Russia. The Ukrainian climate is characterized by an annual
amplitude of 20° to 30°, a mean annual temperature of from +6° to +12°,
a July mean of from +19° to +24°, and a January mean of from 0° to 8°,
with predominant summer rains and a generally insignificant cover of
snow. The difference from the Russian climate is, consequently, quite
considerable. The Russian climate forms the transition to the polar,
that of the Ukraine to the Mediterranean climate.
Nature has provided the Ukraine with a pleasant, very wholesome
climate. On the whole temperate, it does not lack heavy frosts and
considerable degrees of heat, which harden the Ukrainian to any
inclemencies of the weather. The differences of the seasons cause a
pleasant variety, strong winds clear the atmosphere and bring motion
into nature, the rains are everywhere sufficient for the growth of
vegetation and the carrying on of the most important occupation of the
Ukraine—agriculture. The great uniformity of this Ukrainian climate has
recently caused the French geographer, de Martonne, to set it up as one
of the types of climate of the globe.
FLORA AND FAUNA OF UKRAINE
Eastern European bigness characterizes also the organic life of the
Ukraine. But it follows, from the location of the country, that the
Ukraine has a much more varied plant and animal geography than the
proper Russian territory, despite the latter’s much greater extent.
In the Ukraine, the borders of three main divisions of plant-geography
of Europe meet—the Mediterranean division, the steppe region, and the
forest region, with their transition regions. Besides, we meet in the
Ukraine three mountain regions—the Carpathian, the Crimean, and the
Caucasian. In respect to flora, the Ukraine possesses only a few
endemic species. To be sure the great ice period covered only
comparatively small areas of the Ukraine with its glacier, but the
polar flora undoubtedly prevailed in the entire country at that time.
After the withdrawal of the glacier, steppes first appeared in its
place, which then, especially in the Northwest, were forced to make
room for a forest flora that had immigrated from Central Europe and
Siberia. Hence, despite the considerable area of the Ukraine, so few
endemic species.
Since those primeval days, only a very few natural changes have
occurred in the vegetation of the Ukraine. However, man, thru his
cultural activity, has wrought many changes in the plant-world of the
country.
The forest region occupies barely one-fifth of the Ukrainian territory,
only the northwestern and northern borderlands. The southeastern border
of the forest region extends from the Prut and Dniester on the western
boundary of Pokutye and Podolia in a curve to the source of the Buh,
then near the northern boundary of the Dnieper Plateau east as far as
Kiev, and thence toward the northeast as far as the source of the Aka.
This boundary, however, is not sharp. In numerous peninsulas the
compact forest penetrates the adjacent transition region toward the
southeast. On the other hand, this forest boundary coincides almost
exactly with the northern boundary of the black soil. The soil of the
forest region is in general poor. Only in higher places we find fertile
turf; beyond that sandy soil and the podsol, rich in quartz,
predominate.
The prevailing plant formation in this region is the forest. It once
covered the entire region and was thinned to any great extent only
within the last two centuries. What these primeval forests were like we
can now tell in only a few districts of the Polissye and in the famous
virgin forest of Biloveza, which lies in the extreme northwest corner
of the Ukrainian territory. Here we see the primeval forest in its
mighty size and beauty. In wind-fallen woods, several meters high,
rotten, decaying stumps cover the ground. Their roots stand up high
into the air above swampy holes and vast masses of rotting remains of
plants. Above this swampy fen rise, like a vast mass of pillars, the
knotty trunks of century-old oaks and lindens, ash and aspen, and the
slender pine and fir. High above the ground their branches intertwine.
All strive up toward the sun, for a continuous semi-darkness reigns
below. Shrub and herb vegetation thrives only in clearings; beyond that
only last year’s leaves, needles, and a mysteriously glowing decay
cover the ground. Dead silence, only occasionally broken by the
hammering of a woodpecker or by the timid voice of a bird, reigns
everywhere, making all the more impressive the mighty roaring of the
lofty crowns in the storm.
As to their composition, the woods of the Ukrainian forest region are
mixed, altho local conditions cause one or the other species of tree to
predominate. The Ukrainian forest region may be divided into two
regions by a line running thru Lublin southeast toward Lutzk. Southwest
of this line extends the Central European forest zone, northeast of it
the Northern European forest zone.
