Iony Island (russian: Остров Ионы), or Jonas' Island, formerly Ostrov Svyatogo Iony ( Saint Jonas' Island), is a small island in the Sea of Okhotsk.

Geography

Iony Island is the only island in the Sea of Okhotsk that is located in the open sea. All other islands in the Okhotsk Sea are either coastal or belong to the

Kuril The Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands (; rus, Кури́льские острова́, r=Kuril'skiye ostrova, p=kʊˈrʲilʲskʲɪjə ɐstrɐˈva; Japanese: or ) are a volcanic archipelago currently administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast in the ...

island chain. It is in length, wide, and rises to a height of . The island is barren and conical in shape with sheer cliffs rising to heights of . Several rocks lie off the island, including a group of four high rocks about to the north-northwest and several detached rocks to the south. The island is often enveloped in dense fog due to cold bottom water

upwelling Upwelling is an oceanographic phenomenon that involves wind-driven motion of dense, cooler, and usually nutrient-rich water from deep water towards the ocean surface. It replaces the warmer and usually nutrient-depleted surface water. The nut ...

to the surface. The flood

tidal current Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the Moon (and to a much lesser extent, the Sun) and are also caused by the Earth and Moon orbiting one another. Tide tables c ...

off the island sets west, while the ebb sets to the east or east-southeast. These currents may reach up to 1.5 to 2

knots A knot is a fastening in rope or interwoven lines. Knot may also refer to: Places * Knot, Nancowry, a village in India Archaeology * Knot of Isis (tyet), symbol of welfare/life. * Minoan snake goddess figurines#Sacral knot Arts, entertainme ...

during spring tides and create numerous

eddies In fluid dynamics, an eddy is the swirling of a fluid and the reverse current created when the fluid is in a turbulent flow regime. The moving fluid creates a space devoid of downstream-flowing fluid on the downstream side of the object. Fluid b ...

, small

whirlpool A whirlpool is a body of rotating water produced by opposing currents or a current running into an obstacle. Small whirlpools form when a bath or a sink is draining. More powerful ones formed in seas or oceans may be called maelstroms ( ). ''Vo ...

s, and tide rips around the island for some distance offshore.National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. (2014). ''Sailing Directions (Enroute): East Coast of Russia''. U.S. Government, Springfield, Virginia. Administratively, Iony belongs to the Khabarovsk Krai of the

Russian Federation Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

History

As early as 1849 whaleships had reached Jonas Island. Between 1852 and 1866 the island's waters were a common hunting ground for ships cruising for bowhead whales — Captain Moses Snell, of the ship ''Pacific'', of Fairhaven, reported seeing as many as forty-five other ships from his masthead just to the south of the island early in June 1855. The fleet would usually reach the area by late May or early June, spending a few weeks cruising for whales before sailing to the south and west, following the retreating ice. Some would go ashore to take advantage of the bounty of

seabird Seabirds (also known as marine birds) are birds that are adapted to life within the marine environment. While seabirds vary greatly in lifestyle, behaviour and physiology, they often exhibit striking convergent evolution, as the same enviro ...

s and

pinniped Pinnipeds (pronounced ), commonly known as seals, are a widely range (biology), distributed and diverse clade of carnivorous, fin-footed, semiaquatic, mostly marine mammal, marine mammals. They comprise the extant taxon, extant family (biology ...

s residing on the island's rocky shores.''Storfursten Constantin'', of Helsinki, June 1860. In Lindholm, O. V., Haes, T. A., & Tyrtoff, D. N. (2008). ''Beyond the frontiers of imperial Russia: From the memoirs of Otto W. Lindholm''. Javea, Spain: A. de Haes OWL Publishing. On 3 June 1855 the ship ''Edgar'', of Cold Spring, was wrecked on the island during a fog. All hands were saved. The ship then caught or was set on fire. Ships sent boats ashore to salvage what they could of the reported 1,200 to 1,600 bbls of oil that had been aboard the ship, while others picked up whatever they found drifting offshore. Schooners hunted

fur seal Fur seals are any of nine species of pinnipeds belonging to the subfamily Arctocephalinae in the family '' Otariidae''. They are much more closely related to sea lions than true seals, and share with them external ears (pinnae), relatively l ...

s on the island between 1889 and 1896. At least 2,250 were caught, with a peak of 879 by four schooners in 1890.Stejneger, Leonard (1896). ''The Russian fur-seal islands''. Washington, Govt. Print. Off.Jordan, David Starr (1898). ''The fur seals and fur-seal islands of the North Pacific Ocean''. Washington, Govt. Print. Off.

Fauna

The island is a breeding ground for the Steller sea lion.Northern Sea Lion Distribution and Abundance: 1956-80
/ref> In the spring and summer, a number of

s nest on the island, including

northern fulmar The northern fulmar (''Fulmarus glacialis''), fulmar, or Arctic fulmar is a highly abundant seabird found primarily in subarctic regions of the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans. There has been one confirmed sighting in the Southern Hem ...

, several species of

auk An auk or alcid is a bird of the family Alcidae in the order Charadriiformes. The alcid family includes the murres, guillemots, auklets, puffins, and murrelets. The word "auk" is derived from Icelandic ''álka'', from Old Norse ''alka'' (a ...

let ( whiskered, least, and crested), horned and

tufted puffin The tufted puffin (''Fratercula cirrhata''), also known as crested puffin, is a relatively abundant medium-sized pelagic seabird in the auk family (Alcidae) found throughout the North Pacific Ocean. It is one of three species of puffin that make ...

, common and

thick-billed murre The thick-billed murre or Brünnich's guillemot (''Uria lomvia'') is a bird in the auk family (Alcidae). This bird is named after the Danish zoologist Morten Thrane Brünnich. The very deeply black North Pacific subspecies ''Uria lomvia arra'' ...

, Leach's and fork-tailed storm petrel,

kittiwake The kittiwakes (genus ''Rissa'') are two closely related seabird species in the gull family Laridae, the black-legged kittiwake (''Rissa tridactyla'') and the red-legged kittiwake (''Rissa brevirostris''). The epithets "black-legged" and "red-l ...

gulls Gulls, or colloquially seagulls, are seabirds of the family Laridae in the suborder Lari (bird), Lari. They are most closely related to the terns and Skimmer (bird), skimmers and only distantly related to auks, and even more distantly to waders ...

, and

cormorants Phalacrocoracidae is a family of approximately 40 species of aquatic birds commonly known as cormorants and shags. Several different classifications of the family have been proposed, but in 2021 the IOC adopted a consensus taxonomy of seven gen ...

.Kondratyev, A. Y., Litvinenko, N. M., Shibaev, Y. V., Vyatkin, P. S., & Kondratyeva, L. F. (2000)
"The breeding seabirds of the Russian Far East"
''Seabirds of the Russian Far East'', 37-81.

References

External links

Khabarovsk Krai
{{Sea of Okhotsk Islands Islands of the Sea of Okhotsk Islands of the Russian Far East Islands of Khabarovsk Krai Uninhabited islands of Russia Uninhabited islands of the Pacific Ocean Shipwrecks in the Sea of Okhotsk

Geography

History

Fauna

See also

References

External links