Coordinates: 60°0′N 105°0′E / 60°N 105°E / 60; 105

       Siberian Federal District        Geographic Russian Siberia        Historical Siberia (and present Siberia in some usages)

Siberia (/saɪˈbɪəriə/; Russian: Сиби́рь, tr. Sibir'; IPA: [sʲɪˈbʲirʲ] ( listen)) is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union (USSR) from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th to 19th centuries.

Encompassing much of the Eurasian Steppe, the territory of Siberia extends eastward from the Ural Mountains to the watershed between the Pacific and Arctic drainage basins, and southward from the Arctic Ocean to the hills of north-central Kazakhstan and the national borders of Mongolia and China.^[1] Siberia makes up about 77% of Russia's territory (13.1 million square kilometres), but has only 28% (40 million people) of Russia's population.

Etymology[link]

Siberian tiger

Some sources say that the word Siberia originates from the Turkic for "sleeping land". Another version is that this name was the ancient tribal name of the Sabirs, Turkic nomads later assimilated to Siberian Tatars. The modern usage of the name appeared in the Russian language after the conquest of the Siberian Khanate.^[2]

History[link]

The Siberian Traps were formed by one of the largest known volcanic events of the last 500 million years of Earth's geological history. The event continued for a million years and is considered the likely cause of the "Great Dying" about 250 million years ago,^[3] which is estimated to have killed 90% of species existing at the time.^[4]

The tower of ostrog, a 17th-century Russian fort, in Yakutsk.

At least three species of humans lived in southern Siberia around 40,000 years ago: H. sapiens, H. neanderthalensis, and an unknown type of hominin, nicknamed "Woman X" for the time being.^[5]

Siberia was occupied by differing groups of nomads such as the Yenets, the Nenets, the Huns, the Iranian Scythians, and the Turkic Uyghurs. The Khan of Sibir in the vicinity of modern Tobolsk was known as a prominent figure who endorsed Kubrat as Khagan in Avaria in 630. The Mongols conquered a large part of this area early in the 13th century. With the breakup of the Golden Horde, the autonomous Siberia Khanate was established in late 14th century. The Yakuts migrated north from their original area of settlement in the vicinity of Lake Baikal under the pressure of the Mongol expansion during the 13th to 15th century.^[6]

The growing power of Russia to the west began to undermine the Siberian Khanate in the 16th century. First, groups of traders and Cossacks began to enter the area, and then the Russian army began to set up forts further and further east. Towns like Mangazeya, Tara, Yeniseysk, and Tobolsk sprang up, the last being declared the capital of Siberia. At this time, Sibir was the name of a fortress at Qashlik, near Tobolsk. Gerardus Mercator in a map published in 1595 marks Sibier both as the name of a settlement and of the surrounding territory along a left tributary of the Ob.^[7]

By the mid-17th century, the Russian-controlled areas had been extended to the Pacific. The total Russian population of Siberia in 1709 was 230,000.^[8]

Siberia remained a mostly undocumented and sparsely populated area. During the following few centuries, only a few exploratory missions and traders entered Siberia. The other group that was sent to Siberia consisted of prisoners exiled from western Russia or Russian-held territories like Poland (see katorga). In the 19th century, around 1.2 million prisoners had been sent to Siberia.^[9]

Siberian Cossack family in Novosibirsk.

The first great modern change to Siberia was the Trans-Siberian railway, constructed in 1891–1916. It linked Siberia more closely to the rapidly industrializing Russia of Nicholas II. From 1801 to 1914, an estimated 7 million settlers moved from European Russia to Siberia, 85% during the quarter-century before World War I.^[10] From 1859 to 1917, over half a million people moved to the Russian Far East.^[11] Siberia is filled with natural resources and during the 20th century large scale exploitation of these was developed, and industrial towns cropped up throughout the region.^[12]

