Eling Lake

Eling Lake is a large plateau fresh water lake in the upper reaches of the Yellow River, also known as Eling Lake. It was called Baihai in ancient times, and cuoerlang in Tibetan, which means long blue lake. It is located in the depression in the west of Maduo County, Qinghai Province, China, 15 kilometers away from Zaling Lake in the West. Together with Zaling lake, it is called "sister lake at the source of the Yellow River". The shape of Eling Lake is like a golden bell, narrow from east to west and long from south to north. Eling Lake and Zhaling lake are separated by a natural dike, which looks like a butterfly. The lake is 4272 meters above sea level, 32.3 kilometers long from north to South and 31.6 kilometers wide from east to west. The lake covers an area of 610 square kilometers, with an average water depth of 17.6 meters. The deepest point to the north of the lake center is 30.7 meters, with a water storage capacity of 10.7 billion cubic meters. When the Yellow River flows through the Bayan Langma mountain between the two lakes, it forms a gorge, about 300 meters long. From the east of the gorge to the lakeside is a vast swamp. The Yellow River flows in from the southwest and flows out from the northeast. The lake is rich in cold water scaleless fish, and the small island in the center of the lake is a colony of migratory birds, forming another bird island on the Qinghai Tibet Plateau. The lake is surrounded by subalpine meadow, which is an important pasture in Qinghai.

Eling Lake

Eling Lake, located in the west of Maduo County, Qinghai Province, is a large brackish lake on the Qinghai Tibet Plateau. It is not only an important fishery, but also an important breeding place for cormorants, geese and ducks (including spotted geese and red ducks) and gulls (brown headed gulls and fishing gulls).

Overview of lakes

Eling Lake is a famous lake

The large-scale plateau freshwater lake in the upper reaches of the Yellow River, also known as Eling Lake, is called Baihai in ancient times, and cuoerlang in Tibetan, which means blue lake. It is located in the depression in the west of Maduo County, Qinghai Province, China, 15 kilometers away from Zaling Lake in the West. Together with Zaling lake, it is called "sister lake at the source of the Yellow River".

The shape of Eling Lake is like a golden bell, narrow from east to west and long from south to north. Eling Lake and Zhaling lake are separated by a natural dike, which looks like a butterfly.

The lake is 4272 meters above sea level, 32.3 kilometers long from north to South and 31.6 kilometers wide from east to west. The lake covers an area of 610 square kilometers, with an average water depth of 17.6 meters. The deepest point to the north of the lake center is 30.7 meters, with a water storage capacity of 10.7 billion cubic meters.

When the Yellow River flows through the Bayan Langma mountain between the two lakes, it forms a gorge, about 300 meters long. From the east of the gorge to the lakeside is a vast swamp.

The Yellow River flows in from the southwest and flows out from the northeast.

The lake is rich in cold water scaleless fish, and the small island in the center of the lake is a colony of migratory birds, forming another bird island on the Qinghai Tibet Plateau. The lake is surrounded by subalpine meadow, which is an important pasture in Qinghai.

Historically, Eling Lake was the place where Songzan Ganbu married Princess Wencheng.

The Yellow River flows through Xingxiu sea and flows eastward for more than 20 kilometers, then it enters the largest lakes in the upper reaches of the Yellow River, Zhaling lake and Eling Lake. Eling Lake and Zaling lake are the two largest plateau freshwater lakes at the source of the Yellow River, known as "sister lakes at the source of the Yellow River".

Between the two lakes, there is Bayan Langma mountain. Zhaling lake and Eling Lake are more than 3300 meters above sea level, more than 1000 meters higher than Qinghai Lake, the largest inland lake in China. They are truly plateau lakes.

It is a rare tourist attraction with cold and humid terrain, vast territory, abundant pasture and wonderful natural landscape.

Zhaling lake is long from east to west and narrow from north to south. It covers an area of 526 square kilometers, with an average water depth of 8.6 meters. The shallowest part is only more than 1 meter, and its water storage capacity is 4.6 billion cubic meters. The water of Zhaling lake is clear and bright, and the south of the lake center is the main stream line of the Yellow River. It looks like a wide milky yellow belt, which divides the lake into two parts, half of which is clear and green, the other half is slightly white, so it is called "white Long Lake".

In the southwest corner of Zaling lake, not far from the entrance of the Yellow River, there are three small islands with an area of 1-2 square kilometers. There are a large number of waterfowls on the island, so it is also called "Bird Island". Most of the birds here are migratory birds, including swans, geese, fish gulls, red ducks and so on.

After a whirl in Zaling lake, the Yellow River enters a long valley about 20 kilometers long and 300 meters wide in the south of Bayan Langma mountain. Here, the river is divided into nine tracks, scattered through the canyon, and flows into Eling Lake in the southwest corner, with an average annual runoff of 485 million cubic meters. The shape of Eling Lake and Zaling lake is just the opposite. Eling Lake is narrow from east to west and long from north to south. Its surface area is 628 square kilometers, 100 square kilometers larger than Zaling lake. Its average water depth is 17.6 meters, and the deepest can reach more than 30 meters. Its water storage capacity is 10.7 billion cubic meters, which is more than twice that of Zaling lake.

