The Sozh River is one of the most beautiful rivers in Belarus. The Sozh River is amazing: information and facts What is the course of the Sozh River
The route along the river Conversation (from Belynkovichi) and r. Sozh (to Gomel) Length 215 km.
Time: June 2007
My old dream was to go through the resettlement zone. There is always something mysterious in the places where people once lived. You can see nature polluted by people at every step, but I wanted to see how nature lives without people. The choice fell on the route along Besedi. Before the trip about the Besed river, we knew only what is written in the encyclopedia. “The channel is highly winding and branched, the width is 15-20 m in the upper reaches and 30-40 m in the lower reaches, in some areas up to 100 meters. The river valley is indented by oxbow lakes and tributaries, and is swampy in places. The banks are steep in places. 20% of the territory of the river basin is covered with forests. The water flow at the mouth is 28.4 cubic meters / sec. (for comparison: Ptich - 45.6, Shchara - 37.7, Svisloch - 40-50).
The means of transportation along the route were two Taimen-2 kayaks. We took a dosimeter with us for radiation monitoring. Preliminary calculation of mileage was carried out using the OZI EXPLORER computer program. The mileage traveled was monitored by GPS readings. According to preliminary calculations, the mileage was 205 km, according to the final - 215 km. The difference between the calculated and the distance traveled was explained by the inaccuracy of the measurement using an electronic map. This difference amounted to approximately 4.5%, and was maximum in the first two days (+10%).
The Grodno-Belynkovichi train rushed us to the final station in one night. After the bustle of the capital, the station struck us with silence and an almost complete absence of people. The radiation background (hereinafter referred to as RF) at the station and the adjacent territory turned out to be within 20 microSieverts/hour (μSv/h). We had to get to Besedi about 3 km. There were no regular buses, passing transport, too. The locals said that there are cars on a weekday, but today was Saturday. Waiting for transport, they were on duty near the store. People began to approach the opening of the store, among which there were many humanoid creatures in untidy clothes with bluish faces and reddish eyes. Of the vehicles, only the Belarus tractor, the pride of the domestic engineering industry, with a mounted plow and a sober tractor driver, was found. Backpacks and boats were laid and tied directly to the plow. I sat next to the tractor driver, and the rest went on foot. So we haven't traveled yet. True, there was another option for the delivery of equipment. It would be possible to send one person to the village of Belynkovichi, along the outskirts of which a river flowed, and he would find transport and return to the station for equipment.
1st day of the trip.
Boats were collected in the meadow below the road bridge (there is a shop nearby).
The river is 15-20 meters wide, shallow, the bottom is sandy, hard. The shores are meadow, along the shores alder, oaks, and sometimes pine forests occasionally come across.
RF on the river 6–9, on the shore 9–14 µSv/h.
9.7 km. We passed the Druzhba oil pipeline. The river became much wider, the forest receded.
10-20 km. Meadow shores, forest periodically appears. There are places to hang out. On the river are the villages of Kolodlivo and Dubrova.
20-25 km. The river is wide, sometimes divided into branches, there are many oxbow lakes. There is no forest on the shore, but there is a solid shore with a convenient exit.
RF on the river 6-8, on the banks 9-11 µSv/h.
25-27 km. Willows and alders grow along the banks. There are no places to hang out.
27.8 km. Ford. There is a spring on the right bank. You can find a place to park at some distance from the river. RF 17-20. Further to the road bridge (village Prudok) there are no parking spaces. We stopped at the 30th kilometer on the left bank. Gentle cliff 1.5 meters high. The shore is meadow, but in some places there are bushes and trees, and with them firewood. RF on the coast is 30-50, and a little further, in lowlands and bushes up to 98 µSv/h. We chose a site for tents with RF 30-34. Walked 33 km in a day
2nd day of the trip.
I'm going to the resettlement zone.
On the 34th and 36th km Besed approaches the sandy cliffs on the left bank, at the top there is a pine forest. We pass the non-residential villages of Zarechye and Khotimsk. There are no traces of human presence, and only a single pillar on the shore and old piles in the water indicate that people once lived here. RF on water 10-11. The shores are meadow in places, swampy in places, many bushes. Sometimes you can find a way out, but there are no good places to stop.