In the times of the Soviet Union, the earlier katorga system of penal labor camps was replaced by the new one, administered by the GULAG state agency.^[13] According to official Soviet estimates, more than 14 million people passed through the Gulag from 1929 to 1953, with a further 7 to 8 million being deported and exiled to remote areas of the Soviet Union (including entire nationalities in several cases).^[14] 516,841 prisoners died in camps from 1941 to 1943^[15] due to food shortages caused by World War II. At other periods, mortality was comparatively lower.^[16] The size, scope, and scale of the GULAG slave labor camp system remains a subject of much research and debate; for example, Australian professor Stephen Wheatcroft argues that these penal camps were neither as large nor as deadly as is often claimed.^[17] Many Gulag camps were positioned in extremely remote areas of north-eastern Siberia. The best known clusters are Sevvostlag (The North-East Camps) along Kolyma river and Norillag near Norilsk, where 69,000 prisoners were kept in 1952.^[18] Major industrial cities of the Northern Siberia, such as Norilsk and Magadan, were originally camps built by prisoners and run by ex-prisoners.^[19]

Geography[link]

Gulf of Ob Novaya Zemlya Kara Sea Yenisei Ob	Taymyr Peninsula Severnaya Zemlya Arctic Ocean Central Siberian Plateau Siberian Federal District	Lena Sakha Republic Laptev Sea New Siberian Islands Kolyma Verkhoyansk Range
Urals Federal District Kazakhstan Ob Irtysh Altai Tian Shan Syr Darya Taklamakan Himalayas Pamir Hindukush Tibetan	Lake Baikal Mongolia Gobi North China Plain Yangtze Plain Plateau	Stanovoy Range Manchuria Korea Sakhalin Amur Sea of Okhotsk Japan Pacific Ocean
Physical map of Northern Asia.

Altai, Lake Kutsherla in the Altai Mountains.

The peninsula of Svyatoy Nos, Lake Baikal

Koryaksky volcano towering over Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky on Kamchatka Peninsula.

With an area of 13.1 million km² (5.1 million square miles), Siberia makes up roughly 77% of the total area of Russia. Major geographical zones include the West Siberian Plain and the Central Siberian Plateau. Siberia covers almost 10% of Earth's land surface (14,894,000 km²).

Eastern and central Sakha comprise numerous north-south mountain ranges of various ages. These mountains extend up to almost three thousand metres in elevation, but above a few hundred metres they are almost completely devoid of vegetation. The Verkhoyansk Range was extensively glaciated in the Pleistocene, but the climate was too dry for glaciation to extend to low elevations. At these low elevations are numerous valleys, many of them deep, and covered with larch forest except in the extreme north, where tundra dominates. Soils are mainly Turbels and the active layer tends to be less than one metre deep except near rivers.

The highest point in Siberia is the active volcano Klyuchevskaya Sopka, on the Kamchatka Peninsula. Its peak is at 4,649 metres (15,253 ft).

Mountain ranges[link]

Lakes and rivers[link]

Grasslands[link]

• Ukok Plateau — part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site^[20]

Geology[link]

The West Siberian Plain consists mostly of Cenozoic alluvial deposits and is somewhat low-lying. Many of the deposits on this plain result from ice dams; having reversed the flow of the Ob and Yenisei Rivers, so redirecting them into the Caspian Sea (perhaps the Aral as well). It is very swampy and soils are mostly peaty Histosols and, in the treeless northern part, Histels. In the south of the plain, where permafrost is largely absent, rich grasslands that are an extension of the Kazakh Steppe formed the original vegetation (almost all cleared now).

The Central Siberian Plateau is an extremely ancient craton (sometimes named Angaraland) that formed an independent continent before the Permian (see Siberia (continent)). It is exceptionally rich in minerals, containing large deposits of gold, diamonds, and ores of manganese, lead, zinc, nickel, cobalt and molybdenum. Much of the area includes the Siberian Traps which is a large igneous province. The massive eruptive period was approximately coincident with the Permian–Triassic extinction event. The volcanic event is said to be the largest known volcanic eruption in Earth's history. Only the extreme northwest was glaciated during the Quaternary, but almost all is under exceptionally deep permafrost and the only tree that can thrive, despite the warm summers, is the deciduous Siberian Larch (Larix sibirica) with its very shallow roots. Outside the extreme northwest, the taiga is dominant; in fact, taiga covers a significant fraction of the entirety of Siberia.^[21] Soils here are mainly Turbels, giving way to Spodosols where the active layer becomes thicker and the ice content lower.

