Lake Heihai
Lake Heihai is a small mesosaline lake in Golmud County, Haixi Prefecture, Qinghai Province, in western China.
Names
"Lake Heihai" is an English clarification of the pinyin romanization of the Chinese name meaning. The lake is also known as from an old legendary location in the Kunlun Mountains and sometimes confused with Lake Hala in the Qilian Mountains.Geography
Lake Heihai is located about south of the city of Golmud in Golmud County, Haixi Prefecture, Qinghai Province, at an elevation of or above sea level in western China. It lies in a valley roughly long and wide between the Kunlun Mountains to the south and the Burhan Buda to the north. Earthquakes are common, as the lake lies near the major long Kunlun Fault.Covering, it stretches about from east to west and north to south. The deepest point is around below its surface. Two main streams feed into the lake, with a catchment of around. Meltwater flows from two small glaciated areas in the Kunluns. The west is about, the east about ; both appear to have retreated roughly since 1970. The outflow to the east is the source of the Kunlun River, the upper stretch of the Golmud River.
With mean annual precipitation of and high evaporation rates, the lake's water is mesohaline. The mean annual temperature is, so much of the surrounding countryside is permafrost alpine grassland, supporting dwarf cinquefoil and winterfat shrubs and sparse sedges and grasses. Polygonum sibiricum occupies moist saline sites close to the lake; drier land further from shore is characterized by Kobresia robusta on the sandier north side and Poa pachyantha on the south side.