Climate, waters, soils, plants and animals (Lower Zarafshan)
The district has a short, unstable winter and a dry, sunny, scorching summer. It is one of the hottest areas of Uzbekistan: the annual mean is +14…+15°C, the July mean +28…+29.6°C and the January mean +0.4°C at Karakul. When the Siberian anticyclone and Arctic air enter, temperatures fall to –20…–25°C, and in summer rise to +44…+45°C. The frost-free period is 204–214 days and the temperature sum in the growing season about 5000°C, so fine-fibre cotton, sweet fruits and melons are grown. Precipitation is 100–200 mm a year: 44–48 percent in spring, 36–44 percent in winter and 2–3 percent in summer; snow melts within 5–10 days. Water sources are the Amudarya and Zarafshan. Zarafshan water is used for irrigation by canals such as Shafirkan, Vobkent, Romitan and Shahrud; because so much is used upstream, the water is not enough, so the 268 km Amu-Bukhara Canal was built. It also fills the Tudakul and Kuyimazar reservoirs. Drainage water created lakes such as Shurkul, Karakul, Parsankul and Karakir. Ground water lies at 2–3 m and is salty; the pressure water in Cretaceous deposits is not salty. Soils: grey-brown, sandy loam, takyr, saline and meadow, with meadow-oasis soils in irrigated land. Plants: calligonum, camel-thorn and white saxaul on sand; wormwood is the most widespread; in the tugai turanga poplar, oleaster, willow and reed. Animals: jerboa, ground squirrel, monitor lizard, snakes, gazelle, and in the tugai jackal, boar and pheasant. The Jeyran Ecocentre protects and breeds the goitred gazelle.
“For the gazelle”: make a poster about the goitred gazelle: where it lives, how it is adapted and why it declined. Do not try to feed or catch wild animals.