Talk:Wrangel Island

Gulag
http://www.statedepartmentwatch.org/GulagWrangell.htm

Though it's spelled wrong it's no doubt it's the very same island...

Canadian occupation during War of Encirclement
Anyone around here ever heard of this? I'll try and find the details; during the anti-Soviet Wars of the 1920s Canada's share in the "encirclement" of the communist menace was the completely useful task of seizing and holding Wrangel Island. Why, lord knows, and how long they stayed, I can't remember; but I'll find out and be back.Skookum1 04:43, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Wrangel not claimed by US
Wrangel Island is not claimed by the US. The US State Department says that the island was never claimed by the United States (http://www.state.gov/p/eur/rls/fs/20922.htm). This is the official position of the United States government.

Of course, those familiar with John Muir might remember that he was part of an 1881 expedition by a predecessor of the Coast Guard that claimed the island for the United States (http://www.sierra-club.org/john_muir_exhibit/frameindex.html?http://www.sierra-club.org/john_muir_exhibit/writings/cruise_of_the_corwin/ -- see Chapter 15). Four decades later, small groups of fur hunters from Canada and then the United States set up camp on the island for one year each. But for one Inuk Indian, the Canadians perished of the cold. The Americans were evicted by the Soviet Navy. They were awarded compensation for their lost furs by an international court in 1959, some 35 years after the incident.

Despite these, in December 1984, the State Department found that the United States government had never made any formal claim to the island. The United States has maintained this position since that time. For that reason, Wrangel Island was not addressed by the 1990 US-USSR Maritime Border Agreement.

There is misinformation regarding the status of Wrangel Island being disseminated by a right wing faction that calls itself State Department Watch. The State Department web page linked above is the record of fact. Competing assertions of fact by the Wall Street Journal and SDW are simply wrong.

In sum: The United States does not claim Wrangel Island. The State Department claims that the United States has never claimed Wrangel Island. The 1990 Maritime Border Agreement did not specifically address the status of Wrangel Island. Wrangel Island is in the Russian maritime zone. The US Senate has ratified this treaty. The USSR and Russian Federation provisionally accepted the treaty without ratification. The United States considers the agreement to be in effect and to control US-Russian relationships on the matter. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wyokyo (talk • contribs) 18 September 2006 (UTC)


 * As of 3/3/2017 the below State dept web site http://www.state.gov/p/eur/rls/fs/20922.htm DOES NOT have a page devoted to IF they owned it or not. Says page not found. So did they or not? KW — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.35.122.169 (talk) 3 March 2017‎


 * State Department moved the web page here: https://2001-2009.state.gov/p/eur/rls/fs/20922.htm FelisTeeCee (talk) 03:07, 30 May 2021 (UTC)

Wrangell Island is claimed by the USA; State Department Issues Misleading "Fact Sheet"
Text of http://www.statedepartmentwatch.org/FactSheet.htm was copied & pasted here. Replaced with link by Reuben 00:28, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Posted by Carl Olson —Preceding unsigned comment added by OlsonCarl (talk • contribs) 16:10, 22 August 2007


 * These claims have been added before, but they need reliable sources. So far, the only reliable sources we have say that the US makes no claim to this island, and never has.  If you believe this is incorrect, please back up your edits with authoritative documentation. --Reuben 00:32, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Spelling of Wrangell
This island is spelled Wrange"ll" too. I will go to work with the change as soon as I can.CharlesRobertCountofNesselrode 20:51, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The island, the other island, and the man have all had their names spelled with a variable number of L's. The article titles reflect the common spellings used today, as per Use common names.  Please don't change them without good reason and consensus.  --Reuben 22:30, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

"The island has also been spelled Wrangel and Vrangel. The U.S. Board of Geographic names, by resolution named 29 July 1901 determined that Wrangell Island, Alaska, in the Arctic Ocean should be spelled with two l's. The island was named in tribute to Ferdinand Petrovich von Wrangell who spelled his own name with two l's when he wrote in the Roman alphabet."CharlesRobertCountofNesselrode 02:45, 14 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Who are you quoting? That's interesting from a historical perspective.  As I noted, various spellings have been used in the past.  But it doesn't address the fact that Wrangel, with one L, has become the standard spelling of this island today.  Again, please don't move articles around without good reason and at least some attempt at consensus.  --Reuben 22:13, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

"Wrangell" is spelled with two L's because Baron von Wrangell spelled it with two L's. "Wrangel" with one L is a Russified spelling. The double L spelling is correct, because it was given by Americans who discovered and claimed the island for America in 1881. Actually, Captain Calvin Leighton Hooper wanted to call the island New Columbia when his ship Thomas Corwin landed on it, but he was over-ruled by his superiors in Washington. There are extensive reports to Congress on this terrific addition to America. (Carl Olson)


