Nature
The climate is moderate continental, with snowy winters and a short but rather hot summer. Formerly almost all territory was covered with thick conifer forest (fir, pine), but now a large portion of it has been replaced with birch-and-aspen secondary forests and crop fields. Swamps also take considerable areas.
Large animals have been much reduced in numbers, but there are still some bears, wolves, foxes, moose, and wild boars.
A great number of wild birds live and nest in the oblast.
In cities, most common birds are pigeons, jackdaws, hooded crows, rooks, house sparrows, and great tits.
The Volga River flows through Yaroslavl Oblast, with two major dams constructed at Uglich and Rybinsk. The Rybinsk Reservoir, filled between 1941 and 1947, is one of the largest in Europe; its filling flooded the town of Mologa and several hundreds of villages, necessitating the relocation of some 150,000 in Yaroslavl, Vologda, and Kalinin (now Tver) Oblasts.
Mineral resources are limited to construction materials (such as sand, gravel, clay) and peat. There are also mineral water springs and wells.
Read more about this topic: Yaroslavl Oblast
Famous quotes containing the word nature:
“All nature’s creatures join to express nature’s purpose. Somewhere in their mounting and mating, rutting and butting is the very secret of nature itself.”
—Graham Swift (b. 1949)
“Our bread need not ever be sour or hard to digest. What Nature is to the mind she is also to the body. As she feeds my imagination, she will feed my body; for what she says she means, and is ready to do. She is not simply beautiful to the poet’s eye. Not only the rainbow and sunset are beautiful, but to be fed and clothed, sheltered and warmed aright, are equally beautiful and inspiring. There is not necessarily any gross and ugly fact which may not be eradicated from the life of man.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The gods of the earth and sea
Sought through nature to find this tree.
But their search was all in vain:
There grows one in the human brain.”
—William Blake (1757–1827)