Climate[link]

polar desert      tundra      alpine tundra      taiga      montane forest      temperate broadleaf forest      temperate steppe      dry steppe

Vegetation in Siberia is mostly taiga, with a tundra belt on the northern fringe, and a temperate forest zone in the south.

The climate of Siberia varies dramatically. On the north coast, north of the Arctic Circle, there is a very short (about one-month-long) summer.

Taiga near Lake Baikal

Almost all the population lives in the south, along the Trans-Siberian Railway. The climate in this southernmost part is Humid continental climate (Koppen Dfb) with cold winters but fairly warm summers lasting at least 4 months. Annual average is about 0.5 °C (32.9 °F), January averages about −15 °C (5 °F) and July about 19 °C (66 °F), while daytime temperatures in summer typically are above 20 °C.^[22][23] With a reliable growing season, an abundance of sunshine and exceedingly fertile chernozem soils, Southern Siberia is good enough for profitable agriculture, as was proven in the early twentieth century.

By far the most common climate in Siberia is continental subarctic (Koppen Dfc or Dwc), with the annual average temperature about −5 °C (23 °F) and roughly −25 °C (−13 °F) average in January and 17 °C (63 °F) in July,^[24] although this varies considerably, with July average about 10 °C at the taiga–tundra ecotone.

Southwesterly winds bring warm air from Central Asia and the Middle East. The climate in West Siberia (Omsk, Novosibirsk) is several degrees warmer than in the East (Irkutsk, Chita), where in the north an extreme winter subarctic climate (Köppen Dfd or Dwd) prevails. With a lowest record temperature of −71.2 °C (−96.2 °F), Oymyakon (Sakha Republic) has the distinction of being the coldest town on Earth. But summer temperatures in other regions reach 38 °C (100 °F). In general, Sakha is the coldest Siberian region, and the basin of the Yana River has the lowest temperatures of all, with permafrost reaching 1,493 metres (4,898 ft). Nevertheless, as far as Imperial Russian plans of settlement were concerned, cold was never viewed as an issue. In the winter, southern Siberia sits near the center of the semi-permanent Siberian High, so winds are usually light in the winter.

Precipitation in Siberia is generally low, exceeding 500 millimetres (20 in) only in Kamchatka where moist winds flow from the Sea of Okhotsk onto high mountains – producing the region's only major glaciers, though the volcanic eruptions, and low summer temperatures allow limited forests to grow. Precipitation is high also in most of Primorye in the extreme south where monsoonal influences can produce quite heavy summer rainfall.

Researchers, including Sergei Kirpotin at Tomsk State University and Judith Marquand at Oxford University, warn that Western Siberia has begun to thaw as a result of global warming. The frozen peat bogs in this region may hold billions of tons of methane gas, which may be released into the atmosphere. Methane is a greenhouse gas 22 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.^[26] In 2008, a research expedition for the American Geophysical Union detected levels of methane up to 100 times above normal in the Siberian Arctic, likely being released by methane clathrates being released by holes in a frozen 'lid' of seabed permafrost, around the outfall of the Lena River and the area between the Laptev Sea and East Siberian Sea.^[27][28]

Borders and administrative division[link]

Map of the most populated area of Siberia with clickable city names (SVG).

Comparison of the nine biggest Siberian cities' growth in the 20th century.

The term "Siberia" has a long history. Its meaning has gradually changed during ages. Historically, Siberia was defined as the whole part of Russia to the east of Ural Mountains, including the Russian Far East. According to this definition, Siberia extended eastward from the Ural Mountains to the Pacific coast, and southward from the Arctic Ocean to the border of Russian Central Asia and the national borders of both Mongolia and China.^[29]

Soviet-era sources (Great Soviet Encyclopedia and others)^[30] and modern Russian ones^[31] usually define Siberia as a region extending eastward from the Ural Mountains to the watershed between Pacific and Arctic drainage basins, and southward from the Arctic Ocean to the hills of north-central Kazakhstan and the national borders of both Mongolia and China. By this definition, Siberia includes the federal subjects of the Siberian Federal District, and some of the Urals Federal District, as well as Sakha (Yakutia) Republic, which is a part of the Far Eastern Federal District. Geographically, this definition includes subdivisions of several other subjects of Urals and Far Eastern federal districts, but they are not included administratively. This definition excludes Sverdlovsk Oblast and Chelyabinsk Oblast, both of which are included in some wider definitions of Siberia.