On the 47th and 48th kilometer, the left bank of the river approaches a pine forest on a steep bank. In these places, the river forms large and deep oxbow lakes. Similar places are found several times in the section from 48 to 50 km. On the 51st km we approach the village of Antonovka (Russia, Bryansk region). At the beginning of the village there are abandoned dilapidated objects, but the village is inhabited. Behind the village, the river goes back into the meadows and marshes. At the 56th km, the river comes to a high left bank with a pine forest. The locals call this place Bald Mountain. Landfall is poor and parking space can only be found at the very top. There is a spring on the side of the mountain. RF on the river 9, on the slope of the mountain 16-20. In other places on the passed section, they did not go ashore and did not control the Russian Federation. After a kilometer and a half, a similar coast with an old woman, but already called Black Mountain (not to be confused with Montenegro). At about 60 km we stopped for lunch. RF on the river 10, 10-15 meters from the shore 28-30, and even further it reaches 90 µSv/h. A good parking spot is found at the 67th km, then behind the village of Makarichi. On the 71st km there is a gentle hard coast and a pine forest 30 meters away. Similar places are found 3-4 more times. Stopped at 74.5 km (41 km covered in a day)
The parking place is not bad: a high bank with a pine forest. The shore is convenient for swimming and mooring, just below the meadow, where we set up tents. Nearby is a large, fishy, oxbow river with a depth of more than 2 m. RF on the mountain in the forest 14, in the meadow 18-20 µSv/h.p
3rd day of the trip.
76.2 km is the mouth of the Paluzh River, and below it (77th km) is a gently sloping sandy shore bordered by bushes. Further, the banks are meadow, along the banks there are many willow trees and bushes, frequent oxbow lakes. On the 80th km on the left there is a high bank with a good exit and a pine forest. Here is the old lady. And a little lower there are 3 more convenient exits and good places with equipped parking lots.
82 km. We approached Krasnaya Gora (the district center of the Bryansk region, 7 thousand people). On the territory of Krasnaya Gora, the river has a wide, slightly swampy floodplain, forms channels, oxbow lakes, and islands. In a word, it forms something like a landscape park. A suspension pedestrian bridge stretches across the floodplain, the longest of all I have seen before. On the territory of the city, the banks are polluted with various kinds of garbage. And, as the highest manifestation of civilization, the discharge of sewage into the river. At the end of the city there is a road bridge. Outside the city, the river becomes wide and uninteresting. And only after 10 km the river narrows somewhat and beautiful places appear. On the 92nd km on the left there is a beach, good access to the shore and a clearing bordered by a pine forest. 98th km, on the right is an oxbow lake, and behind it is a solid, flat bank with a pine forest 30 meters from the water. 100th kilometer: on the right are three sandy slopes with a pine forest above and a bivouac area below. Next come the coast with swampy, or overgrown with bushes, coastline. Near the village of Cossack Bolsuny (this is Belarus again), the river once again divides into branches, forming islands in a swampy area (there are such places on Ptich in the middle reaches). We decided to go through one of the secondary arms. First, we walked 300-400 meters along a narrow and shallow channel, and then we got into a labyrinth of swampy lakes, bays, oxbow lakes and a channel. The GPS showed us that we were about to enter the main channel, but each time the next channel disappeared in the thickets of bushes, and we returned back and looked for new exits. Throughout the vast water area there were numerous nets and tops. It was a real poaching reserve, where Rybnadzor had never set foot. I must say that getting into the mainstream cost us some effort. After leaving the labyrinth, we walked a few more kilometers along a floodplain swampy and overgrown with bushes and came to a beautiful place. At the 112th kilometer, the river rested against a hard, gently sloping sandy bank and went to the right, and a huge branched oxbow lake went to the left. A pine forest stood on the shore, bordering a cozy clearing. Here we stopped for the night. We walked 38 km in one day. RF on the shore, in the clearing and in the forest did not exceed 26 µSv/h.
4th day of the trip.
