And the Welcome to Russian History Rettold, episode 119, the geography and climate of Russia.

Today's episode is a rather unique one as it deals with, for the most part, with something that's not really

historical but is rather crucial in the history of this great nation. I'll also impart some historical

material like the size of the country as it grew from its early days of Kiev and Novgorod the Great to its size when it was the Soviet Union to today's Russia.

As an adjunct, you can go over to my blog site at

www. Russian rulers history.com to see maps of the various stages of Russia

and information about its climate.

Now let's start off with the climate of Russia.

One of the striking features of it is that there is essentially two main seasons, summer

and winter. Fall and spring seem to only be short periods of

transition from the two main seasons. Basically there are five climactic zones in the

country as it stands today.

The first and most famous, of course, is the polar climate that covers the northern section of

the country.

There one only has at most a 60-day growing season in July and August where the

temperatures just barely rise above freezing. There was little up there to

subside on so it is less habitable than other parts of Russia.

Still, many a hearty person has made the trek up north and survived.

Interestingly enough, St. Petersburg is on the western edge of this and the next zonal region.

The second and by far the largest climactic region covering over two-thirds of the country is the sub-arctic zone.

Immediately south of the polar climate, its growing season is still only 60 to 90 days and contains vast areas of permafrost and

Tiga. Tiga is a northern coniferous forest. The size of this area is larger than any country in the world.

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