The Varangerfjord (;
Extents
The fjord flows through the municipalities of Vardø, Vadsø, Nesseby, and Sør-Varanger. The fjord is approximately long, emptying into the
Barents Sea. In a strict sense, it is a
false fjord, since it does not have the hallmarks of a fjord carved by
.
Its mouth is about wide, located between the town of Vardø in the northwest and the village of Grense Jakobselv in the southeast. The fjord stretches westwards inland past the town of Vadsø to the village of Varangerbotn in Nesseby Municipality.
Older Russian Empire and Soviet Union sources also included its natural extension up to the Russian Rybachy Peninsula on the southern shore and the easternmost part of the Varanger Peninsula on the northern shore.
History
During the first half of the 19th century, the possibility of
Russian Empire demanding the cession of a stretch of coast along the Varangerfjord was for some time on the European diplomatic agenda, inducing King Oscar I of Sweden and Norway to conclude an alliance (1855) with Britain and
France in order to forestall this possibility.
Important Bird Area
A 55,450 ha area comprising the northern coast of the fjord and the nearby islands of Hornøya and Reinøya, including
intertidal zone and
neritic zone habitats as well as coastal wetlands and
tundra grassland, has been designated an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International because it supports large numbers of
,
and
, either breeding or
overwintering. These include lesser white-fronted geese,
,
,
, Steller's eiders,
, red-breasted mergansers, yellow-billed loons,
, black-legged kittiwakes,
,
herring gull,
and
.
External links
