The saiga, margach, or Kalmyk antelope is a cloven-hoofed mammal, a representative of the subfamily of real antelopes. Since 2002, the International Committee for the Conservation of Nature has classified the species as endangered and is listed in the Red Book.
In the 17-18 centuries, saigas, being the largest species of ungulates in Eurasia, inhabited all steppe and semi-desert spaces from the Carpathians to Western China and Mongolia. Today, the situation has changed dramatically. Uncontrolled barbaric hunting was the result of a catastrophic decline in the number of livestock of these animals. A sharp decrease in it set a view on the brink of extinction.
Kalmyk antelope: who is she?
Saigas are the only wild ungulate mammals living in the steppes of Russia. These amazing animals have been known since ancient times. They were contemporaries of the long-extinct mammoths and saber-toothed tigers and occupied vast territories, inhabiting all of Eurasia right up to the shores of Alaska. Due to its excellent adaptability to any conditions and high fecundity, antelopes have survived to this day. They did not suffer the fate of prehistoric mammoths and woolly rhinos, but human activity ranked these animals as an endangered species.
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The saiga is not very large, with a body length of 1-1.4 m and a height at the withers of 0.6 - 0.8 m, characterized by a characteristic humpback proboscis nose and dull in color: reddish in summer and light gray in winter. The body weight of an antelope varies from 20 to 40 kg. There are individuals weighing up to 60 kg, but this is an extremely rare sight. The hoof imprint is in the form of a heart with a bifurcated size of 6-8 cm and is very similar to the trace of a domestic sheep. In various non-standard or dangerous situations, antelopes give voice - they bleat in a peculiar way.
The saiga, the photo of which is presented in the review, has a rather original and unforgettable appearance due to the increased proboscis on the face. This important, albeit somewhat disfiguring muzzle organ is necessary for the animal. Increasing the gaps of the nasal cavity, it warms the cold air in winter, making it easier for saigas to bear the hardships of a winter cold. And in the summer, the expanded nasal passages are used as a filter, cleaning the steppe air from dust and preventing its entry into the lungs. In the harsh conditions of life, such a proboscis often saves the life of its master.
The saiga moves along the steppe with a surprisingly even amble. He seemed to roll, head lowered. The antelope runs away from any emerging danger, developing a speed of up to 60-70 km / h. True, the saiga can run at this pace no more than 10-12 km. On the run, he occasionally jumps up.
The heads of males are decorated with smoothly curved light translucent horns that begin to grow almost immediately after birth. In six-month-old individuals, horns of a dark shade. By the age of one year, the color of the horns changes from dark to light. They acquire an excellent translucent, waxy-like structure. In adult males, they have a length of horns of 40 cm.
Saiga horns, their extraordinary beauty and healing properties played a fatal role in his life. Highly regarded on the black market, they have become the cause of the barbaric extermination of a huge number of animals.
Habitat
In ancient times, saigas lived throughout Eurasia, but after the ice age they survived only in the steppe zones of the continent. 200 years ago, extending to the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains, their habitat sharply narrowed in the 20th century and today occupies small areas of the steppe regions of Russia. The steppe antelope populates exclusively open spaces with smooth, hard rocky or clay soils, avoiding even small groves and giving preference to endless low-grass steppes and semi-deserts. It is important for her to feel safe and not be exposed to sudden attacks of natural enemies.
Today, the steppe saiga lives in the territories of five different states - Russia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. On Russian open spaces saiga populations are mainly located in Kalmykia, which gives rise to the Kalmyk antelope. What does a saiga eat?
Inhabited in flat dry areas, the saiga is used to eating steppe grasses and cereals in the summer, and hodgepodge in the winter. He is rather shy and prefers to stay away from the settlements, bypasses the gardens and fields. Water for life support is needed only in the summer.
Where does the saiga live?
Saigas keep in herds of various numbers - sometimes 10-50 heads, and sometimes 100 or more. They constantly wander - in the winter they turn into low-snow semi-deserts, in the summer - into the steppe.
The saiga, whose natural habitat is the steppe, is perfectly adapted for survival in the northern semi-deserts, it is able to tolerate summer heat and winter cold, can eat more than sparse vegetation and rarely drink. Herds of margachae migrate in the endless search for unpretentious food, without causing any harm to agriculture. Saigas coexist perfectly with domestic animals, grazing on pastures alone and not at all eating them. We can say that livestock do not eat what the saiga eats. His stomach digests weeds and poisonous plants that other herbivores bypass.
Saiga migrations
Saigas are nomads. They live, constantly moving, nowhere do they linger for a long time. They are always on the go, in search of basic food - grassy vegetation.
Throughout the summer period, saiga herds in small numbers graze in the steppes, eating on the move shoots of various plain grasses, receiving food and water necessary for the body. By winter, they gather in thousandth herds and, adhering to areas of little snow, migrate to the south. The onset of winter colds, snowfalls and others make antelopes migrate to more comfortable areas for living. Excellent and hardy runners, saigas are able to overcome more than two hundred kilometers per day. But, of course, such an intense movement is not without sacrifices. The herd, led by the leader, trying to leave the zone of difficult conditions of snow captivity as quickly as possible in more comfortable areas, moves at the speed of the most hardy males, not stopping to rest. Weak and sick individuals often do not withstand such tests. Fearing to keep up with their congeners, they run exhausted and often fall dead while moving.
The connections of antelopes into huge herds and their active migration are a bewitching phenomenon, spectacular and grandiose. Each herd strictly follows the leader at some distance, repeating all his movements, even the most inconspicuous. Sometimes, on a nomadic route, saiga herds can be observed for several days.
