Hunting in the Soviet Arctic

Fishing for marine and fur-bearing animals, wild ungulates, and feathered game has long occupied and continues to occupy a large place in the life of the indigenous population of the Far North of the USSR. The economic importance of the hunting and fishing resources of the Soviet Arctic is particularly increasing at the present time in connection with the general task of comprehensive and rational use of natural resources put forward by the CPSU Program.


In the next twenty years, the productive forces of the eastern regions of the USSR, including the Siberian tundra, the coasts and islands of the northern seas, will receive great development. This means the growth of new cities and towns here, as well as the population employed in industry, which will necessitate the supply of fresh, high-grade, locally harvested food. At the same time, the number of hunter-athletes in the Far North will increase dramatically. The importance of the renewable natural resources of the Soviet Arctic is significantly increasing due to the growing national demand for a number of raw materials of local origin.


It should be borne in mind that the resources of the Arctic wildlife, due to the peculiarities of its biocenoses, primarily their simplified structure, which is directly related to the depletion of the species composition of fauna and flora, have not only a "direct" but also a great "indirect" value. In fact, the involvement in economic turnover of the vast, albeit poorly productive, pastures of northern Taimyr is possible only through the fishing of consumers of this vegetation — wild reindeer, geese and geese (grazing domestic deer here is hindered not only by the scarcity of vegetation cover of the tundra, but also by the lack of woody vegetation, excessive removal of summer pastures from winter). Through eiderdown fishing, it is possible to dispose of colossal stocks of shellfish and other invertebrates off the coasts of the Varentsovo and White Seas, through harvesting eggs and birds themselves at bird markets, using stocks of low—value marine fish, etc.


It is significant that the vast majority of representatives of the Arctic fauna belong to migratory or nomadic species, and fishing for these animals (waterfowl, partridges, wild reindeer, Arctic fox) is sometimes carried out not only and not so much in high latitudes, in places of reproduction of their stocks, as in the south located areas. Thus, the Arctic is to some extent a reserve that constantly replenishes the hunting stock within several natural zones. On the other hand, the wintering conditions of Arctic animals outside the Arctic (for example, the same waterfowl on the Caspian Sea coast) directly determine the general state of their stocks.


There is still a lack of data that really characterizes the total abundance of many species in the Soviet Arctic, including those that are important from a commercial point of view. It can only be noted that the reserves of wild (tundra) deer here amount to about 300 thousand heads, of which over 100 thousand inhabit the Taimyr district. The stocks of the main commercial duck species in areas located only north of the forest tundra and shrub tundra band, according to our approximate estimates, amount to at least 2-3 million individuals, including stocks of seamen are estimated at at least 1.5 million, gag-combs at 500 thousand, turpans, blue and sea black, combined, not less than 300 thousand individuals. The total number of sexually mature, breeding geese living here obviously exceeds 1 million individuals, including approximately 300 thousand white-fronted geese. Several hundred thousand individuals determine the stocks of partridges here (the main breeding grounds of the white partridge are located further south — in the forest tundra and shrub tundra).


These selective data already indicate the importance and diversity of the hunting and fishing resources of the Soviet Arctic, especially since it remains a monopoly supplier of a number of valuable raw materials of animal origin (for example, eiderdown). Топ офферов на Бразилию iGaming