Isakov, Yuri Andreevich

Born in the family of a Moscow school teacher of mathematics of noble origin ^[1] . Since 1927 ^[2] members of the KUBZ (“The Circle of Young Biologists of the [Moscow] Zoo”), under the leadership of P. A. Manteifel . Kyubzovskaya nickname "X" ^[2] .

He graduated from school in 1928. The first attempt to enter the university failed due to "non-proletarian" origin ^[1] . He worked as a guide, later a laboratory assistant at the Moscow Zoo . In 1929, the secretary of KYUBZ ^[2] .

In 1933, published in the Bulletin of zoos and zoos of the USSR, the first scientific work on the reproduction of squirrels. He participated in expeditions - to Badkhyz , to Karakul , to the Mugan Steppe , Lenkoran and Turukhansk Territory .

In 1934 he entered the biological faculty of Moscow State University . In May 1934 ^{[3] he was} arrested by the OGPU in the so-called “KUBZ case”, by the decision of the OGPU board under articles 58-10 and 58-11 sentenced to 3 years in camps ^[4] , according to other sources “for failure to inform” ^[3] . He served a term, working first as a farmer, later as an instructor for hunting in the Povenets fur farm in Karelia, which belonged to Belbaltlag , where he led a brigade of hunters for the extraction of squirrels ^[1] .

In the summer of 1937, at the end of his term as part of the expedition of the Institute “Microbe”, he left for the steppes of the Middle and Lower Don. Because of the danger of re-arrest, it was often necessary to change jobs in remote parts of the country. Since autumn 1937, senior researcher at the reserve Hasan-Kuli . In Hasan-Kuli, he worked for about two years. There he first met the Caspian wintering of waterfowl. On this topic has published two articles in the Proceedings of the reserve.

In the autumn of 1939, he took part in an expedition to the Mologo-Sheksna interfluve (the bed of the future Rybinsk reservoir ), and then in the Barabinsk steppe . Since the autumn of 1941 in the direction of the military office ^{[1] he} has been working as an epidemiologist at the tularemia station in Tomsk . There he managed to enter the Tomsk University , then managed to continue studying in absentia in Moscow University evacuated to Ashgabat.

In 1942, a tularemia station was transferred to work in Khanty-Mansiysk , where he contracted tuberculosis and was close to death, but recovered ^[1] . In 1944, the external student passed the exams and received a certificate of graduation from Moscow University. Of the 17 people arrested in the QUBZ case, Isakov is the only one who managed to get a higher education and then be professionally held as a biologist ^[3] .

C 1945 he worked as head of the scientific part of the Astrakhan Reserve . In 1946, on the basis of materials collected in the Hasan-Kuli nature reserve, he defended his thesis on the wintering of birds in the South Caspian. Since 1947 he has been working as the head of the scientific part of the Darwin Reserve . Interest in the Darwin Reserve was also due to the fact that in the area (in the Mologo-Sheksninskoe interfluve) Isakov worked before the Rybinsk reservoir was flooded.

While working in the Darwinian Reserve, he published two key articles on elementary bird populations. He put forward a hypothesis about the structure of the range and geographical populations of ducks, and on its basis about the distribution and dynamics of stocks of waterfowl.

At the end of 1958 he began work at the Institute of Geography of the USSR Academy of Sciences , a senior researcher in the department of biogeography under the supervision of A. N. Formozov .

Since 1962, after the departure of A. N. Formozov from this post, the head of the department of biogeography of the Institute of Geography of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In May 1963, at the Zoological Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR he defended (on the whole) his doctoral thesis “The habitat and population of birds and mammals”. Then, in 1963, he was rehabilitated according to the “Kubzovsky case” ^[4] . In 1967 he was awarded the title of professor.

In 1970 he participated in the XV International Ornithological Congress in the Netherlands.

From 1975 he was deputy chairman of the Coordination Council on the orientation and migration of birds.

Isakov actively participated in the preparation and adoption of the Ramsar Convention . On the basis of his research, a system of territories playing an important role in nesting, in migratory stops and winterings of waterfowl, which received the special name "Ramsar reservoirs", was developed.

Many of these reservoirs, such as the Caspian Sea, he knew well, since he worked there himself. The initial list of 13 "Ramsar reservoirs" were included in the intergovernmental convention signed by the USSR. The results of this work by Isakov and co-authors were published in the collection “International Regional Meeting on Wildlife Resourses” (Proceedings, 1970). The publication of the collection was timed to the holding of the meeting of the same name, held in 1968 in Leningrad. Isakov was one of the organizers of this meeting.

Permanent expert and representative from the USSR at the International Bureau for the Study of Waterfowl (MBIV). The organizer of the annual meeting of the IBIS Executive Committee in Alushta in 1976. Together with E. V. Kumari , A. I. Ivanov and others, he represented the USSR in the International Ornithological Committee.

In recent years, he has been engaged in inventorying the avifauna of the USSR and writing a new multi-volume monograph “Birds of the USSR”. Participated in the development of the concept of this multi-volume edition. Wrote the first volume (1982) prepared the section "The state of knowledge of avifauna of the USSR." Together with V.E. Flint, he wrote for the second volume of the “Birds of the USSR” an essay on the family of the Drofines.

He died on October 25, 1988 after a severe and prolonged illness.

The wife (since 1940 ^[1] ) is Olga Nikolaevna Sazonova (1918–2001), an entomologist, doctor of biological sciences ^[3] .

• The son is Alexey Yurievich Isakov (1952–2001 ^[5] ), an animal painter, author of many postcards, mail envelopes, stamps ^[6] .

The main scientific works:

• Ecology of wintering waterfowl in the southern Caspian // Proceedings of the Hasan-Kuli nature reserve
• Duck subfamily // Birds of the Soviet Union. Volume 4. M .: State Publishing House "Soviet Science". 1952. p. 344-635.
• The state of knowledge of avifauna of the USSR. // Birds of the USSR. The history of the study and loon, toadstools, trumpet. M .: Science. 1982. pp. 208–227.
• Yu. A. Isakov, V.E. Flint . Family of Bustards // Birds of the USSR. Galliformes, Crane-like. L .: Science. Leningrad branch. 1987. pp. 465-502.

• * Zlotin R.I., Flint V.E., Tishkov A.A., Panfilov D.V. In memory of Yuri Andreevich Isakov (1912-1988) // Russian Ornithological Journal. 2018. Volume 27. No. 1592. p. 1617-1622.

• V. D. Il'ichev. Isakov Yury Andreevich on the Ornithologists Moscow site.
• Heads of the Laboratory of Biogeography, IG USSR Academy of Sciences.