Rivers and lakes

Park's rivers

The density of the river network of Kenozero is 0.3-0.38 km / km2. The total length of the network of streams and rivers is 532 km.

A lot of attention of both scientists and tourists is given to the Porozhenka River, which flows fr om the Great Porzhen Lake and flows into Lake Kenozero. With a length of only 8 km, it has several meters of fall. The river cuts the belt of carbonate hills, formed about 60 million years ago, breaking through a canyon whose depth in some places reaches 100 m. In the carbonate outcrops along its cliffs there are fossilized remains and imprints of ancient marine inhabitants. Due to numerous rapids, the river has the appearance of a turbulent mountain stream, it is difficult to navigate, especially during the spring flood.


 

Unlike Porzhenka, the rivers Vilenka and Chazhenga, which are its sources, are characterized by a relatively calm «disposition». Flowing along a flat marshy lowland near the eastern borders of the Park, they form wide floodplains with abundant bayou lakes and small hills of ancient riverine valleys. Wet, hard-to-reach indigenous forests growing on the banks of the Vilenka and Chazhengi rivers made these rivers natural reserve corners inside the Park. It is home to the otter, mink, wolverine, beaver, bear, elk, golden eagle, white-tailed eagle, swan-swan and many other species of birds and animals.



The Pocha River in the northern part of the Park is most developed and economically inhabitable. On its banks there are two ancient timber industry settlements. For almost two centuries there has been felling and cutting of the forest. Naturally, there are no indigenous forests along the banks of the Pochi River. Pine forests once grew here on the places of cuttings and katishch (plots, adapted for «rolling» of felled forest). Decades ago, there were water mills on the river, fr om which only channel channels have survived. And zapan - a large man-made bay at the mouth of the river, used to form rafts from a mole sweeping along the river, will remain for many years a testament to the rafting past of the river.

Lakes of the Park

The total area of water bodies is 20.3 thousand hectares, which makes 14.4% of the territory of the national park. By the size of the catchment area, 90% of the territory of the Park belongs to the basin of the White Sea and only 10% to the basin of the Baltic Sea. The boundary of the watershed passes near the western boundary of the Park. It is most clearly expressed in the area of Lekshmozero, wh ere the wooded "Maselga" ridge separates both basins.

Each of the numerous reservoirs of the Park reveals its unique beauty in the bends of the banks, the splash of waves, the color of the water. But the greatest impression is made by Kenozero, Lekshmozero, the system of twelve lakes.


The core of the Park is the quaint Lake Kenozero with an area of ​​99.4 square meters. km, formed in the oldest fault of the earth's crust (Proterozoic era). Most of the remaining lakes are of glacial origin. Kenozero consists of three lakes, different in area and in form: Kenozero itself, Svinnoe and Dolgoe. The depth of Kenozero in some places reaches 120 meters, the length of the heavily indented coastline is 350 km. Lake Kenozero is distinguished from the other reservoirs of the Park by an abundance of islands - there are more than 70 of them. Along with the large islands - Bear (250 hectares), Mamonov (90 hectares), Ryapusniy, there are small - Vilovaty (20 hectares), Borovok, Sobachy, Kamenny, Mezhnoy, Zaloznoy.


Lake Lekshmozero is the second largest reservoir in the territory of the Kenozero National Park. It is of glacial origin, and has a simple oval shape, its area is 54.4 sq. Km. km. The banks, overgrown with coniferous forests, leave with an endless ribbon and are barely visible in the southeast - wh ere the Kirillo-Chelmogorsky monastery once stood. There are no islands on the lake. It is shallow, and only in the central part of the bottom is a furrow up to 30 meters deep.


The system of twelve lakes, starting from Lake Maselga, is part of the water system that feeds the Vodlu River flowing into the Onega Lake. On the territory of the Park there are six lakes of this system, connected among themselves by the most beautiful labyrinths of the channel, channels and volokov. Lakes are typically of glacial origin - deep depressions between moraine ridges, once abandoned by the glacier during melting. In July and August they are decorated with white lilies, egg-caps, mountaineers. Here you can find a black-throated diver, ducks-gogol, a fish-eating osprey, goshawks-goshawks. Sometimes in search of fish flies the white-tailed eagle - the largest feathered predator of our country. The system in ancient times was used to develop new territories and develop economic activities.

Fauna of the Lakes

In the lakes and rivers of the Park, there are 28 species of fish, among them bream, bream, whitefish, vendace, burbot, perch, roach, ide, pike, ruff, ukleya, gudgeon and others. In Lake Kenozero, belonging to the White Sea basin, there are two species of the lamprey - the Siberian lamprey and the lagoon of the sea ice. Before large-scale carrying out of an industrial rafting of the forest, which began in the middle of the 20th century, nelma and salmon spawned to Lake Kenozero and the Kenu River.

Shores of lakes and rivers are home to some semi-aquatic animals - otters, mink, beaver, muskrat.



Thanks to an extensive network of reservoirs, there are at least 20,000 nests here, and up to 100,000 waterfowl and waterbirds stop on a flight. To be found nesting are common black-throated diver, large toadstool, mallard, teal-whistle, wig, tufted duck, gogol, seagull and common gull, river tern, waders - snipe, carrier, black. In a small number of nests, the swan-swan, a large mongrel, a greyish grebe, a small gull, a bittern and a coot are nesting.

Flora of the Lakes

In the clean and transparent lakes of the Park there are rare species of plants listed in the Red Books of Russia and the Arkhangelsk region: Dortman's lobelia, quillwort and and spring quillwort, Finnish water-lily and the small yellow pond-lilly.



Along the line of the water's edge stretches a belt of acute sedge, with an admixture of rainbowweed, field mint, bog strawberry. In the shallows, there are thickets of swamp horsetail and reed. On the shoals there are dense «islands» of club-rush. At depths of up to 1 meter, the leaves of the European cow lily, pondweed, water smartweed, bur-reed. Of the submerged plants, the Canadian Elodie occurs, the Siberian one and the flowering one, the siphon and the harrow algae.