The next morning, after walking 200 meters, we found another good place. But further, for 10 kilometers, the river meandered along a wide swampy floodplain among swamps, meadows and oxbow lakes. The first place for a halt appeared opposite the village of Chemernya (landmark power line): on the left, a gentle, solid bank with bushes and trees in the distance. Another place, convenient for overnight stay, will meet after another 2 km: the river approaches a gently sloping sandy shore with a pine forest, and then a sandy cliff begins. Then we pass another 10 km along a swampy floodplain with overgrown bushes and meadow banks. Of the landmarks, we will only meet the bridge in the village of Svetilovichi, the village of Zhelezniki with the mouth of the river. Stolbunki, and the village of Nekrasovo. And only on the 141st km the river approaches the left bank to a sandy cliff with a pine forest and an equipped parking lot. Further, the river becomes uninteresting again and, although one or the other bank periodically rises, there are no parking lots. The village of Starye Gromyki remained unnoticed by us from the river. The village of Khiza was calculated by GPS and decided to go for reconnaissance. We climbed a high shore, overgrown with bushes and uncut grass for years, and immediately found ourselves in the village. From the houses there were destroyed cellars and foundations, densely overgrown with three-meter birches. The contours of the farmsteads were guessed from the concrete columns of fences that were preserved in some places (marauders were not able to take them all out). Instead of wells, there are deep holes in the ground (the upper, outer rings were removed and taken out). In the vegetable gardens there are dense thickets of garlic, juicy stems almost to the waist. Old, hardened, neglected fruit trees look ridiculous, and look more like crosses in an abandoned cemetery. Above everything, solitary poles with dangling wires and stork nests rise above. And through the whole village stretches the road to nowhere, or rather to the past. In the past, when people lived here, worked, loved, rejoiced, gave birth and raised children. From the past life, only the pediments of the cowshed and the village cemetery have been preserved. On the road, the dosimeter showed 30-40 µSv/h, but as soon as you got off the road, it broke into a squeak, showing from 80 to 190 µSv/h.
We moved away from the village and began to look for a place to stay for the night. From time to time there were good places, but everywhere the dosimeter showed from 100 to 170 µSv/h, although RF remained within 18 µSv/h on the river itself. We stopped at the 160th km, on a large and beautiful sandy spit, set up tents one and a half meters from the water. RF 18-20. We covered 48 km in one day.
5th day of the trip
The river is clean, beautiful, sometimes there are good places. However, the dosimeter shows almost everywhere a level of 140-160, and on the river and sandy beaches 12-14 µSv/h. 167th km: the river is divided into 3 branches. 168th km: on the left on the solid bank of the oak forest. RF 110. There are many beaches and oxbow lakes on the river.
172.6 km: a metal bridge, probably built for work on the liquidation of the consequences of the Chernobyl accident. This bridge is not on the map. On the bridge checkpoint (a large booth with a stove). This is a good place to park, and the checkpoint house can be used as a shelter from rain and cold. RF in the vicinity of the bridge is not more than 20 µSv/h. Below the bridge on the left bank there is a beautiful sandy cliff. Opposite, on the right bank is a huge sandy beach. RF on the beach 11, on the cliff 46, and 20 meters away, in the nearest hollow 176 µSv/h. On the left bank, a few hundred meters from the bridge, you can see the remains of what used to be the village of Besed. True, one house, closest to the bridge, has been preserved and now about 20 people with an incomprehensible social status live there. They have something like a commune there. 175th km: on the right is an oxbow lake, pines and oaks, opposite the beach.
We entered Sozh at 181.5 km. There is a smooth current on the Sozh, our average speed is 8.5 - 9.0 km / h. All the way to Gomel on the Sozh there are many good sandy beaches, turning into a gentle coast and closed from the coast by a wall of willow bushes and trees. On one of these beaches, 6 km below the bridge of the R-30 highway, we stopped for the last night. RF on the beaches of the river. Coolant within 12 µSv/h.p
6th day of the trip.
Sozh originates on the Smolensk-Moscow Upland, 12 km south of the city of Smolensk. On a stretch of 20 km, the river serves as the border between Belarus and Russia. The length of the river is 648 km (the length of the Russian section is 155 km), the basin area is 42.1 thousand km 2 - the 2nd in terms of basin area (after the Desna) and the 3rd in length (after the Desna and Psel) Russian tributary of the Dnieper. The main right-bank tributary is the Pronya. Left-bank Oster, Besed, Iput flow into the river. Sozh on Belarusian territory.
The river basin is located on the Orsha-Mogilev plain plateau and in the Gomel Polissya. Humidification of the pool is sufficient. Annual rainfall in the basin is 700–750 mm. The average annual temperature is 5.1°C. The forest cover of the basin is about 25%, swampiness is 10%, plowing is 40%. About 11% of the catchment area has been reclaimed. There are no large lakes or reservoirs. Lots of ponds. The river system of the tree type is well developed. The density of the river network is 0.44 km / km 2, the average slope is 0.16‰.
