To understand why forests sit so close to the heart of Russian identity, it helps to start with scale. The country stretches across eleven time zones, and a vast share of that territory is cloaked in taiga, birch groves, and mountain woodland that still feels largely untouched. When people talk about the “Russian soul”, they are often reaching, consciously or not, for the quiet, stubborn resilience that has grown out of centuries of living beside these trees.
In my experience, the quickest way to glimpse that inner landscape is not in a museum or a Moscow café but on a narrow path under spruce and pine. Out there, the clichés about mystery and melancholy give way to something more grounded: a culture that has relied on the forest for shelter, food, medicine, and meaning, and that still treats a weekend among the trees as a basic human need rather than a luxury.
The forest that built a nation
Any attempt to grasp the country’s character has to start with geography. Modern Russia ranks first in the world by landmass, and much of that expanse is forested, from the European north to the Pacific coast. Researchers who track land use note that Russia’s forest resources cover about half of the national territory, a proportion that has shaped everything from settlement patterns to military strategy. In the eighteenth century, debates over forest governance were already tied to concerns about shipbuilding, taxation, and the ecological impact of logging, a reminder that these woods have long been treated as strategic infrastructure as much as scenery.
That strategic value is magnified by the country’s boreal belt. Conservation specialists describe Russia’s boreal region as home to several important Global 200 ecoregions, part of a science based ranking of the Earth’s most biologically valuable habitats. That status is not just a badge of honor. It means the country holds some of the largest remaining tracts of untouched boreal forest in the world, with all the carbon storage, biodiversity, and climate leverage that implies. When I walk in those woods, I am conscious that they are not only a national symbol but also a planetary asset.
Myths, medicine, and the “Russian soul”
The emotional charge of these landscapes is rooted in older belief systems. Historians of religion point out that in early Answer to how people saw the land, the oak was a sacred tree in early Slavic cultures and remained a symbol of righteousness and strength into the modern period. That reverence for specific species fed into folklore, where forests were populated by spirits and moral tests, and into literature, where groves often stand in for memory and conscience. When I hear older villagers talk about a particular birch stand as if it were a relative, I am hearing an echo of those pre Christian cosmologies.
The link between trees and healing is just as deep. Ethnobotanical surveys describe how, in the General Description of traditional practice, forest plants were central to Slavic medicine and healing rituals, from conifer resins used on wounds to herbal infusions brewed for fevers. Cultural analysts argue that this long familiarity with the forest as pharmacy and sanctuary feeds into the modern idea of a national character that is both stoic and emotionally intense, the quality often labeled the “Russian soul”. Anthropologist Pesmen has written about “soul” as something people enact through everyday practices, and in Russia those practices often involve how one moves, speaks, and behaves in nature.
Dachas, mushrooms, and the rituals of escape
If the forest is a spiritual metaphor, it is also a very practical weekend plan. For generations, city dwellers have relied on modest country houses as seasonal lifelines, heading out on Friday evenings with sacks of potatoes and jars for pickling. Linguists and cultural observers note that this pattern of retreat is so ingrained that it shapes idioms and jokes, and one essay on dachas describes this bond with nature as embedded in the psyche, the language, and the rituals of daily life. When I join friends on these trips, the rhythm is predictable: tea on the porch, a slow walk into the trees, and then hours of quiet foraging.
Mushroom hunting is the most emblematic of these rituals. Guides aimed at foreign learners explain how families head into the woods not just to fill baskets but to reconnect with each other, sometimes walking in companionable silence, sometimes trading stories while scanning the moss. One account of this culture stresses that the forest is “not just trees” but a place for resting, reflecting, or simply feeling the silence, a point underscored in a detailed look at mushrooms and memory. I have watched teenagers who are usually glued to their phones spend an entire afternoon debating the best way to pickle chanterelles, as if the forest had briefly reset their priorities.
Where the wild still feels endless
Some of the most revealing encounters with this landscape happen far from paved roads. In the northwest, the Virgin Komi Forests form one of the largest intact tracts of boreal woodland on the planet, a place where, as one documentary puts it, time seems to stand still and the modern world feels very far away. A video tour of this region describes it as a sanctuary of nature deep in Russia, and when I hiked there, the absence of engine noise felt almost physical. The sense of continuity, of forest stretching beyond the horizon, makes it easier to understand why environmental debates here are often framed in civilizational terms.
Further east, the Putorana Plateau in WHERE Krasnoyarsk Krai, Siberia, is often described as a true wilderness, 7,000 square miles of canyons, lakes, rivers, and strange rock formations that feel almost Martian in their isolation. Travel writers emphasize that there are no roads into the heart of this plateau, only helicopter drops and long treks, which means that standing on a ridge there, you are acutely aware of your own smallness. To the south, the forests of Altai are praised as one of the regions of Russia where you really feel the nation’s massiveness, a landscape captured in 4K VIDEO that lingers on mist rising through larch and cedar. Watching that footage after a trip there, I recognize the same mix of awe and unease I felt on the ground.
Forests as refuge, battleground, and responsibility
These woods have not only been places of contemplation, they have also been stages for conflict and survival. Accounts of Eastern European history note that, during the wars of the twentieth century, forests were giving shelter and served as a battle base, and during the times of peace, they provided food and wood, a pattern documented in descriptions of During the history of Roztocze National Park just across the border. Russian partisans used similar tactics, vanishing into dense stands that occupying armies struggled to penetrate. When older relatives talk about hiding in the trees as children, the forest becomes not a romantic backdrop but a literal shield.
That history feeds into contemporary debates about stewardship. Environmental reports stress that Global 200 ecoregions in Russia are under pressure from logging, fires, and climate change, even as they remain some of the last large scale reservoirs of intact boreal habitat on Earth. Cultural commentators argue that the same sensibility that sends families to the dacha every summer could be mobilized to defend these landscapes, turning affection into policy. When I walk a forest path now, I am aware that I am moving through a living archive of history and belief, but also through a test of whether a country that has long defined itself by its trees can find a way to protect them.
More from Morning Overview