The Central European forest zone embraces the entire Pidhirye in the
Ukraine, the southern part of the Rostoche, and the western spurs of
Volhynia and Podolia. It is distinguished by a greater variety of tree
species. Here, upon damp, loamy hills, entire forests of beech are
found, on the Carpathian foothills the pine, and singly or in small
groups, the larch, the yew, the maple, etc. In the Northern European
zone all these trees disappear, due to the increasing continentality of
the climate. The predominating species of tree here is the pine, which
forms large woods everywhere on sandy soil, then the birch, which
always accompanies the pine, the fir on sandy soil, the oak and white
beech on loamy soil. There is an admixture of a considerable number of
alders on swampy ground, aspens, lindens, elms, maples, ash and wild
apple, pear and cherry trees. Hazel bushes, willow (salix caprea),
mountain ash, raspberry and blackberry bushes comprise the thick
underbrush in these mixed forests, and contribute a great deal to the
beauty of the woods, together with grass and herb vegetation,
especially in numerous clearings. In truer evergreen forests the
underbrush usually is very poor.
There are a great many swamp forests in the Ukrainian forest region. In
the Carpathian foothills they are called lasi, and are quite common
there, but in the Polissye they are most widely developed. There they
are usually composed of pines, with which, however, the swampy ground
does not agree very well. The alders and willows, however, grow all the
better.
The second important formation of the forest region are the luhi. They
usually stretch thru the wide, flat river valleys of the region. These
are luxurious meadows with a beautiful growth of grass and herbs set
with single trees and clusters of trees. In dry places the oak usually
grows, in damp places the alder.
The third typical plant formation is that of the swamps. They are
widely developed in the forest region of the Ukraine, especially in the
flat river valleys of the Rostoche and Volhynia. Polissye is the
greatest swamp country in Europe. Regular moors, made up of peat
mosses, alternate even in the Polissye region with meadow moors, in
which swamp grass and herb vegetation predominates.
The forest region has played a significant part in the history of the
Ukraine. When the Turkish nomad tribes, using the steppe district of
the Ukraine as a convenient military road, destroyed the work of
Ukrainian civilization in the steppe region, the Ukrainian people
retreated into the forests and swamps of the north and west, advancing
toward the southeast again, at the proper moment, to reinhabit the
ravaged and desolated lands. This circle of events repeated itself
frequently in the history of the Ukraine.
Today the woods of the Ukraine forest region are greatly thinned, so
that they take up more than one-third of the total surface only in the
Polissye. Cutting down and rooting up of the woods some centuries ago
was, without a doubt, an important part of the work of civilization.
But now things are different. Now the forest is considered a very
important part of a well organized cultural section, and is, therefore,
carefully preserved in the truly civilized lands of Europe. In the
beautiful forests of the Ukraine, however, a reckless exploitation is
going on, and the evil results are already apparent, especially in the
sparsely wooded borders of the forest region, as well as in the entire
country surrounding the steppe. The rivers have become small in volume
of water, the sources dried up, and the ravines annually transform
thousands of hectares into desert land. And this is happening in the
granary of Europe, which some 300 years ago made foreign travelers
marvel at its incredible fertility.
All the rest of the Ukraine, as far as the foothills of the Yaila and
the Caucasus, is occupied by the steppe region. The limits of this
region, as we have said, are not distinct. In peninsula and island
formations the forest penetrates toward the southeast. In this
direction the forest islands become constantly rarer and smaller, so
that the Russian plant-geographers have felt called upon to insert two
transition zones between the real forest and the real steppe—the zone
of the exterior steppe and the zone of the transitional steppe. The
actual steppe region is supposed to begin at the line which extends
thru Kishinev and Katerinoslav to the bend of the Don. This division
may be criticized, however, since it at most, fits present conditions
brought about in the last 200 years by the destruction of forests on
the part of men. The historical sources of the Ukraine tell of large
woodlands, which, in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, still extended
along the sources of the Inhul and Inhuletz, along the Tasmin, on the
river divides between the left-hand tributaries of the Dnieper, etc.
