The subarctic is a region in the Northern Hemisphere immediately south of the true Arctic and covering much of Canada and Siberia, the north of Scandinavia, northern Mongolia and the Chinese province of Heilongjiang. Generally, subarctic regions fall between 50°N and 70°N latitude, depending on local climates. Northern hemisphere highlighted in yellow. ... The red line indicates the 10°C isotherm in July, commonly used to define the Arctic region border Satellite image of the Arctic surface The Arctic is the region around the Earths North Pole, opposite the Antarctic region around the South Pole. ... This article is about Siberia as a whole. ... For other uses, see Scandinavia (disambiguation). ... Heilongjiang (Simplified Chinese: 黑龙江省; Traditional Chinese: 黑龍江省; Hanyu Pinyin: ; Postal System Pinyin: Heilungkiang) is a province of the Peoples Republic of China located in the northeastern part of the country. ...

Climate and soils

In the Köppen climate classification system it is defined as the region where mean monthly temperatures are above 10 °C for at least one and at most three months of the year. This corresponds to Köppen climate types Cfc, Dfc, Dfd, Dwc and Dwd. In most subarctic climates, aside from the maritime Cfc, precipitation tends to be low due to the low moisture content of the cold air. Typically there is a summer maximum in precipitation ranging from moderate in North America to extreme in the Russian Far East. Except in the wettest areas, glaciers are largely absent because of the lack of winter precipitation; in the wettest areas, however, glaciers tend to be very abundant and Pleistocene glaciation covered even the lowest elevations. Soils of the subarctic are generally very acidic largely because of the influence of the vegetation both in the taiga and in peaty bogs, which tends to acidify the soil, as well as the extreme ease with which leaching of nutrients takes place even in the most heavily glaciated regions. The dominant orders are Spodosols and further north Gelisols. The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. ... North America North America is a continent[1] in the Earths northern hemisphere and (chiefly) western hemisphere. ... Far Eastern Federal District (highlighted in red) Russian Far East (Russian: Д́альний Вост́ок Росс́ии; English transliteration: Dalny Vostok Rossii) is an informal term that refers to the Russian part of the Far East, i. ... This article is about the geological formation. ... The Pleistocene epoch (IPA: ) on the geologic timescale is the period from 1,808,000 to 11,550 years BP. The Pleistocene epoch had been intended to cover the worlds recent period of repeated glaciations. ... A glaciation (a created composite term meaning Glacial Period, referring to the Period or Era of, as well as the process of High Glacial Activity), often called an ice age, is a geological phenomenon in which massive ice sheets form in the Arctic and Antarctic and advance toward the equator. ... Loess field in Germany Surface-water-gley developed in glacial till, Northern Ireland Technically, soil forms the pedosphere: the interface between the lithosphere (rocky part of the planet) and the biosphere, atmosphere, and hydrosphere. ... For alternative meanings see acid (disambiguation). ... Lütt-Witt Moor, a bog in Henstedt-Ulzburg in northern Germany. ... Podsol (also spelled Podzol, or known as Spodosol) is the typical soil of coniferous, or Boreal forests. ... Gelisols are an order in USA soil taxonomy. ...

Subarctic regions are often characterized by taiga forest vegetation, though where winters are relatively mild, as in northern Norway, broadleaf forest may occur - though in some cases soils remain too saturated almost throughout the year to sustain any tree growth and the dominant vegetation is a peaty herbland dominated by grasses and sedges. Typically, there are only a few species of large terrestrial mammals in the subarctic regions, the most important being moose (Alces alces), bears, reindeer Rangifer tarandus, and the wolf (Canis lupus). Agriculture is mainly limited to animal husbandry, though in some areas barley can be grown. Canada and Siberia are very rich in minerals, notably nickel, molybdenum. cobalt, lead, zinc and (since the 1940s) uranium, whilst the Grand Banks and Sea of Okhotsk are two of the richest fisheries in the world and provide support for many small towns. For other uses, see Taiga (disambiguation). ... In norwegian: Nord-Norge meaning Northern Norway. ... The coniferous Coast Redwood, the tallest tree species on earth. ... Subclasses & Infraclasses Subclass †Allotheria* Subclass Prototheria Subclass Theria Infraclass †Trituberculata Infraclass Metatheria Infraclass Eutheria Mammals (class Mammalia) are warm-blooded, vertebrate animals characterized by the presence of sweat glands, including those that produce milk, and by the presence of: hair, three middle ear bones used in hearing, and a neocortex... For other uses, see Moose (disambiguation). ... For other meanings, see Bear (disambiguation). ... “Caribou” redirects here. ... Wolf Wolf Man Mount Wolf Wolf Prizes Wolf Spider Wolf 424 Wolf 359 Wolf Point Wolf-herring Frank Wolf Friedrich Wolf Friedrich August Wolf Hugo Wolf Johannes Wolf Julius Wolf Max Franz Joseph Cornelius Wolf Maximilian Wolf Rudolf Wolf Thomas Wolf As Name Wolf Breidenbach Wolf Hirshorn Other The call... Binomial name L. Barley (Hordeum vulgare) is an annual cereal grain, which serves as a major animal feed crop, with smaller amounts used for malting and in health food. ... For other uses, see Nickel (disambiguation). ... General Name, Symbol, Number molybdenum, Mo, 42 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 6, 5, d Appearance gray metallic Standard atomic weight 95. ... For other uses, see Cobalt (disambiguation). ... For Pb as an abbreviation, see PB. General Name, Symbol, Number lead, Pb, 82 Chemical series Post-transition metals or poor metals Group, Period, Block 14, 6, p Appearance bluish gray Standard atomic weight 207. ... General Name, symbol, number zinc, Zn, 30 Chemical series transition metals Group, period, block 12, 4, d Appearance bluish pale gray Standard atomic weight 65. ... General Name, symbol, number uranium, U, 92 Chemical series actinides Group, period, block n/a, 7, f Appearance silvery gray metallic; corrodes to a spalling black oxide coat in air Standard atomic weight 238. ... Map showing the Grand Banks Historic map of the Grand Banks. ... Map of the Sea of Okhotsk. ... A fishery (plural: fisheries) is an organized effort by humans to catch fish or other aquatic species, an activity known as fishing. ...