Other sources may use either a somewhat wider definition that states the Pacific coast, not the watershed, is the eastern boundary (thus including the whole Russian Far East)^[32] or a somewhat narrower one that limits Siberia to the Siberian Federal District (thus excluding all subjects of other districts).^[33] In Russian, the word for Siberia is never used as a substitute for the name of the federal district.

City Day celebrations in Omsk

Major cities[link]

The most populous city of Siberia, as well as the third most populous city of Russia, is the city of Novosibirsk. Other major cities include:

Barnaul Irkutsk Kemerovo Krasnoyarsk Novokuznetsk Omsk Tomsk Tyumen If the wider definitions of Siberia were to be used, the following would also be included: Chelyabinsk Khabarovsk Vladivostok Yekaterinburg Economy[link] Russia is a key oil and gas supplier to much of Europe. Siberia is extraordinarily rich in minerals, containing ores of almost all economically valuable metals—largely because of the absence of Quaternary glaciation outside highland areas. It has some of the world's largest deposits of nickel, gold, lead, coal, molybdenum, gypsum, diamonds, diopside, silver and zinc, as well as extensive unexploited resources of oil and natural gas. The Khanty-Mansiysk region is home to 70% of Russia's developed oil fields.[34] Russia contains about 40% of the world's known resources of nickel at the Norilsk deposit in Siberia. Norilsk Nickel is the world's biggest nickel and palladium producer.[35] Siberian agriculture is severely restricted by the short growing season of most of the region. However, in the southwest where soils are exceedingly fertile black earths and the climate is a little more moderate, there is extensive cropping of wheat, barley, rye and potatoes, along with the grazing of large numbers of sheep and cattle. Elsewhere food production, owing to the poor fertility of the podzolic soils and the extremely short growing seasons, is restricted to the herding of reindeer in the tundra — which has been practiced by natives for over 10,000 years. Siberia has the world's largest forests. Timber remains an important source of revenue, even though many forests in the east have been logged much more rapidly than they are able to recover. The Sea of Okhotsk is one of the two or three richest fisheries in the world owing to its cold currents and very large tidal ranges, and thus Siberia produces over 10% of the world's annual fish catch, although fishing has declined somewhat since the collapse of the USSR.[citation needed] Sport[link] Bandy, which is the national sport of Russia[36] is even more popular in Siberia than in European Russia. Demographics[link] Main article: Demographics of Siberia Distribution of ethnic groups in the Soviet Union in 1974. Siberia is home to approximately 38 million people.[37] It has a population density of about three people per square kilometer. Most Siberians are Russians and Russified Ukrainians. There are approximately 400,000 Russified ethnic Germans living in Siberia.[38] Such Mongol and Turkic groups as Buryats, Tuvinians, Yakuts, and Siberian Tatars[39] lived in Siberia originally, and descendants of these peoples still live there.[40] The Buryats number 445,175, which makes them the largest ethnic minority group in Siberia.[41] According to the 2002 census there are 443,852 Yakuts.[42] Other ethnic groups include Kets, Evenks, Chukchis, Koryaks, Eskimos, and Yukaghirs. See the Northern indigenous peoples of Russia article for more. About 70% of Siberia's people live in cities. Most city people live in apartments. Many people in rural areas live in simple, but more spacious, log houses. Novosibirsk is the largest city in Siberia, with a population of about 1.5 million. Tobolsk, Tomsk, Tyumen, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk and Omsk are the older, historical centers. Religion[link] A view along Turgenev Street toward the Spaso-Preobrazhenskiy Cathedral in Khabarovsk. See also: Shamanistic cultures in Siberia There are a variety of beliefs throughout Siberia, including Orthodox Christianity, other denominations of Christianity, Tibetan Buddhism and Islam.[43] An estimated 70,000 Jews live in Siberia,[44] there is also the Jewish Autonomous Region.[45] The predominant group is the Russian Orthodox Church. Siberia is regarded as the locus classicus of shamanism and polytheism is popular.