They were not forest terraces, not mere strips of woods confined to
river valleys; they covered the divides far and wide, as well as the
broad tableau sheds lying between rivers. For this reason care must be
taken in sketching the boundaries of the steppe. We therefore
comprehend both the above mentioned transition zones into one, for
which we would suggest the name luhi zone, because the luh, a meadow
studded with scattered groups of trees and little groves, must have
been the predominating plant formation of this transition country.
The typical soil of the transition country, as well as of the steppe
region, is the black earth (Ukr. chornozem, Russ. chernozyom). Every
Ukrainian is familiar with this blackish, ever fertile soil, which
cannot be duplicated the world over and which makes the Ukraine the
granary of Russia. The black earth is a product of the transformation
of loess, with a strong admixture of the products of decomposition of
plants. In places it attains a depth of 2 m. and over.
The black-earth region extends longitudinally thru the Ukraine,
embracing over three-fourths of its territory. The northern boundary of
the black-earth region passes from Lemberg along the north border of
the Podolian and Dnieper Plateau as far as Kiev, and then northeast to
the bend of the Aka, south of Kaluga. The southern boundary describes a
line drawn thru the Boh and Dnieper deltas to their limans and the city
of Mariupol. The entire Kuban plain and the plateau of Stavropol also
belong to the region of black earth. Along the northern border of the
black-earth region extends a transition zone of about 100 kilometers
width, whose black earth contains 4 to 6% decaying plant matter. South
of this lies the wide main area of the black earth with 6 to 10%
decaying matter. On the sea and along the lower Dnieper the region ends
with another transition zone, whose brownish black earth contains 4 to
6% of decaying matter. On the Sea of Azof and in Southern Crimea the
brown dry steppe soil, with numerous islands of saline soil
(solonchaki) and a peculiar vegetation, inclined to absorb salt,
prevails. These are present also in the remaining black earth region,
and there are also islands and strips of saline earth along the rivers
and the seashore.
In the steppe region, the steppe is not the only plant formation. Above
all we must differentiate between the meadow-steppe of the transition
zone and the real steppe of the south, as well as the desert steppe in
some districts of Crimea and the Caucasus. Besides this shrub
formation, meadow-woods (luhi) and real forests are found in the steppe
region.
In the vegetation of the meadow-steppe, grasses and herbs take the
first place. Of the grasses the stippa species are the most
characteristic (tirsa, kovil); of the herbs, the lily-like growths. The
growth of grass in the northern part of the steppe region is very
luxuriant and thick, and attains great heights, altho the times in
which a rider and his horse might disappear in the grass belong to the
past. High weeds and thistles (buriani, bodiaki) form thickets of great
luxuriance. In the spring, when the fresh young grass begins to sprout
up and the blossoming herbs convert the steppe into a carpet of
flowers, when everything is resplendent with the fulness of life and
beauty, then the Ukrainian steppe presents a wonderful picture. But
this picture is not lasting. The heat and the drought transform the
fresh, green, primitive color into yellow and brown. Grasses and herbs
wither and die away, and only the roots and seeds preserve the living
power of the plant, surviving the autumnal drought and the severe cold
of winter, once more to wrap the steppe in its bridal gown in the
spring.
In the southern part of the steppe region the plant covering is not so
luxurious as in the north, and the grasses and herbs grow in isolated
little bushes, between which the bare ground of the steppe remains
visible. The saline earth appears much oftener, with its gray-green
vegetation of salt plants, and we often find sand areas, which begin to
suggest the desert steppes of the Caspian steppe country.
A characteristic plant formation in the entire steppe region is
comprised by the bushes (bairaki, chahari), which generally consist of
heavily tangled thickets of wild cherry (prunus chamaecerasus,
vishennik), spiral (tavolha), snowball (calina), almond shrub
(amygdalus nana, bobovnik), etc. They generally grow in the steppe
balkas, or near them, and cover extended areas.
The Ukrainian steppe, despite contrary current opinion, does not lack
tree growth. In the region of the real steppe, to be sure, we meet only
forest terraces, which extend along the river courses, but in the
transition zone we still find woods and groves, which not only appear
in river valleys, but also cover the plateaus between these. The oak,
the white beech, the maple, the poplar, the wild apple and pear trees,
are the chief representatives of the tree species of the woods of this
section. Even the pine ventures as far as the district of Kharkiv.
