Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea, like the Black Sea, Namak Lake, and Lake Urmia, is a remnant of the ancient Paratethys Sea. It became landlocked about 5.5 million years ago due to tectonic uplift and a fall in sea level. During warm and dry climatic periods, the landlocked sea almost dried up, depositing evaporitic sediments like halite that were covered by wind-blown deposits and were sealed off as an evaporite sink when cool, wet climates refilled the basin. (Comparable evaporite beds underlie the Mediterranean.) Due to the current inflow of fresh water, the Caspian Sea is a freshwater lake in its northern portions, and is most saline on the Iranian shore, where the catchment basin contributes little flow. Currently, the mean salinity of the Caspian is one third that of Earth's oceans. The Garabogazköl embayment, which dried up when water flow from the main body of the Caspian was blocked in the 1980s but has since been restored, routinely exceeds oceanic salinity by a factor of 10.
Caspian turtle
The western Caspian turtle ("M. c. rivulata") ranges throughout southeastern Europe (former Yugoslavia to Greece, the Ionian Islands, Crete, and Cyprus), Bulgaria, eastern to south-central Turkey, coastal Syria, Lebanon, and Israel; records from the vicinity of Ankara and from Lake Emir are questioned by Fritz. This subspecies has narrow or fine reticulations on its carapace (which may be lost with age), and a totally black plastron and bridge. Age-related flavism may occur, resulting in a mainly yellow plastron with black reduced to the seams. This subspecies can be separated from melanistic "M. c. caspica" by differences in head, neck, and foreleg patterns. Its plastral formula usually is "abd > fem > pect > gul > an > hum" in both sexes, but variations of this have been described in Izmir populations.