In the upper reaches of the Sozh there is a small river with a winding channel and insignificant depth. The riverbed abounds in riffles. Plot from with. Flocks to the city of Krichev (Belarus) are lockable. Below the town of Krichev, the river valley expands, the floodplain increases to 3 km. The river becomes more full of water, its width increases to 250 m, depth - up to 4–5 m.
Meals are mixed, mostly snowy. The share of snow supply is about 50%, underground - 42%, rain - 8%. The average annual water consumption near the city of Gomel is 207 m 3 / s (the volume of runoff is 6.533 km 3 / year). Sozh is a river with an Eastern European type of water regime. The spring flood usually begins in the first half of April. The maximum water flow near the city of Gomel is 6600 m 3 / s. The share of spring runoff in the annual runoff is 64%. In summer, low water is unstable, quite often disturbed by rain floods. The minimum water consumption is 16.4 m 3 / s. The share of summer-autumn runoff is 25%, winter - 11% of the annual water runoff.
The largest seasonal range of water level fluctuations is 6 m. The ice cover usually forms at the end of November. The maximum ice thickness is up to 40 cm. The ice breaks up in late March - early April. The turbidity of the water is low - 15.8 g / m 3. Mineralization reaches 300 mg/l in winter, decreases to 90–100 mg/l during floods, and increases to 200–250 mg/l in summer. Housing and communal and industrial waters enter the river. Water is classified as moderately polluted or relatively clean. Sozh is considered one of the cleanest rivers in Europe.
The river is inhabited by fish of such species as pike, perch, roach, bream, golden crucian carp, bleak, silver bream, chub, as well as Ukrainian lamprey. On the river there are the cities of Krichev, Cherikov, Slavgorod, Chechersk, Vetka, Gomel.
V.A. Bug, N.I. Alekseevsky
The Sozh River is one of the most beautiful rivers in Belarus. Its length is 648 km, of which 155 km flows through the territory of Russia. It is the second largest after the river. Pripyat. The width of its channel in the lower reaches is 230 m.
Basic data
The Sozh River originates in Russia on the Smolensk-Moscow Upland, 12 km south of the city of Smolensk, and then flows through the territory of two Belarusian regions - Mogilev and Gomel. The catchment area is asymmetric and clearly defined, which is especially noticeable along the left bank.
The total catchment area is:
In Russia - 42140 km 2;
In Belarus - 21,700 km 2.
The coolant reaches 6 meters at a current speed that sometimes exceeds 1.5 m/s. As a result, in the section of the river near Gomel, the river carries about 200 cubic meters of water in one minute.
For the most part, the relief of the basin is represented by small hills, the height of which does not exceed 20 m. Individual sections are separated by deep ravines and gullies. rather winding, which is especially noticeable near Slavgorod, where a rather large bend is observed near the river.
Before Gomel, there are even sandy islands on the river, the length of which does not exceed 300 m, and the width is 50 m. As for lakes, their area in the catchment area is less than 1%. In fact, these are separate mirror reservoirs, the area of \u200b\u200bwhich does not exceed 1 km 2.
Water level changes
The rise continues for a crescent in the upper reaches and about a month in the lower reaches. The water level in the Sozh River begins to increase from the end of March. At the same time, the smallest water height is 4 m, and the largest is 7.5 m. Often, in late spring or early summer, the water level can rise by several meters as a result of prolonged downpours and floods, the duration of which sometimes exceeds one month.
The winter rise in the average level is only a few tens of centimeters higher than the summer one and in most cases passes almost imperceptibly.
The Sozh begins to freeze at the beginning of winter, and opens only in the middle of spring, and this process begins from the mouth to the upper reaches. The average water temperature in the Sozh River in summer is 19-28°C.
origin of name
This river was the central river for the Eastern Slavs Radimichi. The influence of the Sozh River in the history of the Radimichi land should be viewed through the prism of factors: the role of the Sozh in the socio-economic, political and spiritual life of people. Of course, the role of Sozh in the socio-economic life was the greatest. The Sozh River was an integral part of the trade route "from the Varangians to the Greeks." Along the banks of the river and its tributaries, the Slavs founded their rural settlements and cities. Sozh was one of the main factors that influenced the emergence of Gomel.
fishing
All kinds of fish are found in the Sozh, but their numbers have been significantly affected by an increase in the level of poaching and weather conditions, because as a result of a large number of floods, it is sometimes difficult for fish to enter the Sozh to spawn.
