THE KURIL ISLANDS 
9 
May before this ice clears off altogether. Fog pre¬ 
vails throughout the summer, the worst month in 
this respect being July. The autumn is the finest 
season of the year, when clear, bright, pleasant 
weather may be expected, with westerly winds. 
The winter is very cold, with a great deal of snow; 
indeed, the islands are never entirely free from snow, 
and it is well on into July before it is all melted on 
the lower portions of some of the islands. 
Heavy gales are frequent, May being a particu¬ 
larly boisterous month. The currents setting along 
the coasts, and back and forth through the many 
straits, are strong and irregular, making navigation 
dangerous. Very heavy tide-rips are met with, 
mostly off the ends of the islands in the various 
straits. In some of these no boat could live, and a 
sailing-vessel, unless she has a strong breeze, is help¬ 
less, and unable to stem the currents, which at times 
run as much as from 5 to 6 knots an hour. 
Fortunately, the islands generally are surrounded 
by deep water close in to their shores, and have but 
few off-lying dangers ; further, immense fields of kelp 
grow about their rocky shores in from 5 to 20 fathoms 
of water, entirely surrounding some of the islands to 
a distance from the beach of a third of a mile or more. 
This kelp grows to lengths of 150 feet or more, and 
at slack water it is so thick that a boat has difficulty 
in getting through it. A vessel, therefore, on ap¬ 
proaching the islands in foggy weather will usually 
have warning of the vicinity of the land before she 
is likely to strike anything. In addition to this, the 
initiated know of many other guides for navigating 
amongst these islands, so that, in spite of the fog, they 
can tell their whereabouts with tolerable accuracy. 
