The northern Quarken is covered with traversable ice every third or fourth year. The Helsinki Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area includes the Baltic Sea and the Kattegat, without calling Kattegat a part of the Baltic Sea, "For the purposes of this Convention the 'Baltic Sea Area' shall be the Baltic Sea and the Entrance to the Baltic Sea, bounded by the parallel of the Skaw in the Skagerrak at 57°44.43'N. The land is still emerging isostatically from its depressed state, which was caused by the weight of ice during the last glaciation. * Baltic Sea states' summit to open in Lithuania * Russia invites Poland to participate in Baltic NPP construction Baltic Sea States summit on Tuesday. The Northern Baltic Sea lies between the Stockholm area, southwestern Finland, and Estonia. Navigation is interrupted by drifting ice from about the middle of November to the beginning of May, though the port of HernOsand has been known to remain open during a whole winter. The waves of the Baltic are usually short and irregular, often dangerous to navigation. Bibliography InformationChisholm, Hugh, General Editor. [13] Older native names in languages that used to be spoken on the shores of the sea or near it usually indicate the geographical location of the sea (in Germanic languages), or its size in relation to smaller gulfs (in Old Latvian), or tribes associated with it (in Old Russian the sea was known as the Varanghian Sea). Neutral Sweden developed incident weapons to defend its territorial waters after the Swedish submarine incidents. At the time of the last great subsidence, in glacial times, an arm of the sea extended across Sweden, submerging a great part of the littoral up to the Gulf of Bothnia, and including the Plies period the this of themnorthe and Baltic were s fg ficiently salt for oysters to flourish. In the eighteenth century, Russia and Prussia became the leading powers over the sea. However, the processes that are of major importance are quite well known. The name Baltic Sea became dominant only after 1600. The northern part of the Baltic Sea is known as the Gulf of Bothnia, of which the northernmost part is the Bay of Bothnia or Bothnian Bay. The present contracting parties are Denmark, Estonia, the European Community, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, and Sweden. The Baltic Sea stretches about 1350 km from east to west between the cities of St. Petersburg, Russia and Kiel, Germany; and about 1260 km from north to south between Lulea, … Levellings from Swinemunde show that the mean level of the surface of the Baltic at that point is 0.093 metres (_, 305 ft.) below. After the Nazi's rise to power, Germany reclaimed the Memelland and after the outbreak of the Eastern Front (World War II) occupied the Baltic states. That, on account of the earth's rotation, the main part of the Baltic Stream must keep close to the coast of the Scandinavian peninsula. The flow of freshwater into the sea from approximately two hundred rivers and the introduction of salt from the southwest builds up a gradient of salinity in the Baltic Sea. North Sea and Baltic Sea: Germany's maritime side Clear blue sea and sandy beaches – a trip to the north German coast is always worthwhile. The part of it west of a line joining the Skaw with Christiania fjord receives the name of Skagerrak; the part east of this line is called the Kattegat. The subsequent upheaval restricted direct communication with the open sea to the Danish channels, and the Baltic waters became fresher: the oyster disappeared, but a number of cold salt-water fishes and crustaceans, and even seals, became acclimatized. Because of this large anaerobic zone, the seafloor ecology differs from that of the neighboring Atlantic. The mix of the fresh and salt water in the Baltic Sea causes a gradient of salinity that depends on its depth and is connected with the gradient of temperature. The Baltic Sea is a mediterranean (intracontinental) sea of the Atlantic Ocean; it extends deeply into the European continent. In recent decades they have become less frequent. Approximately 100,000 km2 (38,610 sq mi) of the Baltic's seafloor (a quarter of its total area) is a variable dead zone. Freezing begins in the northern extremities of the Gulf of Bothnia typically in the middle of November, reaching the open waters of the Bothnian Bay in early January. The Convention covers the whole of the Baltic Sea area, including inland waters and the water of the sea itself, as well as the seabed. Between Stockholm and Visby navigation usually ceases at the end of December and begins again about the 10th of April. In the deeper hollows in the south part of the Baltic the bottom consists almost invariably of either soft brown or grey mud or hard clay, while on the shallow banks and near the low coasts fine sand, of white, yellow or brown colour with small pebbles, is usually found. Read More > The governing body of the convention is the Helsinki Commission,[73] also known as HELCOM, or Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission. It might be connected to the Germanic word belt, a name used for two of the Danish straits, the Belts, while others claim it to be directly derived from the source of the Germanic word, Latin balteus "belt". Also Credner, Die Entstehung der Ostsee (Leipzig, 1895); G. de Geer; Om Skandinaviens niveif orandringar under quartarperioden (Stockholm, 1888); R. Sieger, Seeenschwankungen and Strandverschiebungen in Skandinavien (Berlin, 1893); O. Pettersson, "Review of Swedish Hydrographic Research," Scottish Geographical Magazine (1894) N. Ekholm, Om klimatets andringar i geologisk och historisk tid. A healthy serum concentration of sodium is around 0.8–0.85%, and healthy kidneys can concentrate salt in urine to at least 1.4%. The Norse also used the rivers of Russia for trade routes, finding their way eventually to the Black Sea and southern Russia. Storm surge floodings are generally taken to occur when the water level is more than one metre above normal. The Baltic receives much more water by rainfall, discharge of rivers, &c., than it loses by evaporation; hence a surplus must be got rid of by an outflowing current which may be named the "Baltic Stream." This not only saves time but also avoids storm-prone seas and having to pass through the Danish straits. The ice then covered 400,000 km2 (150,000 sq mi). 90% of these are concentrated in the 10 km (6 mi) band around the coast. The Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Riga freeze typically in late January. The aim of the present paper is to review current knowledge about the water exchange. In the far north of this bay, saltwater species are almost entirely absent. This page was last edited on 28 January 2021, at 18:30. Thus, statistically, the more of the entrance that is included in its definition, the healthier the Baltic appears; conversely, the more narrowly it is defined, the more endangered its biology appears. 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