After the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the Sozh River has ceased to be used for industrial fishing, and the herbage in it is no longer removed. As a result, constant decay of vegetation occurs, and the content of harmful substances in the water increases significantly, the last spawning grounds and places of mass feeding of many fish species are destroyed.
Wide sandy strips stretch along the coastal areas along the entire length of the river. The bottom in close proximity to the river is sandy, thanks to which both adults and children can swim in the river. In the area of the urban village Loev Sozh flows into the Dnieper, through which the greatest waterway from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea previously ran, known since ancient times as the route “from the Varangians to the Greeks”.
Russia Russia, Belarus Belarus, Ukraine Ukraine
The width of the Sozh channel in the lower reaches reaches 230 m, the depth is up to 5-6 m, the flow rate is sometimes more than 1.5 m per second. Near Gomel every second the river carries about 200 m³ of water. This water is famous for its high purity. Sozh is one of the cleanest rivers in Europe.
tributaries
Economic use
The length of the navigable section of the river is 373 km. Previously, a sluice system operated on the Sozha, which was destroyed during the Great Patriotic War.
The following cities stand on the river: (downstream): Krichev, Cherikov, Slavgorod, Chechersk, Vetka, Gomel.
hydronym
There are several assumptions about the origin of the name of the river:
At the same time, it should be noted that there is no evidence of Finnish or Iranian tribes living in the Sozha river basin. In the 3rd millennium BC. Finno-Ugric peoples appeared on the territory of the Dvina and Posozhye.
On some old maps it bears the name Sozhzh. Forms met in the past Szhzh, Szhitsa, Sozha, Sozh .
Photo
Fishing on the river Sozh. Krichev or Krychaw (Belarus).JPG
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Notes
Literature
- // Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - St. Petersburg. , 1890-1907.
- The Sozh River // Reservoirs of the Moscow Region: Directory of the Moscow Society "Angler-Athlete" / Editor-compiler I. Chukhrai. - M .: Soviet Russia, 1969. - S. 177 - 179. - 224 p. - 50,000 copies.
Links
- Sozh- article from the Great Soviet Encyclopedia.
- Sozh // Dictionary of modern geographical names / Rus. geogr. about. Moscow Centre; Under total ed. acad. V. M. Kotlyakova. . - Yekaterinburg: U-Factoria, 2006.
- on the Yandex.Panorama service.
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An excerpt characterizing the Sozh (river)
- White! white!This meant that Tikhon was not giving him the vest he wanted. Another time he stopped and asked:
- And soon she will give birth? - and, shaking his head reproachfully, he said: - Not good! Go on, go on.
The third time, when Prince Andrei finished the description, the old man sang in a false and senile voice: “Malbroug s” en va t en guerre. Dieu sait guand revendra.
The son just smiled.
- I'm not saying that this was a plan that I approve, - said the son, - I just told you what is. Napoleon had already drawn up his plan no worse than this.
Well, you didn't tell me anything new. - And the old man thoughtfully said to himself quickly: - Dieu sait quand revendra. - Go to the dining room.
At the appointed hour, powdered and shaved, the prince went into the dining room, where his daughter-in-law, Princess Mary, m lle Bourienne and the prince’s architect, who, by a strange whim, were admitted to the table, were waiting for him, although this insignificant person by his position could not count on such an honor. . The prince, who firmly adhered to the difference in fortunes in life and rarely allowed even important provincial officials to come to the table, suddenly proved to the architect Mikhail Ivanovich, who was blowing his nose in a checkered handkerchief in a corner, that all people are equal, and more than once inspired his daughter that Mikhail Ivanovich did nothing worse than you and me. At the table, the prince most often turned to the dumb Mikhail Ivanovich.
In the dining room, enormously high, like all the rooms in the house, the household and the waiters who stood behind every chair were waiting for the prince to come out; the butler, with a napkin on his hand, looked around at the table setting, winking at the lackeys and constantly darting restlessly from the wall clock to the door from which the prince was supposed to appear. Prince Andrei looked at a huge, new to him, golden frame depicting the genealogical tree of the Bolkonsky princes, hanging opposite the same huge frame with a badly made (apparently by the hand of a house painter) image of a sovereign prince in a crown, who was supposed to come from Rurik and be the ancestor the Bolkonsky family. Prince Andrei looked at this family tree, shaking his head, and chuckled with the air with which one looks at a portrait that is similar to the ridiculous.
