General scientific task of historical geography can be defined as study of evolution of the territorial (or regional) differences in man's relationship with the natural environment. Historical-geographic regionalization is the foreground in this study. The formation of the historical-geographic regions depend on many natural and social factors, of which at the initial stage the first ones play the main role and landscape structure of the territory is a basis. In the course of history the role of human activity increases and landscape anthropogenic transformation is enhanced. The article discusses the initial stages of the formation of historical-geographic regions, covering the era of Kiev Russia and the feudal fragmentation of the country (IX-XV centuries). Regionalization is made at the mezoregion level called historical-geographic land (krai). The basic and the most stable of them - the North-Western and the Central Russian (or Volga-Oka) - are located mainly within the sub-taiga (hemiboreal) landscape zone. To the end of the XV century the internal regional differences are also outlined in the Russian North, but by the end of the XV century the historical-geographic lands here were still in a developmental phase.

We propose a combined method of determining the dates of stable transition of the average daily air temperature at 0 and 15 °C, which are the boundaries of the climatic seasons. During the period from 1881 to 2013 years the selection of climatic seasons was carried out for St. Petersburg. The significant reduction was shown in the winter period (28 days) due to increase in the length of the other seasons, which is due to the earlier onset of spring (16 days) and the later onset of autumn (12 days). The estimation of the duration of weather anomalies within the climatic seasons (thaw, frost, hot weather in spring and autumn, cool weather in summer) was made. It is shown that the thaw in average is observed for 23 days during the winter, and the rarest are freeze in the spring and hot weather in autumn (3 days).

Economic-geographical position is considered as the most important condition for the development and functioning of cities. A method of assessing the position is suggested. The article proposes two its components: the transport-geographical position and the metropolitan status. Estimates were defined for all 229 cities in non-capital regions of Central Russia. We analyzed the differences in the position of cities depending on regions and population size.

Nutrition is an important life quality indicator and an element of national security. The article provides an overview of the formation of food consumption geography. The differences in food consumption between the regions of Russia in dynamics from 1990 to 2013 are revealed. They are caused by the influence of such factors as environmental conditions, the level of socio-economic development of the region, local traditions associated with agricultural profile of the territory, standard of living, ethnic traditions etc., on the nutrition structure. The well-being of regions with higher food consumption rate is mainly connected either to economic conditions or favorable natural conditions for life. The article presents the results of a cluster analysis of Russian regions based on nutrition structure in 1990 and 2013.

The article is the continuation of the discussion on modern state and development paths of landscape science, which was spread on the pages of «Izvestia RGO» (A.G. Isachenko, G.A. Isachenko, E.Yu. Kolbovskiy, A.V. Khoroshev). The author's position on subjects raised in the discussion is stated, based on P. Feyerband's points of philosophy of science and Ph. Descola's concept of ontological modes. A proposal is given that contradictions appearing between practice of landscape forming and theory of landscape are determined not by theory's shortcomings but the fundamental historic flaws of new-European ontology, underlying the contemporary practice of nature use. A conceptual alternative, which became possible in the gnoseological conditions of post-modern, is suggested to lie among ontologies that differ from new-European one, to be used for development of landscape theory as well as for improvement of social practice of landscape transformation.

The category of «consumption» in economic and social geography is considered. It has been argued that the ground for attributing the problems of consumption to the sphere of socio-economic geography is the territorial system. Among territorial systems of consumption the relatively simple way to identify ones are the systems of food consumption. In general, territorial systems of consumption in the Russian Federation are characterized by enormous specifics. However, the specifics are not limited to food segment of the economy, and cover other basic needs - social, spiritual and other. Special interest in geographical aspects of consumption in relation to Russia is defined by Federal status of the latter as well as the abundance of subjects of Federation, significantly differing in natural, historical, economic, social, cultural and other conditions of development. Especially relevant are the physical and economic accessibility of food, the level of consumption, the quality and composition of diet for the people living in the far North and equivalent territories.