Willem Barentsz Biological Station

The Mukhrino Field Station is located at the east bank of the Irtysh River near the confluence with the Ob River in the central taiga area of Western Siberia (60°54’ N, 68°42’ E), 26 km west of the town of Khanty-Mansiysk (90000 inhabitants).

The Mukhrino Field Station was opened in 2009. It is a two-storey wooden building with study/laboratory rooms, beds for 14 persons, a simple dining room with kitchen, and a Russian sauna. The experimental field is equipped with 1 km long walking boards, which cross the main mire ecosystem types and facilitate researcher’s access to perform experiments and measurements in and above the mires, without disturbing the ecosystems. In the centre of the field site, an equipment shelter has been built. Distributed across the field site are clusters of thermologgers, water level recorders, and nine semi-automatic chambers (1 m2) and an Eddy Covarians measuring station for measuring greenhouse gas fluxes.

Due to the severe continental climate, the environmental conditions in the region are comparable with the subarctic zone of Northern Europe. The research site is representative for the Western Siberian pristine carbon accumulating peatland ecosystem (“plain mires”). The mires cover c. 60 % of the land surface and can be regarded as important sources/sinks of greenhouse gases and aerosols. The main mire type of the site is raised bogs of the type “Pine-dwarf shrubs-bogs” (“ryam”) characterised by pine trees, Ledum palustre and dwarf shrubs, with areas of Sphagnum fuscum. Interspersed are mires of the type “poor fens” (partly drained in the summer) dominated by Carex lasiocarpa and other graminoids, and Sphagnum balticum. Also ridge-hollow complexes, consisting of bog ridges and poor fen hollows are present. The (avi-) fauna includes many species typical for the peatland and extensive river floodplains near the station and of the relatively dry mixed forests between the peatlands and the floodplains.

Near the Mukhrino Field Station, a limited number of local people, mostly from Khanty-Mansiysk town, can be met while fishing in the rivers and lakes. Hunting is mainly a winter activity using snowmobiles. The wider area is part of oil/gas concession area, but no activities are expected near the station for this decade.

The Mukhrino Field Station is accessible from Khanty-Mansiysk by road (first 20 km) and then either by boat (in spring and early summer only), by foot (7 km, in late summer), or by snowmobile (in winter and spring). Khanty-Mansiysk has an international airport with daily connections to Moscow.