Barsakelmes Nature Reserve, Aral, Kazakhstan
Today Barsakelmes is surrounded by the sands of the world’s youngest desert, the Aralkum. But it wasn’t long ago that Barsakelmes was an island in the middle of the Aral Sea, the fourth largest lake in the world. Until the 1960s, the waters around Barsakelmes were rich fishing grounds, while the island’s isolation made it a haven for endemic and endangered plants and animals.
The island was discovered in 1848, during a two-year Russian scientific survey of the Aral Sea led by Captain Alexei Butakov. When Butakov’s team (which included the exiled Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko, tasked with sketching their findings) first landed here, the island’s Saiga antelope had clearly never seen humans before, not even startling at the sound of a gun. Within a few decades a colony of fishermen lived on the island - now known as Barsekelmes, Kazakh for the land of no return.
But the Soviet Union’s disastrous agricultural policies led to water from two rivers – the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya – being diverted away from the sea to irrigate the steppe and boost cotton production. Water levels dropped and the once abundant populations of bream, carp and other freshwater fish dwindled with them. By the end of the Soviet period 90 per cent of the sea had dried up, and Barsakelmes had become an island in the middle of a new desert.
The core zone of Barsakelmes Reserve was established in 1939 when the island was still, well, an island. But since then the reserve has been extended to cover 400,000 hectares, and includes a large area of former seabed. In 2016 it was designated a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, one of the only wildlife reserves in the world to be located in the middle of an ecological catastrophe.
Today the reserve is home to 178 bird species and 27 species of mammal, among them Saiga antelope, goitered gazelle and kulan, a type of wild donkey. It also constitutes the world’s only natural ‘laboratory’ for the observation of natural desert ecosystems in their initial stages of creation.
Barsakelmes is around 180 km south of the town of Aral, once a thriving port on the shores of the Aral Sea. You’ll need a good sense of adventure to travel here, as it involves basic accommodation and long days on rough tracks. However, if you love adventure, history and wild, remote places, then you’ll be fascinated by a trip to Aral and Barsakelmes.