Except for those areas adjacent to warm ocean currents, there is almost always continuous permafrost due to the very cold winters. This means that building in most subarctic regions is very difficult and expensive: cities are very few (Murmansk being the largest) and generally small, whilst roads are few and railways non-existent. An important consequence is that transportation tends to be restricted to "bush" planes, helicopters and, in summer, river boats. Ocean currents (1911) Ocean currents (1943) An ocean current is any more or less continuous, directed movement of ocean water that flows in one of the Earths oceans. ... In geology, permafrost or permafrost soil is soil at or below the freezing point of water (0°C or 32°F) for two or more years. ... Murmansk coin Murmansk (Russian: ; Finnish: (archaic); Northern Sami: ; Skolt Sami: ) is a city in the extreme northwest part of Russia with a seaport on the Kola Bay, 12 km from the Barents Sea on the northern shore of the Kola Peninsula, not far from Russias borders with Norway and... Mountain road with hairpin turns in the French Alps For other uses, see Road (disambiguation). ... Airplane and Aeroplane redirect here. ... For other uses, see Helicopter (disambiguation). ...

Economy

Except for a few parts of Europe where the winters are relatively mild due to prevailing wind patterns, subarctic regions were not explored until the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Even then, the difficulty of transportation ensured that few settlements (most of them created for mining) lasted long - the ghost towns of the Yukon, Northwest Territories and increasingly Siberia illustrate this. For other uses, see Europe (disambiguation). ... Chuquicamata, the second largest open pit copper mine in the world, Chile. ... This article is about Yukon Territory in Canada. ... For other geographical names that include Northwest, see Northwest. ...

The Trans-Siberian Railway, which skirts the edge of the region, provided a major boost to Russian settlement in the subarctic, as did the intensive industrialisation under Stalin that relied on the enormous mineral resources of the Central Siberian Plateau. Today, many towns in subarctic Russia are declining precipitously as former mines close. In Canada, after the early minerals run out, development stalled until hydroelectric development occurred in the 1950s and 1960s. Hydro-Québec in particular has carried out many remarkable engineering works in regions of near-continuous permafrost, but these have never supported a significant population and have mainly served densely populated southern Québec. For the Fabergé egg, see Trans-Siberian Railway (Fabergé egg). ... Iosif (usually anglicized as Joseph) Vissarionovich Stalin (Russian: Иосиф Виссарионович Сталин), original name Ioseb Jughashvili (Georgian: იოსებ ჯუღაშვი&#4314... The Central Siberian Plateau (ru: Среднесиби́рское плоского́рье) is a part of Siberia. ... Hydroelectricity is electricity produced by hydropower. ... Hydro-Québec is a crown corporation that provides hydroelectric power for Quebec, Canada and the north-eastern parts of the United States. ... During the 1960s, a terrorist group known as the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) launched a decade of bombings, robberies and attacks on government offices. ...

Tourism in recent years has become a major source of revenue for most countries of the subarctic due to the beautiful, generally glacial, lanscapes so characteristic of the region. Most areas in the subarctic are among the most expensive places in the world to visit, both due to high costs of living and extreme difficulties of transport. Nonetheless, the great opportunities for outdoor recreation lure an ever-increasing number of travellers. At the same time, the older industries of the subarctic (fishing, mining, hydroelectric power) are being threatened both by environmental opposition and overfishing leading to depleted stocks of commercially important species.

See also

• Subarctic climate