[46] These native religions date back hundreds of years. The vast terrority of Siberia has many different local traditions of gods. These include: Ak Ana, Anapel, Bugady Musun, Kara Khan, Khaltesh-Anki, Kini'je, Ku'urkil, Nga, Nu'tenut, Numi-Torem, Numi-Turum, Pon, Pugu, Todote, Toko'yoto, Tomam, Xaya Iccita, Zonget. Places with sacred areas include Olkhon, an island in Lake Baikal. Transport[link] Many cities in Siberia, such as Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, cannot be reached by road, as there is virtually none connecting from other major cities in Russia or Asia. The best way to tour Siberia is through the Trans-Siberian Railway. The Trans-Siberian Railway operates from Moscow in the West to Vladivostok in the East. Cities not nearby the Railway are best reached by air or the separate Baikal-Amur-Railway (BAM). Bibliography[link] Alan Wood (ed.), The History of Siberia: From Russian Conquest to Revolution (London, Routledge, 1991). Steven G. Marks, Road to Power: The Trans-Siberian Railroad and the Colonization of Asian Russia, 1850-1917 (London, I.B. Tauris, 1991). James Forsyth, A History of the Peoples of Siberia: Russia's North Asian Colony, 1581-1990 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994). Nicholas B. Breyfogle, Abby Schrader and Willard Sunderland (eds), Peopling the Russian Periphery: Borderland Colonization in Eurasian history (London, Routledge, 2007). Igor V. Naumov, The History of Siberia. Edited by David Collins (London, Routledge, 2009) (Routledge Studies in the History of Russia and Eastern Europe). References[link] ^ словари. "Great Soviet Encyclopedia (in Russian)". Encycl.yandex.ru. http://encycl.yandex.ru/dict/bse/article/00070/76500.htm?text=%D0%A1%D0%B8%D0%B1%D0%B8%D1%80%D1%8C. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ Vasily Surikov. The Conquest of Siberia by Yermak. http://www.tanais.info/art/en/surikov6more.html ^ "Yellowstone's Super Sister". Discovery Channel. ^ Benton M J (2005). When Life Nearly Died: The Greatest Mass Extinction of All Time. Thames & Hudson. ISBN 978-0-500-28573-2.  ^ "DNA identifies new ancient human dubbed 'X-woman'". BBC News. March 25, 2010. ^ "Investigating the effects of prehistoric migrations in Siberia: genetic variation and the origins of Yakuts.". Hum Genet. 2006 Oct;120(3):334-53. Epub 2006 Jul 15. ^ Asia ex magna Orbis terrae descriptione Gerardi Mercatoris desumpta, studio & industria G.M. Iunioris ^ Sean C. Goodlett. "Russia’s Expansionist Policies I. The Conquest of Siberia". Falcon.fsc.edu. http://falcon.fsc.edu/sgoodlett/courses/hist1100/lect08.html. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ Carl De Keyzer, Zona at the Impressions Gallery, BBC ^ The Great Siberian Migration: Government and Peasant in Resettlement from Emancipation to the First World War ^ "The Russian Far East: A History". John J. Stephan (1996). Stanford University Press. p.62. ISBN 0-8047-2701-5 ^ Fiona Hill, Russia — Coming In From the Cold?, The Globalist, 23 February 2004 ^ "The unknown gulag: the lost world of Stalin's special settlements". Lynne Viola (2007). Oxford University Press US. p.3. ISBN 0-19-518769-5 ^ Robert Conquest in Victims of Stalinism: A Comment. Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 49, No. 7 (Nov., 1997), pp. 1317-1319 states:"We are all inclined to accept the Zemskov totals (even if not as complete) with their 14 million intake to Gulag 'camps' alone, to which must be added 4-5 million going to Gulag 'colonies', to say nothing of the 3.5 million already in, or sent to, 'labour settlements'. However taken, these are surely 'high' figures." ^ Zemskov, Gulag, Sociologičeskije issledovanija, 1991, No. 6, pp. 14-15. ^ Stéphane Courtois, Mark Kramer. Livre noir du Communisme: crimes, terreur, répression. Harvard University Press, 1999. p.206. ISBN 0-674-07608-7 ^ Stephen Wheatcroft. The Scale and Nature of German and Soviet Repression and Mass Killings, 1930-45. Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 48, No. 8 (Dec., 1996), pp. 1319-1353 ^ Stéphane Courtois, Mark Kramer. Livre noir du Communisme: crimes, terreur, répression. Harvard University Press, 1999. p.239. ISBN 0-674-07608-7 ^ "Gulag: a History of the Soviet Camps". Arlindo-correia.com. http://www.arlindo-correia.com/041003.html. Retrieved 2009-01-06.  ^ "Altai: Saving the Pearl of Siberia". http://www.pacificenvironment.org/article.php?list=type&type=83. Retrieved 2006-11-30.  ^ C. Michael Hogan. 2011. Taiga. eds. M.McGinley & C.Cleveland. Encyclopedia of Earth. National Council for Science and the Environment. Washington DC ^ "Novosibirsk climate". Worldclimate.com. 2007-02-04. http://www.worldclimate.com/cgi-bin/data.pl?ref=N55E082+1102+29634W. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ "Omsk climate". Worldclimate.com. 2007-02-04. http://www.worldclimate.com/cgi-bin/data.pl?ref=N54E073+1202+0004115G2. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ "Kazachengoye climate". Worldclimate.com. 2007-02-04. http://www.worldclimate.com/cgi-bin/data.pl?ref=N56E107+1102+30337W. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ "Гидрометцентр России" (in Russian). Archived from the original on June 27, 2008. http://web.archive.org/web/20080627063054/http://meteoinfo.ru/NovosibirskClimat. Retrieved January 8, 2009.  ^ Ian Sample "Warming hits 'tipping point'". The Guardian, August 11, 2005 ^ Connor, Steve (September 23, 2008). "Exclusive: The methane time bomb". The Independent. http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/exclusive-the-methane-time-bomb-938932.html. Retrieved 2008-10-03.  ^ N. Shakhova, I. Semiletov, A. Salyuk, D. Kosmach, and N. Bel’cheva (2007), Methane release on the Arctic East Siberian shelf, Geophysical Research Abstracts, 9, 01071 ^ Малый энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона (The Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary, in Russian) ^ Сибирь—Большая советская энциклопедия (The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, in Russian) ^ Сибирь- Словарь современных географических названий (in Russian) ^ Encyclopædia Britannica. "Siberia-Britannica online encyclopedia". Britannica.com. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9067598/Siberia. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ "Siberia", The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition ^ The City Built on Oil: EU-Russia Summit Visits Siberia's Boomtown, Spiegel ^ "Norilsk raises 2010 nickel output forecast". Reuters. ^ "Russian bandy players blessed for victory at world championship in Kazan". Tatar-Inform. 2011-01-21. http://eng.tatar-inform.ru/news/2011/01/21/33986/. Retrieved 2009-08-31.  ^ "China's Growing Interests in Siberia". Der Spiegel. May 6, 2011 ^ "Siberian Germans". Everyculture.com. http://www.everyculture.com/Russia-Eurasia-China/Siberian-Germans-Orientation.html. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ According to the 2002 census there are 500,000 Tatars in Siberia, but 300,000 of them are Volga Tatars who settled in Siberia during periods of colonization.[1] ^ "Ethnographic map of Siberia". Hunmagyar.org. http://www.hunmagyar.org/turan/ssib.html. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Russian Federation : Buryats. ^ World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Russian Federation : Yakuts. ^ Russian Embassy website — Religion in Russia[dead link] ^ "Planting Jewish roots in Siberia". Fjc.ru. 2004-05-24. http://www.fjc.ru/news/newsArticle.asp?AID=136974. Retrieved 2010-05-15.  ^ "Why some Jews would rather live in Siberia than Israel" The Christian Science Monitor. June 7, 2010 ^ Hoppál 2005:13 External links[link] Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Siberia Wikiversity has learning materials about Siberia Wikisource has original text related to this article: Siberia Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Siberia Siberia travel guide from Wikitravel v t e Regions of the World Africa Northern Middle East Sub-Saharan Central Southern Western Eastern Oceania Australasia Australia Zealandia Melanesia Micronesia Polynesia America North Northern Middle Central Caribbean South Southern Northern Western Guianan States Anglo Latin (Hispanic) Polar regions Arctic Antarctic Asia Central Eastern Northeastern Northern Southeastern Mainland Maritime Southern Indian subcontinent Western Middle East Oceans World Arctic Atlantic Indian Pacific Southern Europe Central Eastern Northern Southeastern Middle East Southern Western Seas List of seas Related Continents of the world List of seas Physical Earth v t e Russia topics History Timeline Proto-Indo-Europeans Scythians East Slavs Rus' Khaganate Kievan Rus' Novgorod Republic Vladimir-Suzdal Grand Duchy of Moscow Tsardom of Russia Russian Empire Russian SFSR Soviet Union Russian Federation Military history Postal history Geography Subdivisions Ural Mountains Siberia European Russia West Siberian Plain Caucasus Mountains Caspian Sea North Asia North Caucasus Cities and towns Islands Economic regions Rivers Volcanoes Climate Governance Constitution Government President Federal Assembly Law Foreign relations Constitutional Court Public Chamber State Council Judiciary Politics Elections Political parties Human rights Economy Agriculture Inventions Tourism Banking Central Bank Russian ruble Transport Telecommunications Corruption Demographics Russians Public holidays Languages Religion Crime 2002 Census 2010 Census Famous Russians Culture Architecture Literature Ballet Avant-garde Cinema Material culture Music (Opera) Language Cuisine Martial arts Folklore Internet Sports Symbols National flag Other flags Coat of arms National anthem Category Book Portal WikiProject