 * Your facts seem to be a bit confused. The naming Wrangell Island predated the Thomas Corwin landing, and the island had been discovered long before.  You can find these details in the article, with sources.  As for the Baron, he was a Baltic German aristocrat of the Russian Empire; there are several spellings of his family name.  If you romanize the Russian version, Врангель, you get Vrangel' rather than Wrangel.  Please note that Ferdinand von Wrangel's own Wikipedia article uses the single-L spelling too.  As for the spelling of the island's name, that has also been done both ways, but the current convention is to use one l for the Russian island and two ls for the one in Alaska.  The article titles reflect the common spellings used today, as per Use common names. --Reuben 00:42, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Prehistoric human habitation uninterrupted until European discovery?
The article is not clear on this point. What evidence of the Krachaians (Yuit Eskimos?) did Stepan Andreyev find in 1764? Ancient spear points? A Krachaian hunting camp? The article seems to imply that Wrangel was abandoned by the time of the Stefansson expiditions (1914-1921). Were the Eskimos that were persecuted by Konstantin Semenchuk in the 1930's transplants from Chukotka? I will try to find clarifying references, but some help would be appreciated. --Sungmanitu (talk) 18:49, 28 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I think I've read someplace they came from Provideniya Bay; if I come across the ref I'll add it. Dankarl (talk) 16:40, 16 May 2011 (UTC) Added the ref; it would be worthwhile to check this back to the refs cited therein.Dankarl (talk) 14:22, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Wikileaks Cablegate
It seems that Wrangel Island was one of the most frequently-addressed areas in State Department Cablegate leak, with almost 7.000 records. Why is the island discussed so extensively? -- Petri Krohn (talk) 20:26, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

Zapovednik
I dont think this is the correct translation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.10.185.16 (talk) 21:09, 15 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Please clarifyDankarl (talk) 12:21, 16 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Not sure what the anon means either. However, we do have an article about the concept (zapovednik), even though I personally don't think we should be using transliterated Russian words to refer to the concepts which can be easily translated ("nature reserve").—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 16, 2011; 14:10 (UTC)
 * I wikilinked the term in the article. In the meantime, I asked NVO to take a look.  For whatever it's worth Google Translate does not recognize Zapovednik as Russian and when informed that it is supposed to be suggests an alternative (in Cyrillic characters) with the general connotation of a preserve or reserve, but not necessarily the strict sense stated in the article.Dankarl (talk) 15:56, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
 * According to the Law of the Soviet of Ministers of the Russian SFSR of March 23, 1976, the island's territory is classified as a nature reserve. The law seems to still be in effect, so I would say that the definition is used in the strict legal sense of the term. I hope I haven't just stolen NVO's thunder&mdash;it's just that I have immediate access to (probably the same) legal databases he was going to check.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 16, 2011; 16:06 (UTC)

enclaves with milder microclimates
I added a dubious tag after the assertion that the Island's enclaves with milder micro-climates was "unique in the high arctic". Ellesmere Island also has enclaves with milder micro-climates. Geo Swan (talk) 13:09, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I deleted the sentence. Dankarl (talk) 00:19, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

"the most recent survival of all known mammoth populations"
http://www.cbc.ca/hamilton/news/story/2013/03/18/hamilton-reviving-extinct-species-in-reach.html

Hendrik Poinar claims that the most recent surviving mammoths died about 3000 years ago, not 4000-4500 years ago, as stated in the Wrangel Island article. (added 10:07, 6 June 2013‎ by user:Nickleus) ‎
 * I don't think a popular press account of one throwaway line in a lecture is citeable for that date, but it would be interesting to know where he got his estimate. Dankarl (talk) 12:36, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

Dallman
The "British, American and Rusian expeditions" section has an insert which says "The German whaler, Eduard Dallmann, landed on the Island in 1866", which is repeated from the source (here, p240). However the source also states this is "not widely known", and it turns out the source for that assetion is Dallman's own account. So I've edited the claim in the text accordingly. I trust that is OK with everyone. Xyl 54 (talk) 23:58, 16 March 2014 (UTC)

Questionable statement
''Evidence for prehistoric human occupation was uncovered in 1975 at the Chertov Ovrag site.[15] Various stone and ivory tools were found, including a toggling harpoon. Radiocarbon dating shows the human inhabitation roughly coeval with the last mammoths on the island c. 1700 BC. Though no direct evidence of mammoth hunting has been found, today this is not considered as a valid observation to discard any hypothesis.[16][17] The presence of mammoths on the island of Wrangel more than 5000 years after their extinction on the mainland, and its coincidence with the arrival of man, is considered as a strong evidence that the climate change hypothesis as the cause of the quaternary extinction event is not consistent with the survival of woolly mammoth on this island and the island of Saint Paul, so many authors today argue that the most likely cause of extinction of the mammoth was excessive hunting.[17][18]''

This is a very absurd logic isn't? Then we must consider the 'lack of proof' as the 'proof'? What does it means? The Chertov site C14 talks about 3,000-3,300 yrs ago. The Mammuth were NOT coeval with this, atleast we can find only 4,400 yr young mammuth bones. I know that it's a very difficult thing to determinate the effective dates through C14, but the question is cleary absurd. We are talking about things that we frankly don't know, but there is the 'Clovis(and friends) wing' that decided about the human induced extinction. Without proof, just conjectures.