Rut
With the onset of winter, rutting begins. During this period, the males lose their appetite and are very excited. They are especially aggressive, between them fierce fights occur, during which serious wounds are often inflicted, sometimes leading to the death of one of the participants in the duel.
Each male marks his own territory, leaving a litter, and builds his own “harem” of females conquered in battles with fellow tribesmen, the number of which can vary from 5 to 50 goals. Their number depends on the strength and activity of the male. In addition, he is forced to constantly confirm his right to own a harem. Another male can pretend to be “wives”, and then the battle starts again. When the owner of the harem loses, the victorious margach leads away several females.
Reproduction and life expectancy
The Kalmyk antelope does not live long, the life expectancy of females and males is different. Males live 4-5 years, females measure a longer period - 8-9 years. But the reproductive function of antelopes is incredible: they reproduce very quickly. Already at the age of seven months, females reach puberty and participate in the drive, bringing the first offspring at the age of one. Males reach maturity only by 2.5 years.
Annual calving takes place in May. Pregnant females, grouping in a flock, leave the herd, choosing for the calving the most remote sections of the steppes with small or very sparse vegetation and the absence of ponds, that is, places where predators do not look. Without arranging any special nooks, they give birth directly on the ground.
The first-calf female usually brings one cub, in older adults 2-3 babies are born. The first days they are absolutely helpless, lie on the ground and practically do not move, merging due to their own coloring with the general background of the area. Nature took care of them, making it possible to be inconspicuous in the most vulnerable moments of life, which often saves them from the attack of natural enemies - ferrets, foxes, eagles or other predators, when approaching the baby freezes, merging with the ground so that it is very difficult to see. Saigachata are probably the most obedient children in the world. Without moving, they lie on the ground and wait for the mother to come and feed them. Females graze at this time, visiting babies several times a day.
After a week, the saiga baby, the photo of which is presented above, is already relentlessly following its mother, after two it can run, developing the speed of an adult, and after a month it begins to pinch the grass.
Molting
In summer, saiga hair has a reddish-sand hue, as close as possible to the natural colors of dry steppes. On the back it is darker and much lighter on the sides. Twice a year - in the fall and in the spring - the margach molt passes. Winter coat is a long and thick fur that grows in winter and protects the animal from snowstorms. It is much lighter than summer and often has all shades of light gray tones. In addition, by winter, saigas have muzzle hair like reindeer on their faces. They protect the nose from hypothermia. Throughout the winter period, the winter coat regularly serves the saiga, and with the onset of spring, it is replaced by a lightweight sandy-reddish summer fur.
Natural enemies of saigas
Saigas are animals that lead a daily lifestyle. The most dangerous enemy for adults is the steppe wolf, strong and intelligent, from which the antelope can be saved only by flight. He is able to destroy more than a quarter of the herd. The steppe wolves that have strayed in flocks overtake and destroy males, pregnant females, and sick animals that have weakened after rutting. Other predators are less dangerous for antelopes. The attacks of jackals, foxes and stray dogs are often subjected to the still not very mature grown saiga. And newborn cubs can become prey for ferrets, eagles and foxes. But a high level of species reproduction is able to balance natural disasters.
A large number of animals die from pasteurellosis. Only in 2010, the epidemic of this disease reduced the number of margach by 12 thousand goals.
Hunting and poaching
One and a half hundred years ago, saigas inhabited the steppe regions from Ukraine to Lake Baikal, but by the beginning of the 20th century they remained in Russia only in the Volga and Kazakhstan regions. It was such a monstrous extermination of the species that Lenin issued a special decree prohibiting the hunting of antelopes, which did not slow to affect the sharp increase in the number of nomadic herds.
By the middle of the 20th century, saiga stock had grown to two million. Obviously, both the ban on the shooting of antelopes and the extinction of a parasite dangerous to animals — the saiga gadfly — affected. During this golden period, huge herds of Margachev constantly roamed along all the routes of their migration. In the mid-fifties, hunting was again allowed for saigas.
This situation changed in the 70s, when the active development of the vast territories that used to be the habitats of saigas significantly reduced their range. The construction of pipelines, the construction of roads, land reclamation, and the extraction of minerals violated the habitual way of life of the nomadic population, hindering the natural migration routes of artiodactyls, and the number of saigas decreased again so that hunting was again prohibited. Antelopes mastered the Kalmyk expanses.
The collapse of the Soviet Union ricocheted into the population of these animals. If before the species lived on the territory of one state and was protected by it, then
Today, the saiga antelope is an animal that lives in several countries that have not signed a single document of international conventions for the protection of rare species. Uncontrolled shooting of animals and poaching - these are the troubles that cannot be compared to the largest flocks of wolves. The extermination of the saiga population first for meat, and then for the horns of males smuggled into China, led to a catastrophic decline in the number of antelopes, amounting to only 35 thousand individuals. This is very small, given that the vast majority of surviving antelopes are females.
Security measures
Taking into account the disastrous situation created with the saiga population, the state took the necessary measures to protect the species in the areas of the Aral Sea, Kazakhstan and the Astrakhan steppes. Today, the Center, where wild animals of Kalmykia are studied, contains a small, partly domesticated group as a reserve for the restoration of the species if unforeseen misfortunes occur with wild saigas. About 20 thousand saigas live in a limited space in Kalmykia on the territory of the created biosphere reserve. The Kalmyk antelope lives in the Rostovsky Nature Reserve on Manych-Gudilo Lake.
A wildlife fund helps to restore saiga livestock — grants are allocated to support the established system for protecting margays in Kalmykia.