Besides the forest terraces, the rivers of the steppe region are
accompanied by the formation of the so-called plavni. They are thickets
of sedge and reeds, with luxuriant willow and alder growth; in drier
places, which are flooded only during high-water time, real oak forests
are added. With pleasure the eye of the traveler, wearied by the
uniformity of the steppe, rests upon them.
As to the origin of the steppes of the Ukraine, scholars differ. Every
one of them thinks he has found the only correct explanation. In
reality, the origin and preservation of the Ukrainian steppes can be
traced to the combined action of various causes. In the first place
there is the continental dry climate. The amount of rainfall is too
slight for the development of forest-flora; the drought of the summer
and fall too long.
A minor cause is the salt content of the steppe-soil, which, however,
is apparent only in places. On the other hand, the shape of the ground
is very important. Where the land is level, where the dry steppe winds
have free play and the rainwater cannot easily dissolve and wash away
the salt of the soil, the steppe prevails. Where the land is cut by
river valleys and balkas, however, there is more shelter from wind,
more moisture, and no salt in the soil, so that conditions are given
which are favorable for the development of tree vegetation. For this
reason not only the valleys of the rivers, but also the balkas, which
but seldom carry water, have always had tree growth, and even woods and
groves. The trees which are planted there thrive very well, while
attempts at cultivation in the real level steppe almost regularly fail.
The most important foundation for the existence of steppes, however, is
their character as remains of the old post-glacial steppe formation.
Since the beginnings of the alluvial epoch, its territory is being won
by the forest, which is constantly pushing forward toward the south and
southeast, using the river valleys as the main lines of advance. In
this advance toward the south, the forest has now been stopped by man
before it was able to reach the shore of the Black Sea and the Sea of
Azof.
Man has wrought many changes in the steppe region. In the first place
he has entered into the struggle between the woods and the steppe in
opposition to the woods. The ancient Ukrainians of the Kiev state
rooted out great areas of forest and reclaimed them for civilization.
On the other hand, the nomad tribes, roaming the steppes ever since man
can remember, repeatedly destroyed forests with fire, in order to
obtain good pasture for their herds and to break down the best defense
of the agricultural Ukrainian population. In the 16th Century began the
deforestation of the transition zone thru the progressing colonization
movement of the Ukrainians, under the protection of the Cossack
organization. But even in the 18th Century there were still great
forests in the transition zone, which have since entirely disappeared.
The intensive colonization movement of the 19th Century put an end to
them. At the same time the hand of man attacked the steppe formation.
Today only very small parcels of steppe are in their original
condition. The steppe grasses have yielded place to an increasingly
intensive cultivation of grain grasses; the place of the natural steppe
has been usurped by the cultivated steppe, with its waving fields of
grain and inevitable dreary stubble fields. With the progressive
destruction of forests this cultivated steppe of man’s fields
constantly moves toward the north and west of the Ukraine, favoring the
accompanying migration of the steppe-plants and steppe animals into
Central Europe.
Entirely independent is the position of the Ukrainian flora in the
southern slope of the Yaila and the Caucasus. They belong really to the
Mediterranean Sea region. The mild climate here has matured a flora of
an entirely southern type, with many evergreen trees and shrubs
peculiar to the Mediterranean region. Yet the vegetation of this
district can only be considered as the advance guard of the real
Mediterranean vegetation, for the representatives of the northern flora
by far predominate over the southern species of plants, particularly in
the forests which develop in higher altitudes.
Besides the just discussed plant-geographical regions and zones of the
plain, the Ukraine has three mountain regions—the Carpathian, the
Crimean and the Caucasian.
The foot of the Carpathians is covered by mixed and leafy forests.
White beech, birch, linden, aspen and pine comprise these forests. At
one time the oak predominated here, as it still does on the southern
slope of the mountain range. On higher ridges of the Low and High
Beskid, mixed forests of beech and fir are found. At the upper tree
limit of the High Beskid the beech appears almost exclusively in forest
formation. The trees become constantly smaller and more gnarled, and at
a height of 1000 m. we meet only beech brush. On the southern side of
the mountain range pure beech woods prevail.