So how so if there is a new article that claims the mammouth as 'seriously weakened' in DNA because the interbreeding? This is: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/03/170302143933.htm#

While it doesn't proof nothing about the extinction, it notes that mammuth werten't healty at all in their last years. And this wa a fact, not bubbling. 62.11.0.22 (talk) 21:56, 1 April 2017 (UTC)


 * To understand the statistical study about Associational Critique, it's necessary to be familiarized with quantitative and probabilistic models. If you read the 2012 study of the University of Wyoming (and you understand statistics), the results are very clear: the lack of evidence of hunting is exploitation of extinct fauna is not only consistent with overkill but also nearly every other extinction hypothesis that has been proposed, thus rendering the Associational Critique irrelevant.


 * Regarding the cause of the extinction, the big question is not why the mammoth in Wrangel became eventually extinct (in a small Island it could be anything, genetic degeneration, overkill, cataclism...), but why they didn't go extinct at the same time that continental populations, if the climate was the cause of the extinctions. That is why Wrangel and Saint Paul populations are so important for science. A climate change never could kill big, wide-spread populations with the possibility of migrating along the continents, and at the same time don't swept away two tiny populations in two small islands. That's what makes so important Wrangel, not why mammoths went extinct eventually, but why they survived for thousands of years after the continental populations went extinct. I advise you to read this article written for UNESCO the last year, explaining the importance of these extinctions on island populations of megafauna in all the planet:


 * About this conjecture: but there is the 'Clovis(and friends) wing' that decided about the human induced extinction. Without proof, just conjectures. You need to update your information. Mathematics are the opposite of conjectures, and is precisely the climate change hypothesis which is lacking support from any high resolution data analysis today. Along the ongoing decade (the last 4 years actually) situation have changed totally, this is not a debate of ideas anymore, is pure, cold mathematics. For the first time we have statistical studies with high resolution data, and all of them get to the same conclusion: human arrival was the necessary cause of extinctions, check this study of 2015 and this one of the same year . And please, make an effort to read the references, at least the conclusions of the studies, before sharing your point of view. It takes a time to explain and summarize studies that you could at least read by yourself before writing. --Cocedi (talk) 09:21, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Wrangel Island. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110818073305/http://id.erudit.org/revue/etudinuit/2007/v31/n1-2/019715ar.html?lang=en to http://id.erudit.org/revue/etudinuit/2007/v31/n1-2/019715ar.html?lang=en

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 10:14, 22 May 2017 (UTC)

Claim by "activists" that the US claims Arctic islands
We read:


 * According to some American activists,[43] eight Arctic islands currently controlled by Russia, including Wrangel Island, are claimed by the United States.

Dead link, but I suppose that the Wayback Machine could dig up such an article.

"Activists" could perhaps be reexpressed here as "conspiracy theorists". After all, the website's top stories -- even now, in mid 2017! -- include one on the alleged faking of Obama's birth certificate.

Suggestion: Cut any mention of this allegation unless it is described, even briefly, in a reality-based news source. -- Hoary (talk) 00:55, 12 July 2017 (UTC)
 * These must be the same kind of "activists" as the Russian ones claiming that Alaska should be returned to Russia :) I'm debating the removal of this segment altogether, but on the other hand, if someone comes looking to confirm/debunk these "claims", the explanation currently in place isn't half bad. The passage, if kept, definitely need better sources though.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); July 27, 2017 ; 14:01 (UTC)


 * Good point. I hope that this works. -- Hoary (talk) 23:37, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * The Wall Street Journal ran an opinion piece titled "Russia Occupies American Land, Too"  with the line " The island ... belongs to the U.S.". It was published Nov. 4, 2022 and written by Thomas Emanuel Dans MLisStam (talk) 20:50, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

Flora and Fauna
The claim is made "Forest occupies about 15% of the island's area." There is no citation for this. Given the cold climate, it would be surprising if there was any forest on the island. Does anyone know for sure? 110.145.170.78 (talk) 04:48, 30 January 2019 (UTC) Deleted as unsourced. Dankarl (talk) 03:16, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Wrangelinsaari
Hi X1\ Thanks for the suggestion. I am not aware of any Finnish readers working on this article. Could we interest you in joining us? or if not, could you put a list of the points of difference on the talk page, preferably along with the reference numbers from the Finnish article? Dankarl (talk) 02:24, 5 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I believe my Suomi proficiency would be so poor as to be insulting, and not of any use as a translator. My interest was sparked by automated translation.  If I get an opportunity, I will though see if I can fish-out something of value into English later.  X1\ (talk) 01:24, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

It wasn't an island during the last ice age
Information to add to this article: Wrangel Island was not an island during the last ice age, during which time sea levels were 400 feet lower than they are today. Wasn't it part of Beringia (the Bering Land Bridge)? 173.88.246.138 (talk) 05:21, 21 February 2022 (UTC)

Infobox error
The last map inside the infobox shows a blank area of ocean, with no island in it. Paulmlieberman (talk) 15:11, 14 December 2023 (UTC)