On Nature in the Czech Republic

Nature Conservation 4/2008 — 19. 8. 2008 — On Nature in the Czech Republic

A Valuable Landscape of the Moravian Karst

author: Leoš Štefka

From a point of view of nature conservation, in the Czech Republic State Nature Conservancy authorities guarantee and have responsibility for both the above surface and karst underground space.

Under Act No. 114/Gazette on the Protection of Nature and the Landscape, as amended later, the State Nature Conservancy bodies (i.e., Protected Landscape Area and National Park Administrations, regional authorities) issue permissions for speleological research, inventories and surveys in caves and conserve caves both on the surface and underground, particularly with relation to underground water quality. In the Moravský kras/Moravian Karst Protected Landscape Area (PLA), known cave corridors were taken in account when delimiting the individual nature conservation zones under Articles 26 and 27 of the above Act. In the Moravský kras/Moravian Karst PLA, land plots with concentrated occurrence of limestone sinkholes as well as those above caves were included into the I., the most strictly protected zone. In 1985–2003, the limestone sinkholes had been successfully excluded from the officially declared arable land: consequently, almost 200 hectares were grassed. Limestone extraction poses high threat to near caves. At present, the Moravský kras/Moravian Karst PLA Administration deals with a buffer between the current PLA southern border and a quarry in the vicinity of the village of Mokrá. A buffer zone along the PLA border, 200 to 250 metres in the width, should i.a. protect the Ochoz Cave. The PLA Administration has been implementing a lot of measures against visitors´ vandalism to protect rare stalactite formations. Unsuitable lighting which caused algae and moss growths at the sites filled with light was removed. In the caves, paid guided tours were introduced. Since 2008, a visitor centre has been built jointly by the Agency for Nature Conservation and Landscape Protection of the Czech Republic and the Cave Administration of the Czech Republic at the Skalní mlýn/Rock Mill.