Exercises

1. Translate the following words into Russian:

Reserve, region, derive, remarkable, canyon, vertical, fairly, impenetrable, total, area, embrace, picturesque, landscape, ridge, respectively, typical inhabitant, Siberian, ibex, roe, deer, boar, weasel, vulture, rare, lynx, argali, golden eagle, saker falcon, short-toed, purpose, northernmost, nesting, place, extend, encounter, waterfowl, impressive, attract, immense, number, fortuitous, protect, landscape, swamp-and-lake, area, measure, protection complex, doubt, origin, depth, whitefish, observe.

2. Give Russian equivalents of the following word combinations:

Nature Reserve, South Kazakhstan region, the names of the rivers, total area, Alpine landscapes, 239 species of animals, typical inhabitants, Siberian ibex, with rare species, pink flamingo, the northernmost nesting place of the pink flaming, 42 species of animals and 298 bird species, the number of waterfowl, immense numbers of waterfowl, spring migrations, particularly protected landscape of swamp-and-lake areas, natural reserve, most common species, one of the inhabitants, Persian gazelle, 203 bird species.

3. Put special questions to the following sentences.

1.Quite remarkable is the canyon of the Aksu river: its banks are almost vertical. The lake of Tenghiz is the northernmost nesting place of the pink flamingo. 3.The reserve extends for some 243,700 ha of which 199,200 ha, i.e. more than one half thereof, is occupied by water table. 4.There are 59 species of animals and 25 species of birds in the reserve. 5.It is situated on an island of the same name in the Aral Sea.

4. Give the definitions:

Nature Reserve, canyon, waterfowl.

5. Retell the text Text 12: Wildlife

In 1867, the German zoologist Alfred Brehm, while exploring southern Siberia and Central Asia, found a true paradise in the area now known as Kazakhstan. Excited, he wrote in a report titled “On the tracks of the arkhar”: “From the rocks, where Finsch’s wheatear, Godlewski’s bunting and red-fronted rose finch carry on, the faint song of the stone thrush resounds, jackdaws swarm around the upper peaks, and above them circles the golden eagle by day, and soundlessly glides the Eurasian eagle-owl by night—both keen on catching the abundant rock partridge or a careless marmot. The most interesting of all is the arkhar... the argali in the words of the explorer, one of the giant mountain sheep of Central Asia, as tall as European red deer... They climb effortlessly up and down almost vertical slopes, jump wide crevasses and come down from on high, as though they could fly.”

Unfortunately its nimbleness has not saved the argali from having been all but wiped out. These days, they are included in the red list of animal species under threat of extinction. They share this fate with many other animals: the ram-snouted saiga antelope, the elegant dzheyran or goitred gazelle, the kulan (wild ass) and numerous birds of prey. There was little that Brehm could know then about the dangers threatening the snow leopard, the brown bear and even the wolf.

The causes of the decimation of so much of Kazakhstan's wildlife are manifold. First was the conversion of 25.5 million hectares of steppe-a surface equal to that of Great Britain—into agricultural territory in the 1950s and 1960s. This large-scale destruction of natural land, known as the Virgin Lands programme, irreversibly deprived many animals of their habitat. The grasslands of the kulan, saiga, dzheyran, fox, wolf, songbirds and birds of prey disappeared to make way for dubious monoculture. What had taken centuries to grow in the harsh climate of Central Asia was ploughed out within a decade. Even now that large-scale agriculture with chemical agents has ended, it will take decades before the original steppe vegetation, able to support large herds of antelope, gazelle, wild donkey and birds, can be restored.