page_title: Primorsky Krai
section_title: Flora and fauna
hierarchical_section_title: Primorsky Krai / Geography / Flora and fauna
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Сопки Брат и Сестра (Находка) English: Brat &amp; Sestra (Brother and Sister) Hills, Nakhodka, Maritime Territory, eastern Russia Français&#160;: les collins Brat et Sestra (Frère et Sœur) à Nakhodka en Primorie en Russie de l'est
context_page_description: Primorsky Krai is a federal subject of Russia, located in the Far East region of the country and is a part of the Far Eastern Federal District. The city of Vladivostok is the administrative center of the krai, as well as the largest city in the Russian Far East. The krai has the largest economy among the federal subjects in the Russian Far East, and a population of 1,956,497 as of the 2010 Census.
  The name of the krai is derived from the Russian words "приморский", meaning "littoral" or "coastal", and "край, meaning "region" or "area". It is informally known as Primorye in Russian, and is occasionally translated as Coastal Territory in English. The krai shares Russia's only border with North Korea, along the Tumen River in Khasansky District in the southwestern corner of the krai. Peter the Great Gulf, the largest gulf in the Sea of Japan, is located along the south coast.
  Historically part of Manchuria, Primorsky Krai was ceded to the Russian Empire by Qing China in 1860 as part of a region known as Outer Manchuria, forming most of the territory of Primorskaya Oblast.
context_section_description: The geographic location of Primorye accounts for the variety of its flora. The territory of Primorye has not been subjected to the ice cover in the past in contrast to the rest of Siberia during the ice ages. This circumstance, as well as the specifics of the geographical situation and the specific features of climate, determine the unique, diversity of the plant world at species and cenotic levels and the richness of plant resources. In the flora of Primorye there are more than two thousand species of higher plants, of which are about 250 species of trees, bushes and ligneous lianas. Flora of mosses and lichens are very diverse. As part of the coastal flora, there are many valuable medicinal, technical and food plants, many relict and endemic species. About 200 species are listed in the IUCN Red List as rare and threatened extermination.
  There are mountainous tundra areas, conifers and coniferous-deciduous forests, and forest-steppe, which is sometimes called the Far Eastern Prairie, where many ancient plant species have been preserved, including ferns, lotus, and the Chosenia willow. The flora of the territory contains such plants as Taxus cuspidata, Juniperus rigida, Phellodendron amurense, Kalopanax, Aralia elata, Maackia amurensis, Alnus japonica, Actinidia kolomikta, Schisandra chinensis, Celastrus orbiculatus, Thladiantha dubia, Weigela, Eleutherococcus, Flueggea suffruticosa, Deutzia, Nelumbo nucifera, Betula schmidtii, Carpinus cordata, Acer mandshuricum, Parthenocissus tricuspidata, Vitis amurensis, Panax ginseng and many others.
  The fauna of Primorye is also diverse. The following animals are found in the Krai: Ussuri black bear (Ursus thibetanus), Amur tiger, Amur leopard (Panthera pardus orientalis), Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx), wild boar (Sus scrofa), Manchurian deer (Cervus elaphus xanthopygos), Siberian roe deer (Capreolus pygargus), musk deer (Moschus moschiferus), long-tailed goral (Naemorhedus caudatus), sika deer (Cervus nippon), sable (Martes zibellina), Blakiston's fish owl (Bubo blakistoni), mandarinka duck (Aix galericulata), black stork (Ciconia nigra), scaly goosander (Mergus squamatus), chestnut-cheeked starling (Sturnia philippensis), black griffon (Aegypius monachus), large-winged cuckoo (family Cuculidae), and others. Among 690 species of birds inhabiting the territory of the former USSR, 350 are found in Primorye. Rich fisheries of salmon, Hucho taimen, lenok and marine fisheries of crab, pollock and other species make the aquatic and maritime environment a valuable resource for the region. However, the rich diversity of wildlife in Primorye is threatened by poaching and the illegal wildlife trade. Wildlife Conservation Society, World Wildlife Fund, Wild Salmon Center, and Russian NGOs including Phoenix Fund are active in the region's wildlife and habitat conservation.
caption: The cliffs Brat ("Brother") and Sestra ("Sister") in the environs of Nakhodka.
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