(Satellite image of Lake Balkhash)
When it comes to Central Asia, the lakes that have a great relationship with us, perhaps most of us are familiar with the "Han Sea" - Lake Baikal, but another lake located in kazakhstan, most people know very little, in ancient texts, it is called "Yiban Sea".
Balkhash, derived from Tatar, Kazakh, etc., roughly meaning "grass in the swamp", is now located in Kazakhstan.
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(Map of the Lake Balkhash Basin)
㊙ The Chinese origin ㊙ of "Yi Bo Hai"
However, in Chinese history, it has long been in the territory under our control. Known as Yibohai during the Western Han Dynasty, it was also a natural dividing line between the northwest border of ancient China, and was once the boundary lake between China and Russia in history.
In 1765, the Qing Empire's territory, Lake Balkhash, was used as a national border
During the Western Han Dynasty, the vast area east and south of Lake Balkhash had administrative organs of the Han Dynasty government.
In the second year of the Reign of Emperor Yi of Han (60 BC), the Western Han Dynasty established the Western Regions Capital Protectorate in Wulei (present-day Luntai County), which included the Balkhash region.
During the Tang Dynasty, it is recorded in the New Book of Tang:
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Sixty miles west of the Western Yancheng City of Tingzhou, ShaBao City was guarded and captured... It traveled thousands of miles west to Shanye City, and the water flowed north into the moraine and into the Yibo Sea.
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During the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, after the defeat of The Great and Small and Zhuo, the territory of the empire also reached this range. Until 1864, it was the territory of the Qing Dynasty.
Waves of Lake Balkhash
Lake Balkhash is a typical inland lake, located deep in the continent, with an area of 16,996 square kilometers, it is the thirteenth largest lake in the world, and it is also the fourth longest lake in the world, with a length of 605 kilometers from east to west and a maximum width of 74 kilometers.
Lake Balkhash
The basin area of the lake is 413,000 square kilometers, and the basin countries are Kazakhstan and China, of which 85% of the basin area is in Kazakhstan.
Scenery of Lake Balkhash
Lake Balkhash is tectonically located at the junction of the Alpine orogenic belt with the land of ancient Kazakhstan. The terrain of the basin is quite complex, the mountain system is scattered, and the plains and deserts are also widely distributed. Affected by arid continental climates, the annual precipitation is less than 150-200 mm.
Lake Balkhash and the surroundings
In the Late Paleozoic Era (300-250 million years ago), the Lake Balkhash region was in the Central Asian hyperplasia orogenic belt, and the island arc magmatic activity in the area was frequent, thus forming the famous Ring Balkhash Mineralization Belt.
The east-west boundary of Lake Balkhash - the Sarejesic Peninsula
Lake Balkhash has a special feature, the western half of the lake is fresh water, while the other half is more salinity. The east and west parts of the lake are separated by the saryesik peninsula and are connected by a narrow waterway, Uzenarar (about 3.5 km wide).
What is the reason for this unique phenomenon?
The western half of the lake is fed by the Ili River, which originates in Xinjiang, China, which provides nearly 90 percent of the freshwater infusion. The western half of the lake is vast and shallow, with a width of about 27 km to 74 km, but no more than 11 m deep.
Ili River
To the west of Lake Balkhash, the Iren River flows into fresh water from the Tianshan Glacier (salinity is only 1.48‰). Glaciers supply water, causing daily and seasonal fluctuations in their water levels and increasing strongly during the melting season of glaciers from June to July.
April 11, 2003,
Balkhash has not yet thawed
April 18, 2003,
Balkhash has thawed
Due to the abundant supply of fresh water, the western half has enough fresh water to replenish it into a freshwater lake.
The western half of Lake Balkhash
In the western half, the lake is rich in Ili bowfish, Balkhash bowfish (that is, silver bowfish) and so on.
Fishing in Lake Balkhash
In the large reeds of the lake, there are flocks of gulls, wild ducks, cormorants, swans and so on.
Patches of reeds by the lake
In the eastern half of the lake, the situation is very different. The water color is more turbid than the western part, and the width is relatively narrow, about 10 km to 20 km wide, the water depth is about 25 m, and the salinity (10.4 ‰) is higher.
Kartara River Basin
Although several rivers flow into the eastern half, the flow of the river is extremely small, and the large evaporation and the lack of fresh water replenishment gradually increase the salt content of the eastern half of the lake.
Saryesik peninsula
In addition, the gorge in the middle of the lake (Uzenarar) hinders the exchange of water between the two sides of the salty lake, so it forms a unique situation of salty and light lakes.
⬇ Lake Balkhash – environmental issues and challenges ⬇
Aral Sea Fleet of the Russian Empire in the 1850s
Lake Balkhash, once known as Lake Balkhash, and the Aral Sea, located about 800 kilometers west of it, are both "Jiangnan water towns" in the interior of Central Asia. The Aral Sea, in particular, was once the site of the Russian Empire's Aral Sea Fleet. Since the late 20th century, the Aral Sea has experienced serious ecological and environmental disasters.
Satellite map of the Aral Sea area reduction trend from 1989 to 2014
Although Lake Balkhash is much larger than the Aral Sea, the trend of environmental degradation is not optimistic.
Since 1970, the local government has built the Kapchagay Reservoir to store water, where the water comes from, and a wave of government operations has targeted the Ili River, which has finally reduced the water supply of the Ili River to Lake Balkhash by 2/3. At this stage, the lake's decline rate is about 15.6 cm/year, which is much greater than the natural decline rate from 1908 to 1946 (9.2 cm/year).
The rich mineral deposits of Lake Balkhash, while promoting local economic development, have also become another factor affecting the ecology of the Ili-Balkhash Basin.
Balkhash City Mining Plant
In the long history of the river, the "crescent" lake in Central Asia, Balkhash, has always fed the people along the coast, and a good history of development should be in harmony between human beings and nature. This blue "jade belt" hopes to be permanent to the scenery.
The graphic is derived from the network intrusion and deletion
For more knowledge about natural resources, please log on to the official website of The Remote Sensing Information Technology Research Institute of China Science and Technology Geoscience (Beijing).