The water color of Eling Lake is very clear and dark green. When it is sunny, the clouds in the sky and the surrounding mountains are reflected in the water, so it is called "Blue Lake".

Eling Lake is vast and magnificent.

In the morning, the surface of the lake is calm and calm; in the afternoon, the weather often changes dramatically, and the strong wind suddenly rises. The calm surface of the lake is rough and the waves are splashing on the shore.

Sometimes, there will be a scene of darkness. One moment, it looks like a series of black tents and banners hunting. It is said that this is the grand scene when Tubo Songzan Ganbu met Princess Wencheng. Another moment, it turns into a little white tent. From far to near, the scene is very spectacular.

development planning

In April 2016, Qinghai Province held a meeting of the Standing Committee of the provincial Party committee to deploy the pilot work of Sanjiangyuan national park system, and proposed to strive to build China's Sanjiangyuan National Park within five years.

The scope of Sanjiangyuan National Park includes Kekexili National Nature Reserve in Qinghai Province, and Zhaling lake, Eling Lake, Xinghai and other places in Sanjiangyuan National Nature Reserve.

Climatic characteristics

The average temperature of the lake area for many years is - 4 ℃, which is one of the alpine regions in Qinghai Province.

Winter is long and cold. The monthly average temperature from October to next April is below 0 ℃. The average temperature in the coldest January is - 16.5 ℃. The lowest temperature of - 48.1 ℃ was measured on January 2, 1978.

Summer is short and cool. The hottest months are July and August. The monthly average temperature is only about 8 ℃, and the highest temperature is only 22.9 ℃. There is almost no frost free period in the lake area all year round.

The two lakes appear shore ice in the middle of October every year, and the whole lake is frozen in late November or early December. The maximum ice thickness on the shore can reach about 1m. After March of the next year, the lake ice began to melt. At the beginning of May, the lake ice almost disappeared, and the freezing period lasted for more than half a year.

Ecological characteristics

birds

The small island in the middle of the lake is home to many kinds of migratory birds, such as wild geese, brown necked gulls, fish gulls, green mallard, etc. This island, which has never been climbed before, still maintains its original ecological environment and is an ideal place to study the ecology of migratory birds.

fish

The fishes inhabited in Eling Lake include gymnocyprinus maculatus, platypharyngodon orientalis, Yellow River fish with bone lips, heavy lipped fish with thick lips and some loaches. The deep water layer is loach fish, and the middle upper water layer is Cyprinidae fish. Among them, gymnocyprinus maculatus and platypharyngodon orientalis are economic fish, with a yield of about 22.5kg/hm2.

The composition of fish fauna is relatively simple, only 9 species of fish were found.

There are only two species of fish resources, i. Because it is located in the nomadic area of the Tibetan people, and the Tibetan people used to regard fish as a God and never eat fish, there was no fishery in the lake in the long historical period.

From 1960 to 1962, the relevant departments of Qinghai province built a seasonal fishing ground here, fishing more than 2000 tons. Later, because of the long way to sell the fishing goods, inconvenient transportation, difficult preservation and high cost, it was intermittent.

Due to the long-term survival of fish, not only the density of fish is high, but also they are not afraid of people. When people get close to the fish, they still can't swim. If they throw stones, the fish will not disperse, but will gather at the place where the stones fall into the water, so it's very easy to net and fish.

In the future, with the development of local production and the improvement of traffic conditions, the original fish reservoirs of the two lakes will undoubtedly be developed.

However, the two lakes are located in an alpine environment. The growth rate of the two fishes is quite slow. It takes about 10 years for each kilogram of body weight to grow. Moreover, the sexual maturity is slow and the fecundity is low. Therefore, the fishing intensity and mesh size should be properly controlled during the development, so as to make the growth, reproduction and fish production relatively stable

aquatic plant

The aquatic plants in the lake are only found in the shallow water of the Bay, such as Ranunculus tenuifolia, Sargassum alopecuroides, Ipomoea bulbus, Potamogeton cristatus, etc.

Terrestrial animals

The activities of white lipped deer and yellow sheep are common in the lake area. On the shore of the lake, marmots and plateau pikas can be found everywhere. The body weight of Marmota ranged from 3.0 to 4.0 kg. Hajiang salt pond on the east side of the lake is rich in rock salt, with an annual output of 500 ~ 600t, which is exported to Sichuan and nearby pastoral areas.

Zooplankton

The number of zooplankton was less than 1 ind. / L for cladocera and 12 ind. / L for Copepoda.

phytoplankton

According to the investigation in July 1978, the average number of planktonic algae was 38 144 ind. / L, including dinoflagellate 28 478 ind. / L, Chlorophyta 4 022 ind. / L, diatom 3 433 ind. / L, Chrysophyta 1 444 ind. / L and Cyanophyta 767 ind. / L.

Benthos

Chinese PinYin : E Ling Hu