In the Gorgani we soon distinguish two forest zones. The lower one has
principally beech woods, with an admixture of firs and maples; the
upper one consists almost entirely of fir woods. Their upper limit
usually lies at a height of from 1500 to 1600 m., but the zekoti (seas
of sandstone boulders), which cover all the higher peaks and ridges,
reduce the upper tree limit a great deal in some places.
In the Chornohory, a similar division of the forest zone prevails. Oak
forests, with thick underbrush, cover the foot of the range on both
slopes. Above the oak woods lies the zone of mixed forests, in which
white and red beech, birch, ash, maple and firs predominate. Above the
height of 1300 m. lies the upper tree zone, which is made up of stocks
of fir entirely. The upper tree limit lies at a height of 1700 m. The
milder climate of the Chornohory matures a much more luxurious and a
richer vegetation than in other parts of the Ukrainian Carpathians.
In the forest zones of the Carpathians, great complex primeval forests
have survived to a great extent. They lie in inaccessible places, which
the bandit axe of the professional forest destroyer has not yet
penetrated. The Carpathian virgin forest is, perhaps, the most
beautiful plant formation of the Ukraine. Giant firs, as much as 60 m.
in height and six feet thick, raise their dark green slender pyramids
above rocky slopes and immense wind-fallen woods, in which the modern
firs lie in piles. Thick shrubbery covers the clearings, while in the
eternal semi-darkness of the thickets, on rocky ground covered with
needles, just an occasional pillow of moss may be found.
A second plant-formation of the Carpathians is that of the
dwarf-shrubs. They develop above the forest limit and cover wide areas
in the Gorgani and Chornohori. Mountain fir (zerep), accompanied by
juniper (in the Beskyds and Gorgani) and by dwarf-alder bushes (lelich,
in the Chornohory), in thickets which are impassible in places. The
formerly widely distributed stone pine has become rare, since its
fragrant wood is preferred by the mountain-dwellers for all sorts of
woodwork.
The third plant formation of the Carpathians are their mountain meadows
(polonini). They lie above the forest limit and begin to appear at the
source of the San. Toward the southeast they become constantly more
luxuriant and more frequent. The grass and herb growth of the polonini
is very varied and rich, especially in the so-called zarinki, that is,
parts of the mountain meadows where hay is made. The polonini are of
great importance to the inhabitants of the mountains. Great herds of
horses, cattle and sheep remain here all summer. The polonini are
peopled, and a life of great privation—a hard life but free—develops in
primitive dairy huts, with never dying camp-fires.
In the mountains of Crimea we find, in the main, the same arrangement
of plant zones. At some height above sea-level the forest zone begins.
White and red beech, oak, and two species of pine appear here in
forests. Only on the broad peak surfaces we find poor mountain meadows
with thick but short grasses. The name of these mountain pastures
(yaila) has been transferred to the entire mountain chain.
In the Caucasus we find, within Ukrainian territory, only the forest
zone of this mountain system. The forests often attain a height of 2500
m., and consist of various kinds of oak, beech, elms, linden, maple and
ash. Above the forest limit we meet with a low shrub formation and the
beautiful, wonderfully rich grass and herb growth which cover the
mountain meadows of the Caucasus, rising, at a height of 2900–3500 m.,
to the snow border.
The animal-geographical conditions of the Ukraine are much simpler than
the plant-geographical. The Ukraine, like the rest of Europe, belongs
to the holarctic region, and despite the extent of the land, only
slight differences in the fauna are found, these being due to the
floral and morphological differences of the mountains, forests and
steppes of the Ukraine.
Since the ice age, the animal world of the Ukraine has experienced no
lesser changes than the plant world. In the ice period many mighty
beasts of prey (cave bear, cave lion, cave hyena, etc.) lived here,
besides thick-skinned animals (mammoth, rhinoceros), together with the
ancestors of the present animal world and various polar forms. All
these animals are either altogether extinct, or they followed the
receding glacier to the north. On the other hand, together with the
post glacial steppe, a steppe-fauna spread out from south and east,
which then gradually had to make way for the forest fauna advancing
southward with the forests.
