Polesie region is located within the Polesie lowland. This is not only a geographical, but also a historical and cultural region, where their own traditions and separate groups of dialects were formed. Most of Polissya is located on the territory of the Republic of Belarus and Ukraine.
Where is the region located?
Polesye stretched in a long strip, covering four states: Poland, Belarus, Ukraine and Russia. Its total area is approximately 270 thousand square kilometers. Most of its territory runs along the sides of the Ukrainian-Belarusian border.
On the map of Belarus, the region occupies 30% of the territory, on the map of Ukraine - 19%. On the western side, it covers a small part of the Ljubljana province of Poland, on the eastern side, a small segment of the Bryansk region of Russia.
Polesskaya lowland arose in places of deflections of tectonic plates. Its flat surface occasionally turns into low hills, not exceeding 320 meters. In the southern part of the lowland, the terrain is more undulating and the rock composition is more diverse.
Polesie is predominantly forests, swamps and meadows, alternating with each other. The landscapes of the lowland are heterogeneous and rather resemble a mosaic canvas, separated by a dense network of rivers. Typical Polissya landscapes are clearly visible in the paintings of Ivan Shishkin.
There are rare and unique natural complexes in the Polissya region. These are the Shatsky Lakes National Park and the Shatsky Biosphere Reserve, Belovezhskaya Pushcha, the Pribuzhskoye Polesie Reserve, the Cheremlyansky and Drevlyansky Reserves, the Polessky and Pripyatsky National Parks. Part of the territory of the region was affected by the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, as a result of which a radiation-ecological reserve appeared in the Gomel region of Belarus.
Belarusian Polissya
On the map of Belarus, Polesye stretches for 500 kilometers parallel to the Pripyat River. Inland, it deepens for about two hundred kilometers. The Goryn and Yaselda rivers conditionally divide it into Western and Eastern parts. Within Belarus, the region is also divided into five geographical areas: Zagorodye, Brest, Gomel, Mozyr and Pripyat woodlands.
The absolute heights of the lowlands in Belarus do not exceed 150 meters. In some places, moraine ridges and elevations up to two hundred meters protrude. The formation of the local relief was influenced by the activity of glaciers, as well as the waters of the Pripyat River. Soddy-podzolic, floodplain, peat-marshy soils are found here.
Nature of Belarus in the Polesye regionrepresented by mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forests, lowland and water meadows. Oak, hornbeam, spruce, pine, black alder, birch grow in Belarusian Polissya. Sedge, grasses, mosses and grasses are common in lowland areas. Typical natural complexes have been preserved on the territory of the Pripyat National Park.
Ukrainian Polissya
Ukrainian Olesye is a strip about a hundred kilometers wide from the border with Belarus, which covers the territory of Volyn, Sumy, Chernihiv, Zhytomyr and Kyiv regions. Based on its location relative to the Dnieper River, it is divided into right-bank and left-bank.
If in the Belarusian woodland the relief is flat, then on the territory of Ukraine it is more dissected, especially in the western part. There Polissya covers the northwestern margin of the crystalline shield, which comes to the surface with quartz, granite and gneiss formations. One of them is the Slovechansko-Ovruch ridge, stretching for 60 kilometers in length.
The river network of Ukrainian woodland is formed by the rivers Irpen, Desna, Sluch, Teterev, Seim, Stir. Almost all of them are tributaries of the Dnieper and Pripyat. The climate in the region is temperate continental. Up to 700 mm of precipitation falls annually, which feed the rivers.
Population of the region
The indigenous population of Polissya is an ethnic group of Poleschuks. The term is rarely used as a self-name and is coined to refer to the inhabitants of the region. By origin, they are Eastern Slavs, closest in gene pool toUkrainians and Belarusians.
Within this ethnic group, there is also a community of Western Poleshchuks, who have their own traditions, but are quite divided and have not formed a single ethnic group. Presumably, the formation of the Poleshchuks was influenced by the tribes of the Drevlyans, Dulebs, Yotvingians, Dains, Dregovichs, etc.
Among the Poleshchuks, there are separate small groups:
- bogs - people living near wetlands;
- field workers live in villages in more or less dry areas;
- forest people - residents of near-forest areas.
Ethnographers talked about the similarity of the people with the Ukrainians and Belarusians, but noted some differences both in appearance and in everyday life. However, at the beginning of the 19th century, in many atlases they were noted as Ukrainians, and their language was considered a dialect.
Shatsky lakes
In the western part of Polissya, a territory with many closely spaced lakes was formed, called the Shatsk Lake District. It covers more than thirty large lakes concentrated in the Volyn region of Ukraine.
The largest body of water is Svityaz with an area of 26 square kilometers. This is the second largest lake in Ukraine. A national park was created to protect the lakes and their surrounding nature. It covers an area of 48,000 hectares.
Shatsky lakes are full of fish, they are inhabited by: trout, perch, Chud whitefish, Amur carp, pike perch, loach, perch, catfish, pike, roach, etc. Waterfowl nest near the coasts. The territory of the park is heavily swamped, in addition to lakes there ismany ponds and swamps. The local vegetation is rich in mosses and algae.
More than 70 species of mushrooms grow in the park, and more than 32 local plants are listed in the Red Book, among which are several species of butterflies, lyubok, sundews, low birch and venus slippers. There are about 33 rare or endangered animal species in the Shatsky Lakes: copperfish, black storks, yellow herons, aquatic warblers, gray cranes and others.
Belovezhskaya Pushcha
Another unique natural complex in Polissya is Belovezhskaya Pushcha. It is located on the territory of Belarus and Poland and occupies 161 thousand hectares. Belovezhskaya Pushcha is a preserved relic lowland forest - a landscape that has been in this area since pre-glacial times.
The number of plants and animals in Belovezhskaya Pushcha exceeds all natural complexes in Europe. There are more than 500 species of mushrooms alone, about the same number of moss and lichen species, and about 1000 vascular plants. Owls, eagle owls, white-tailed eagles, short-toed eagles, badgers, lynxes and even bison live in the forest.
In prehistoric times, such forests covered a fairly large part of Europe, but were eventually destroyed. In its original form, the natural complex has been preserved only here.