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. This biography of a living person needs additional citations for verification. Tagged since July 2009. Its lead section may not adequately summarize its contents. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of the article's key points. Tagged since November 2009.

Raymond Paul "Ray" Mears (born 7 February 1964) is an English woodsman, instructor, author and TV presenter. His TV appearances cover bushcraft and survival techniques, and he is best known for the TV series Ray Mears' Bushcraft, Ray Mears' World of Survival, Extreme Survival, Survival with Ray Mears, Wild Britain with Ray Mears and Ray Mears Goes Walkabout.

Early life[link]

Mears grew up in Kenley, Greater London, and the North Downs, where he discovered a countryside abundant with wildlife. Educated at Reigate Grammar School, a co-educational independent school in Reigate, Surrey, he learned to track foxes in the forest at a young age. As a boy, he desired to sleep out on the trail, but unable to afford camping equipment, he resorted to setting up camp using what he could find in his surroundings.

Interests[link]

Mears's enthusiasm for his subject, combined with his broad knowledge of survival and the uses which may be made of plants, trees and other natural materials found in woodland, forest or desert, have made him a popular figure in TV broadcasting in the UK.^{[citation needed]} He has travelled extensively across the world for his TV series and has learned survival techniques from the indigenous peoples he has met. In his programmes he demonstrates his knowledge of the wild, how to find food from seeds, berries, roots and other growing things, and how to survive by constructing temporary shelters, fires and canoes from natural materials.

Mears has practiced Judo for many years. He once proudly on TV when challenged as a guest wrestled the then winner of a 6 player bushmans tournament. Mears emerged victorious after a strenuous and competitive match. The bush community were most impressed.

Mears is particularly interested in the survival of groups of resistance fighters and partisans for extended periods during the Second World War, such as the Norwegian heavy water plant saboteurs (see The Real Heroes of Telemark^[1]) and the Bielski brothers in Belarus (see Extreme Survival).

Personal life[link]

Mears met his partner, Rachel, in 1992 when she attended one of his five day survival courses. The couple lived in East Sussex with her two adult children, and married in 2005, after Rachel was diagnosed with breast cancer. Rachel died from cancer in 2006, aged 50, and her ashes are scattered in the Ashdown forest near their home.^[2]

While filming a documentary in Wyoming in 2005 Mears was involved in a serious accident. The helicopter in which he and his camera crew were travelling struck the ground during a steep low level turn, and broke apart, rolling to a stop. The fuel tank was ruptured in the accident, and escaping fuel covered Mears and the crew. No fire occurred, and Mears was able to escape the wreckage and assist in the rescue and first aid of one of the crew who was badly injured. Mears escaped uninjured.^[3]

Non-television work[link]

Mears started his bushcraft company aged 19. Mears' first book, The Survival Handbook, was published in 1990. Mears has continued to publish books, both standalone works, and as accompaniments to his TV series.

In September 2007, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Oxford Brookes University, and in the same year he began to deliver public lectures across the United Kingdom on his experiences in front of and behind the lens.