How do I recognize him here! he said to Princess Marya, who came up to him.
Princess Mary looked at her brother in surprise. She didn't understand what he was smiling at. Everything her father had done aroused in her awe that was beyond negotiation.
“Everyone has their own Achilles heel,” continued Prince Andrei. “With his great mind, donner dans ce ridicule!” [succumb to this pettiness!]
Princess Marya could not understand the boldness of her brother’s judgments and was preparing to object to him, when the expected steps were heard from the study: the prince entered quickly, cheerfully, as he always walked, as if deliberately with his hasty manners representing the opposite of the strict order of the house.
At the same instant, the big clock struck two, and others echoed in a thin voice in the drawing-room. The prince stopped; from under thick drooping eyebrows, lively, shining, stern eyes looked around at everyone and stopped at the young princess. The young princess experienced at that time the feeling that courtiers feel at the royal entrance, that feeling of fear and reverence that this old man aroused in all those close to him. He stroked the princess on the head and then, with an awkward movement, patted her on the back of the head.
"I'm glad, I'm glad," he said, and, still looking intently into her eyes, he quickly walked away and sat down in his place. - Sit down, sit down! Mikhail Ivanovich, sit down.
He showed his daughter-in-law a place beside him. The waiter pulled out a chair for her.
- Go, go! said the old man, looking at her rounded waist. - Hurry up, not good!
He laughed dryly, coldly, unpleasantly, as he always laughed, with one mouth and not with his eyes.
“You have to walk, walk, as much as possible, as much as possible,” he said.
The little princess did not hear or did not want to hear his words. She was silent and seemed embarrassed. The prince asked her about her father, and the princess spoke and smiled. He asked her about common acquaintances: the princess became even more animated and began to talk, conveying to the prince bows and city gossip.
- La comtesse Apraksine, la pauvre, a perdu son Mariei, et elle a pleure les larmes de ses yeux, [Princess Apraksina, poor thing, lost her husband and cried out all her eyes,] she said, more and more animated.
As she revived, the prince looked at her more and more sternly, and suddenly, as if he had studied her enough and formed a clear idea about her, turned away from her and turned to Mikhail Ivanovich.
- Well, Mikhail Ivanovich, Buonaparte is having a bad time with us. How did Prince Andrei (he always called his son that in the third person) told me what forces were gathering on him! And we all considered him an empty person.
Mikhail Ivanovich, who resolutely did not know when we had said such words about Bonaparte, but who understood that he was needed to enter into a favorite conversation, looked at the young prince in surprise, not knowing himself what would come of it.
He is a great tactician! - said the prince to his son, pointing to the architect.
And the conversation turned again to the war, about Bonaparte and the current generals and statesmen. The old prince, it seemed, was convinced not only that all the current leaders were boys who did not understand the ABCs of military and state affairs, and that Bonaparte was an insignificant Frenchman who had success only because there were no Potemkins and Suvorovs to oppose him; but he was even convinced that there were no political difficulties in Europe, there was no war either, but there was some kind of puppet comedy played by today's people, pretending to do business. Prince Andrei cheerfully endured his father's mockery of new people and with apparent joy called his father to a conversation and listened to him.
“Everything seems good as it was before,” he said, “but didn’t the same Suvorov fall into the trap that Moreau set for him, and didn’t know how to get out of it?
The largest tributary of the Dnieper, which is in second place in terms of water content, is the Sozh, a river flowing from Russia through Belarus. It also has left and right tributaries - Pronya, Besed, Iput. The beginning of the river is in the Smolensk region. The river crosses different geomorphological regions of glacial origin. Near the town of Loeva, the Sozh flows into the Dnieper.
Geographical position
So, one of the most amazing rivers flowing on the territory of the former Soviet Union begins its journey from the Smolensk-Moscow upland, 12 km south of Smolensk itself.
The Sozh River passes through two regions of Belarus: Gomel and Mogilev. Its total length is 648 kilometers. The upper reaches of the river belong to Russia, the length of which is 155 kilometers. The total catchment area of the river is 42,140 km². Of these, within the limits of Belarus, the catchment area is 21,700 km².
