Ukraine, the land and its people

by Stepan Rudnytskyi

Today the woods of the Ukraine forest region are greatly thinned, so that they take up more than one-third of the total surface only in the Polissye. Cutting down and rooting up of the woods some centuries ago was, without a doubt, an important part of the work of civilization. But now things are different. Now the forest is considered a very important part of a well organized cultural section, and is, therefore, carefully preserved in the truly civilized lands of Europe. In the beautiful forests of the Ukraine, however, a reckless exploitation is going on, and the evil results are already apparent, especially in the sparsely wooded borders of the forest region, as well as in the entire country [[103]]surrounding the steppe. The rivers have become small in volume of water, the sources dried up, and the ravines annually transform thousands of hectares into desert land. And this is happening in the granary of Europe, which some 300 years ago made foreign travelers marvel at its incredible fertility.

All the rest of the Ukraine, as far as the foothills of the Yaila and the Caucasus, is occupied by the steppe region. The limits of this region, as we have said, are not distinct. In peninsula and island formations the forest penetrates toward the southeast. In this direction the forest islands become constantly rarer and smaller, so that the Russian plant-geographers have felt called upon to insert two transition zones between the real forest and the real steppe—the zone of the exterior steppe and the zone of the transitional steppe. The actual steppe region is supposed to begin at the line which extends thru Kishinev and Katerinoslav to the bend of the Don. This division may be criticized, however, since it at most, fits present conditions brought about in the last 200 years by the destruction of forests on the part of men. The historical sources of the Ukraine tell of large woodlands, which, in the 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, still extended along the sources of the Inhul and Inhuletz, along the Tasmin, on the river divides between the left-hand tributaries of the Dnieper, etc. They were not forest terraces, not mere strips of woods confined to river valleys; they covered the divides far and wide, as well as the broad tableau sheds lying between rivers. For this reason care must be taken in sketching the boundaries of the steppe. We therefore comprehend both the above mentioned transition zones into one, for which we would suggest the name luhi zone, because the luh, a meadow studded with scattered groups of trees and little groves, must have been the predominating plant formation of this transition country. [[104]]

The typical soil of the transition country, as well as of the steppe region, is the black earth (Ukr. chornozem, Russ. chernozyom). Every Ukrainian is familiar with this blackish, ever fertile soil, which cannot be duplicated the world over and which makes the Ukraine the granary of Russia. The black earth is a product of the transformation of loess, with a strong admixture of the products of decomposition of plants. In places it attains a depth of 2 m. and over.

The black-earth region extends longitudinally thru the Ukraine, embracing over three-fourths of its territory. The northern boundary of the black-earth region passes from Lemberg along the north border of the Podolian and Dnieper Plateau as far as Kiev, and then northeast to the bend of the Aka, south of Kaluga. The southern boundary describes a line drawn thru the Boh and Dnieper deltas to their limans and the city of Mariupol. The entire Kuban plain and the plateau of Stavropol also belong to the region of black earth. Along the northern border of the black-earth region extends a transition zone of about 100 kilometers width, whose black earth contains 4 to 6% decaying plant matter. South of this lies the wide main area of the black earth with 6 to 10% decaying matter. On the sea and along the lower Dnieper the region ends with another transition zone, whose brownish black earth contains 4 to 6% of decaying matter. On the Sea of Azof and in Southern Crimea the brown dry steppe soil, with numerous islands of saline soil (solonchaki) and a peculiar vegetation, inclined to absorb salt, prevails. These are present also in the remaining black earth region, and there are also islands and strips of saline earth along the rivers and the seashore.

In the steppe region, the steppe is not the only plant formation. Above all we must differentiate between the meadow-steppe of the transition zone and the real steppe of the south, as well as the desert steppe in some districts [[105]]of Crimea and the Caucasus. Besides this shrub formation, meadow-woods (luhi) and real forests are found in the steppe region.

In the vegetation of the meadow-steppe, grasses and herbs take the first place. Of the grasses the stippa species are the most characteristic (tirsa, kovil); of the herbs, the lily-like growths. The growth of grass in the northern part of the steppe region is very luxuriant and thick, and attains great heights, altho the times in which a rider and his horse might disappear in the grass belong to the past. High weeds and thistles (buriani, bodiaki) form thickets of great luxuriance. In the spring, when the fresh young grass begins to sprout up and the blossoming herbs convert the steppe into a carpet of flowers, when everything is resplendent with the fulness of life and beauty, then the Ukrainian steppe presents a wonderful picture. But this picture is not lasting. The heat and the drought transform the fresh, green, primitive color into yellow and brown. Grasses and herbs wither and die away, and only the roots and seeds preserve the living power of the plant, surviving the autumnal drought and the severe cold of winter, once more to wrap the steppe in its bridal gown in the spring.

In the southern part of the steppe region the plant covering is not so luxurious as in the north, and the grasses and herbs grow in isolated little bushes, between which the bare ground of the steppe remains visible. The saline earth appears much oftener, with its gray-green vegetation of salt plants, and we often find sand areas, which begin to suggest the desert steppes of the Caspian steppe country.

A characteristic plant formation in the entire steppe region is comprised by the bushes (bairaki, chahari), which generally consist of heavily tangled thickets of wild cherry (prunus chamaecerasus, vishennik), spiral (tavolha), snowball (calina), almond shrub (amygdalus nana, bobovnik), [[106]]etc. They generally grow in the steppe balkas, or near them, and cover extended areas.

The Ukrainian steppe, despite contrary current opinion, does not lack tree growth. In the region of the real steppe, to be sure, we meet only forest terraces, which extend along the river courses, but in the transition zone we still find woods and groves, which not only appear in river valleys, but also cover the plateaus between these. The oak, the white beech, the maple, the poplar, the wild apple and pear trees, are the chief representatives of the tree species of the woods of this section. Even the pine ventures as far as the district of Kharkiv.

Besides the forest terraces, the rivers of the steppe region are accompanied by the formation of the so-called plavni. They are thickets of sedge and reeds, with luxuriant willow and alder growth; in drier places, which are flooded only during high-water time, real oak forests are added. With pleasure the eye of the traveler, wearied by the uniformity of the steppe, rests upon them.