From this time on, the Ukrainian fauna suffered only very slight
natural changes. On the other hand, the artificial changes produced by
the hand of man have been all the greater. Many species which were
dangerous as beasts of prey or useful for food or skins, have either
been entirely exterminated by man or greatly limited in their spread.
In destroying the forests and putting cultivated steppes and fields in
their place, he has, to a great extent, beaten the way to the heart of
Central Europe for the animals of the steppe. But his activity has been
rather to exterminate than to change, and he has destroyed the once
wonderful animal life of the Ukraine.
Of the higher animal life of the Ukraine on the middle and lower
Dnieper, we are told, in a historical source, almost incredible facts
prevailing about the middle of the 16th Century. “The Ukraine is so
rich in game that bisons, wild horses and deer are hunted merely for
the sake of their skins. Of their meat only the choicest cuts of chine
and loin are used, all other parts thrown away. Hinds and young boars
are not hunted at all. Roes and wild boars wander in great herds from
the steppes into the woods in winter, returning to the steppes in
summer. During this season they are killed by the thousands. On all the
rivers, streamlets, brooks, live innumerable beaver colonies. The bird
world is so remarkably rich that enormous quantities of wild goose,
wild duck, crane and swan eggs and young ones are gathered. In the
rivers, such great shoals of fish swarm in the spring that the fishing
spear thrown in stands upright.” Another chronicler, of the 17th
Century, tells that he was present when a single throw of the net at
the mouth of the Orel brought 2000 fish to light, of which the smallest
was one foot long.
Of the cat family, the lynx and the wildcat have become very rare and
are met with only in the Carpathians and the Caucasus; the lynx also in
the Polissye country. The bear, formerly very frequent thruout the
Ukraine, is now also confined to these three regions. On the other
hand, wolves, foxes, badgers, martens, polecats and all sorts of small
animals of prey have survived, altho in very much smaller numbers. Of
the large plant-eating animals the bison (thanks only to the unusual
care on the part of the government) has survived in the primeval forest
of Biloveza, the moose-deer only in the Polissye, the stag only in the
Carpathians and the Caucasus. On the other hand, there are still a
great many roes and wild boars in the woods. Of the rodents the hare is
still common everywhere, while the beaver, which at one time inhabited
all the rivers of the Ukraine, is now confined to the most inaccessible
swamps of the Polissye and the Caucasian tributaries of the Kuban. The
bird kingdom, too, has become much poorer in species. Large birds of
prey, like eagles and hawks, nest only in the Carpathians and in the
Caucasus—very seldom in the woods of the plain. The heath fowl and
grouse seek the most inaccessible thickets, and even the number of
small insect and grain-feeders has been greatly reduced. Of the
waterfowl, wild ducks, wild geese, coot, diving birds, etc., are still
very numerous. Cranes and herons are rare. The former wealth of fish is
ruined and no one takes care of the artificial raising of fish. To be
sure, much fish is still caught, especially in the Dnieper and Don
systems, mainly pike, tench, carp, crucian, shad, etc., and trout in
the mountain streams; but of the abundance of even the comparatively
recent past, there is no trace. Sturgeon, sterlet and other sea fish,
which formerly came in great swarms up the Dniester, Boh and Dnieper,
are only seldom found today.
The steppe region has lost even more of its animal wealth. Above all,
the rich higher animal life of the transition zones, which as late as
the 18th Century provided food for the populous Zaporog Sich, has quite
disappeared. The tarpani (wild horses), which still inhabited the
steppe in great herds in the 17th Century, are now completely
exterminated. Saiga antelopes (saihaki), once generally distributed
thruout the steppe region of the Ukraine, have retreated to the Caspian
steppe. The smaller game and the bird world have suffered far less, but
the activity of man, who has changed the steppes into fields and
pastures, has been fatal to them too. The bustard, sandpiper, partridge
and grouse, which formerly inhabited the steppe brush in great numbers
have become rare. The same may be said of the bird-world of the
watercourses and swamps which once inhabited the river districts of the
steppe in immense swarms. The insectivorous birds, too, have decreased,
and the harmful insects are increasing at a terrible rate. Only the
locust pest, which formerly caused great damage in agriculture, is now
almost gone.
