Lake Parishan (

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

: دریاچه پریشان) is a lake in

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

. The Parishan Lake is in

Jereh and Baladeh District Jereh and Baladeh District () is in Kazerun County, Fars province, Fars province, Iran. Its capital is the city of Valashahr. Demographics Population At the time of the 2006 National Census, the district's population was 37,315 in 7,805 hou ...

Fars province Fars Province or Pars Province, also known as Persis or Farsistan (فارسستان), is one of the 31 provinces of Iran. Its capital is the city of Shiraz. Pars province has an area of 122,400 km2 and is located in Iran's southwest, i ...

and is the largest freshwater lake in the country. It receives very small amount of water from feeder rivers and the whole lake or wetland is a protected area, as it is considered a globally significant wetland ecosystem. Another lake in this area is that of Arzan. The whole protected area is called "Arzhan National Park." This area is an important sanctuary for birds. In the past, the

Asiatic lion The Asiatic lion is a lion population of the subspecies ''Panthera leo leo''. Until the 19th century, it occurred in Saudi Arabia, eastern Turkey, Iran, Mesopotamia, and from east of the Indus River in Pakistan to the Bengal region and the Narm ...

used to occur in this place, besides other parts of

. Nowadays, in the

wilderness Wilderness or wildlands (usually in the plurale tantum, plural) are Earth, Earth's natural environments that have not been significantly modified by human impact on the environment, human activity, or any urbanization, nonurbanized land not u ...

Eurasia Eurasia ( , ) is a continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. According to some geographers, Physical geography, physiographically, Eurasia is a single supercontinent. The concept of Europe and Asia as distinct continents d ...

, the only members of this race of lions occur in and around

Gir Forest Gir National Park and Wildlife Sanctuary, also known as Sasan Gir, is a forest, national park, and wildlife sanctuary near Talala Gir in Gujarat, India. It is located north-east of Somnath, south-east of Junagadh and south-west of Amreli. ...

, in

Kathiawar Peninsula Kathiawar (), also known as Saurashtra, is a peninsula in the south-western Gujarat state in India, bordering the Arabian Sea and covering about . It is bounded by the Kutch district in the north, the Gulf of Kutch in the northwest, and by the ...

, India. A plan in 1977 to introduce Gir lions to the area around the lake did not eventually materialize. This area includes the village of Arzhan, and is of agricultural importance, and bringing in lions would mean setting aside farmland, and settling farmers elsewhere. This happens to be a reason why it is difficult to reintroduce lions from Gir Forest to another place within India. Nevertheless, Iran's intention to restore its population of lions would continue into the 21st century, and in February 2019, Iran obtained a male named 'Kamran' from

Bristol Zoo Bristol Zoo was a zoo in the city of Bristol in South West England. The zoo's stated mission was to "maintain and defend" biodiversity through breeding endangered species, conserving threatened species and habitats and promoting a wider underst ...

in the United Kingdom, followed in June by the acquisition of a female named 'Eilda' from

Dublin Zoo Dublin Zoo (), in Phoenix Park, is a zoo in Dublin, Ireland, and one of Dublin's most popular attractions. Established and designed in 1830 by Decimus Burton, it opened the following year. Today, it focuses on conservation projects, breeding p ...

in Ireland, and lodged them at Tehran Zoological Garden in a bid to reproduce and reintroduce lions in the wild. Antoin Sevruguin 7 Men with live lion

Geographical location

This lake is located between 51 degrees and 44 minutes and 51 degrees and 51 minutes of east longitude and 29 degrees and 32 minutes and 30 seconds of north latitude. Its area is 4300 hectares and its height is 820 meters above the open water level. Its catchment area is 266.5 square kilometers and its largest area is in April.

Biodiversity

Flora

* In this lake, different types of coarse or fine algae and submerged algae containing green algae live, including the following:

Phytoplankton Phytoplankton () are the autotrophic (self-feeding) components of the plankton community and a key part of ocean and freshwater Aquatic ecosystem, ecosystems. The name comes from the Greek language, Greek words (), meaning 'plant', and (), mea ...

Spirogyra ''Spirogyra'' (common names include water silk, mermaid's tresses, and blanket weed) is a genus of filamentous charophyte green algae of the order Zygnematales, named for the helical or spiral arrangement of the chloroplasts that is charact ...

, Nitzschia, Lemanea, Gomphosphaeria,

Gymnodinium ''Gymnodinium'' is a genus of dinoflagellates, a type of marine and freshwater plankton. It is one of the few naked dinoflagellates, or species lacking armor known as cellulosic plates. Since 2000, the species which had been considered to be part ...

. * Submerged plants in Parishan Lake, which are completely submerged in water, include the following types:

Najadaceae ''Najas'', the water-nymphs or naiads, is a genus of aquatic plants. It is cosmopolitan in distribution, first described for modern science by Linnaeus in 1753. Until 1997, it was rarely placed in the Hydrocharitaceae,Angiosperm Phylogeny Grou ...

and

Ceratophyllaceae Ceratophyllaceae is a cosmopolitan family of flowering plants including one living genus commonly found in ponds, marshes, and quiet streams in tropical and in temperate regions. It is the only extant family in the order Ceratophyllales. Species ...

families are plants that are completely submerged in water and only their flowers may appear on the surface or outside of the water surface. * Different types of plants like the following live in this ecosystem:

Phragmites ''Phragmites'' () is a genus of four species of large perennial plant, perennial reed (plant), reed Poaceae, grasses found in wetlands throughout temperate and tropical regions of the world. Taxonomy The World Checklist of Selected Plant Famili ...

, Typhaceae,

Cyperaceae The Cyperaceae () are a family of graminoid (grass-like), monocotyledonous flowering plants known as wikt:sedge, sedges. The family (biology), family is large; botanists have species description, described some 5,500 known species in about 90 ...

Liliaceae The lily family, Liliaceae, consists of about 15 genera and 610 species of flowering plants within the order Liliales. They are monocotyledonous, perennial, herbaceous, often bulbous geophytes. Plants in this family have evolved with a fai ...

Fauna

10 species of fish live in Parishan Lake, which are in the order of average abundance: Capoeta barroisi,

Shishamo , or ''Spirinchus lanceolatus'', is an anadromous smelt native to Hokkaido, Japan. Description This fish averages 15 centimeters in length, with a maximum recorded length of 70 cm. It is generally dark on the back with a silver-white unders ...

, Mesopotamian himri,

Eurasian carp The common carp (''Cyprinus carpio''), also known as European carp, Eurasian carp, or simply carp, is a widespread freshwater fish of eutrophic waters in lakes and large rivers in Europe and Asia.Fishbase''Cyprinus carpio'' Linnaeus, 1758/ref>Ark ...

,''

Hypostomus plecostomus ''Hypostomus plecostomus'', also known as the suckermouth catfish or common pleco, is a tropical freshwater fish belonging to the Loricariidae, armored catfish family (Loricariidae), named for the longitudinal rows of armour (anatomy), armor-lik ...

'' , Crucian carp,

Anguillidae The Anguillidae are a family of ray-finned fish that contains the freshwater eels. All the extant species and six subspecies in this family are in the genus ''Anguilla'', and are elongated fish of snake-like bodies, with long dorsal, caudal and a ...

, Liza abu and Shabout.

Registered in UNESCO

This lake has been registered as an international wetland in the Ramsar Convention and is considered a protected area in the division of regions.

drying up of the lake

The existence of 1,300 wells for unsustainable agriculture has been the main reason for the drying up of Parishan Lake.

References

{{Protected Areas of Iran Parishan Landforms of Fars province Biosphere reserves of Iran Lakes in Fars province