Science is Fun Fridays!

Last week we looked at the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia - this week we're heading inland to Lake Baikal, a massive ancient lake in Siberia along the Mongolian border.

Declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1996, it is considered the deepest lake in the world and is the largest freshwater lake by volume, containing more water than the North American Great Lakes combined.

The lake is covered by a thick layer of ice for several months of the year.  Spring doesn't really hit until May, and the thaw drains through a single river - the Angara.

Baikal seals are the only exclusively freshwater species, although they are related to the Arctic ringed seal.

Known by the indigenous peoples as nerpa, the seals have been depicted in rock art panels and bones have been found at habitation sites as well as human cemeteries.

Many of the species in the lake are endemic, such as the omul fish, which is the most important to the local fisheries.  

Many of the amphipods, such as this Brachyuropus reicherti, are larger than their Antarctic relatives.  This has been linked to high levels of dissolved oxygen in the lake.

Endemic sponge, Lubormirskia baicalensis.

Wikipedia