But, in spite of the war of extermination which man is waging against
the animal world of the steppe, animal species are found which were
well able to adapt themselves to the new circumstances, have become
accustomed to man and have found plenty of food in the fields of the
cultivated steppe (field-mice, marmot, ground squirrels, etc.). They
have increased greatly and have migrated toward the west and north,
causing great damage to farming.
As we must dispense with a scientific discussion of the flora and fauna
of the Ukraine, we shall only report a few essential facts about the
useful plants and domestic animals.
The Ukraine, according to its soil and its climate, is the richest
grain country of Europe. For wheat the conditions in the Ukraine are
the most favorable, especially in the southern half of the black-earth
region. Rye is raised more widely in the north and northwest; barley
everywhere, but on a large scale only in the south; oats in the north
and in the Carpathians, where it is often used to make bread. Buckwheat
is distributed chiefly on the northern edge of the black-earth region;
millet thrives well in the entire Chornozyom region. Corn is raised on
a large scale only in the southwest and in the sub-Caucasus country.
Of pod plants, peas and beans are especially imported; they are raised
not only in vegetable gardens but also in fields. Of the tuberous
plants, the potato is generally distributed only in the western part of
the Ukraine and increases in importance but slowly in the rest of the
country. Sugar beets are cultivated on great areas of the Volhynian,
Podolian and Dnieper Plateaus. Vegetable culture embraces all the
vegetables of Central Europe, but is not especially developed. On the
other hand, water melons, cantaloupe, cucumbers (particularly in the
Southern Ukraine) are raised in special plantations (bashtani). Hemp,
flax, rape-seed, sunflower, are generally distributed, and poppy is
cultivated not only in gardens but also in fields. Tobacco culture is
very important in the Ukraine, particularly in the Dnieper Plain.
Thanks to the warm summer and fall, the Ukrainian climate is well
fitted for fruit culture. The orchard is a necessity to the Ukrainian
farmer and is planted and cared for even under difficult conditions.
Fruit culture flourishes particularly in Pokutye, Podolia (where the
more tender species of apple and pear, as well as apricots, thrive in
the Dniester valley), in Bessarabia, in Crimea and the sub-Caucasus
country, where even peaches and grapes are added. The northern limit of
the vine extends along the Dniester, then thru Kamenetz and
Katerinoslav to the bend of the Don. Wine-culture has its main regions
in Bessarabia, in Crimea and in the sub-Caucasus country, altho South
Podolia and the Dnieper valley in the old Zaporog country do not lack
vineyards.
The domestic animals are the same in the Ukraine as in Central Europe.
Only in the extreme south camels and buffaloes are added. The horned
cattle belong chiefly to the so-called Ukrainian breed, which is
distinguished by its gray color and its size, and is bony and
strong-limbed. It is very well fitted for work and is rich in milk. On
the southwest borders of the Ukraine the Hungarian great-horned breed
is widely distributed. In recent times the pure Holland, Tirol and
Swiss breeds are continually spreading. The horses of the Ukraine
belong to various mixed breeds. The most beautiful breed of horses, the
Ukrainian, has been raised by the Zaporog Cossacks. It is of medium
size, very strong and fleet, very enduring and useful for any sort of
work. The Chornomoric variety is now being raised by the Kuban Cossacks
and is rightfully famed thruout Eastern Europe for its high qualities.
Very efficient, too, is the Hutzulian breed of mountain horses, small
of stature but very strong, unsurpassed for mountain roads and
foot-ways. The peasant horses of Galicia, Volhynia, etc., are, despite
their unseemly outward appearance, really created for the rough roads
of their land.
Donkeys and mules are rarities in the Ukraine, also very few goats are
kept. In sheep, however, the Ukraine is the richest country in Europe.
Not only native breeds (among them the justly famous reshetilivka, as
it is called), but also foreign merino sheep are raised, especially in
the steppes of the Ukraine. Hog raising is very highly developed.
Usually Polish hogs are raised in Western Ukraine, Russian short-eared
hogs in the eastern part, and in Southern Ukraine, southern crinkled
hogs. In barnyard fowl the Ukraine is the richest land in Eastern
Europe. Also bee culture is very important, especially in the Dnieper
Plain. Silkworm culture, however, is not very important, altho the
mulberry trees find favorable climatic conditions thruout the Ukraine.