In July 2010, Mears was asked by Northumbria Police to help them track fugitive killer Raoul Moat, after he fled his temporary tent-based shelter in the village of Rothbury.^[4]

Television[link]

Mears has made a number of series for BBC television, visiting various parts of the world and covering such topics as bushcraft and survival skills, the traditional culture of indigenous peoples, and the achievements of noted explorers.

In 2009 he was approached by ITV to present a planned revival of its long-running nature documentary series Survival.^[5] The resulting three-part series was rebranded Survival with Ray Mears and broadcast on ITV1 in 2010. Each episode followed Mears as he used his tracking skills to locate bears, wolves and leopards. In a Radio Times interview to promote the series, Mears complained of being typecast by the BBC.^[6] This series was followed by Wild Britain with Ray Mears, also broadcast by ITV.

Series[link]

• Wild Tracks (BBC, 1994)
• Tracks (BBC, 1994–97)
• Ray Mears' World of Survival (BBC, 1997–98, 2 seasons of 6 episodes each)
• Ray Mears' Country Tracks (BBC, 1998, 2002–03)
• The Essential Guide to Rocks (BBC Education, 1998)
• Ray Mears' Extreme Survival (BBC, 1999–2002, 3 seasons of 6 episodes each)
• Ray Mears' Adventure Special (BBC, 2001) – Mears takes Ewan McGregor into the Honduran jungle on the trail of the prehistoric people of the Mosquito Coast.
• Ray Mears' Real Heroes of Telemark (BBC, 2003)
• Ray Mears' Bushcraft (BBC, 2004–05, 2 seasons of 5 episodes each)
• Ray Mears' Wild Food (BBC, 2007, 5 episodes)
• Ray Mears Goes Walkabout (BBC, June 2008, 4 episodes)^[7] – Mears tours the Australian outback. An accompanying hardcover book was published in the UK by Hodder and Stoughton in March 2008. In the series Mears meets one of his heroes: Les Hiddins (aka "The Bush Tucker Man"). He also heads to the Kimberley region to meet the reputed aboriginal artist and bush guide Ju Ju Wilson.
• Ray Mears' Northern Wilderness (BBC Two, Autumn 2009, 6 episodes) – Mears follows in the footsteps of pioneers who opened up Canada, such as Samuel Hearne, John Rae and David Thompson.
• Survival with Ray Mears (ITV, Spring 2010, 3 episodes)
• Wild Britain with Ray Mears (ITV, Autumn 2010, 6 episodes) - To be followed in 2011 by extended 60 minute episodes with exclusive additional content to be broadcast on UKTV's natural history channel Eden.

Books[link]

• The Survival Handbook (1990)
• The Outdoor Survival Handbook (1992)
• Ray Mears' World of Survival (1997)
• Bushcraft (2002)
• Essential Bushcraft (2003)
• The Real Heroes of Telemark: The True Story of the Secret Mission to Stop Hitler's Atomic Bomb (2003)
• Ray Mears' Bushcraft Survival (2005)
• Wild Food by Ray Mears & Professor Gordon Hillman (2007)
• Ray Mears Goes Walkabout (2008)
• Vanishing World - A Life of Bushcraft (2008)
• Northern Wilderness (2009)

Quotations[link]

Quotations by Ray Mears include:

• "Bushcraft is what you carry in your mind and your muscles."
• "The great thing about bushcraft is that wherever you go, the skills go with you."
• "One of the great things about bushcraft is that skills you learn in your back garden can be used all over the world." ^[8]
• "Knowledge is the key to survival and the best thing about that is: it doesn't weigh anything."
• "You cannot underestimate the importance of preparation."
• "As far as I'm concerned, these people are just showmen." On Bear Grylls^[9]

See also[link]

• Les Hiddins
• Mors Kochanski
• Lofty Wiseman
• Richard Proenneke
• Les Stroud
• Bear Grylls
• Rüdiger Nehberg
• Bruce Parry
• Lars Monsen

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Ray Mears on Myspace
• Ray Mears at the Internet Movie Database
• Ray Mears Woodlore on Facebook
• Ray Mears Bushcraft's channel on YouTube
• Ray Mears' Survival shows on Dave (UKTV)
• Photographs of 2005 helicopter accident
• Wild Britain on itvWILD