The Sozh River is not only beautiful, but also clean. It is cleaner than most rivers flowing in Europe. Its tributaries are mainly within Belarus. So, Pronya has a length of 172 kilometers, Besed - 261 kilometers, Iput - 437 kilometers. The cities of Cherikov, Gomel, Krichev, Slavgorod, Vetka, Chechersk are majestically located on the banks of the Sozh.
The water artery of Belarus has a well-defined trapezoidal valley, with a depth of 20 to 30 m. In places of the Krichevsky region, the Sozh river has a width of 1.5 to 3 km, and at a rather long distance. And in the Oster valley, where the rivers join together, its width reaches 5 km. Having merged with the Besed River, the Sozh River continues to flow through the Polissya of Belarus.
Its slopes are predominantly moderately steep and gentle. Their height reaches 25 m. The banks of the river are rich in ravines, gullies and valleys of tributaries.
coast
On the left bank of the described water stream, forests are mainly located, on the right - open spaces and arable land. The exposed areas of the valleys contain morgel-cretaceous rocks with flint raw materials. The river bed is winding, especially near Slavgorod. On the way to Gomel, you can meet sandy islands. The length of the islands is from 30 to 300 m.
If you move along the river to the mouth of the Pronya, the banks become steep, then gently sloping, and below Slavgorod - steep.
In the lower reaches, the width of the channel reaches 230 m, and its depth is from 5 to 6 meters. The speed of the river flow is more than 1.5 m/s.
Sozh has its own port - Gomel, and a branch of the river shipping company of Belarus is located here. The water artery serves as a river route for passenger and freight traffic.
Level
Unfortunately, it happens that the level of the Sozh River rises so much that it floods the nearby populated areas. For example, having risen to a level of 578 cm, the river flooded 118 farmsteads, and the Novobelitsky district of Gomel was recognized as the most affected. Only due to the fact that the foundation of private houses is very high, water did not get inside the dwelling. But the gardens were flooded. Most of all, when the water level in the Sozh River rises in these places, Polevaya Street suffers. Rescuers from the Ministry of Emergency Situations are constantly on duty here, and some residents find themselves literally cut off from civilization. Residents are taken out of the flooded areas on boats.
The increase in the level in the river lasts up to two weeks in the upper reaches and up to one month in the lower reaches of the river. The smallest height is 4 meters, and the largest is 7.5 meters. If prolonged showers are observed, then the probability of an increase in the level increases. Especially if such a period lasts more than a month.
Relief
The river valley is characterized by the presence of relief, fairly well-defined, through terraces: one floodplain and two above the floodplain. They are of considerable length. At Loev, the Sozh flows into the mighty and wide Dnieper.
The relief of the river is unique, and a large number of small tributaries flowing into the Sozh save it from drought during hot summers, filling it with water. Many small tributaries become a source of water replenishment for the Sozh River in the hottest time of summer. Sandy shores can be observed below the city of Vetka. Here are located, respectively, sandy beaches.
On the right, Sozh has tributaries of the rivers Vihra, Uza, Volchas, Pronya. On the left - Khmaru, Iput, Oster, Ut, Besed. The river along its course has many windings, small sedge islands. In winter, ice on the river can be up to 60 centimeters thick. In the spring - from mid-March, less often in early April - the flood begins. It can last up to 25 days (minimum 10 days).
Fish and its prey
Fishing is carried out almost throughout the river. The water expanses of the Sozh are rich in perch, roach, pike, pike perch, and bream. Here they catch tench, golden carp, perch, Ukrainian lamprey, chub and silver bream.
Undoubtedly, the Sozh River, the temperature of which in summer is over 22 °C, and in August it can reach 28 °C, is attractive for tourists and the local population.
And this is despite the fact that some part of the river passes through Chernobyl - the zone of the great catastrophe. Here the water is contaminated with radionuclides.
On average, water at the mouth is consumed in the amount of 19 m³ / s, and the average slope of the river water surface is 0.17%. The middle course of the river falls on the Orsha-Mogilev plain. More than half (57%) of the annual runoff of river water falls on the time of high water, spring. Ice drift, which begins in March, usually lasts from three to five days.
For the Eastern Slavs - Radimichi - Sozh was the central river. In their history, she played a political, socio-economic and spiritual role. It was Sozh that played a decisive role in the arrangement of the city of Gomel. The river was part of the trade route "from the Varangians to the Greeks".