Mud Hills - Kerch peninsula

The vast areas of Kerch hilly mountainous territory are rich in original shapes of relief, connected with the volcanic activity. Some of the active mud hills represent the curious natural phenomena as if imitating the real volcanos in miniature. Throwing out the cold mud which squeezes out from the depths of earthly crust under the pressure of combustible natural gases, they illustrate the oil and gas content of the Kerch peninsula.

Mud hills and fields the ammount of which here is more than 50, usually are not high, they are various in shape and rise on the hight from 2 - 3 till 50 metres above surrounding area. Because of the periodic effusions of mud, spreading far on different sides from the holes of the craters, the area which adjoins the hilly cones has cheerless and lifeless view. Only in the craters the liquid mud pulses under the pressure of the gases as if breathing.

The ingredients of the hilly muds are silica, alumina, haematite, ions of calcium, magnesium. These muds are used for production of ceramzit and in medicial aims. The most interesting mud hills of the Kerch peninsula are to be necessarily preserved inviolable as samples of the modern development of relief, as important scientific and cognitive objects.

Finds of many rare minerals are connected with the mud hills as well as with the iron-ore sediments of the Kerch peninsula. Among more than 200 mineral sorts known in the Crimea, about ten were first found here on the Crimean land. Among them there are alpha-, beta-, gammakerchenits, reedburunits, mitridatits, bosporits...