Podrobné vyhledávání v článcích

Canberra, Seoul, Saint Louis, Chicago, Warsaw or Nairobi. What do these famous cities have in common? Unlikely as it may seem, national parks have been declared in their immediate vicinity or even within them. Yet only one of them can boast the unofficial title of the World’s only Wildlife Capital. Kenya’s capital city is the holder of this title, thanks to the national park of the same name.

The idea that the European larch (Larix decidua) is native only to the Nízký Jeseník/Low Jeseník Mts. (northern Moravia and southern Silesia) between the Alps and the Carpathians is being changed by new research documenting larch surviving for thousands of years at some sites in the North Bohemian sandstones. We do not have such detailed research elsewhere, so we do not know if larch grew there for a long time. Nevertheless, shifts and uncertainties in knowledge need to be taken into account in conservation planning. It does not make sense to eliminate larch across the board from common regularly managed commercial forests and within protected areas. On the other hand, in rocky habitats and areas less affected by forestry, it should be protected as a potentially interesting and valuable relic for nature conservation. The case of the European larch shows how scientific knowledge is progressing and how the interests of nature conservation and production forestry can be reconciled.

‘Pannonian oak forest on sand’. This is a title of a unique habitat of open-canopy/coppice oak groves that have been preserved north of the town of Hodonín (South Moravia) covering some hundreds of hectares. Extraordinary geological conditions and centuries of using them by humans resulted in remarkable species diversity. Rather paradoxically, species that elsewhere occur in steppes and meadows are the main target of nature protection, conservation and management there.

The Czech landscape has gone through significant changes over the past decades. These changes have also affected protected areas such as National Parks (NPs), Protected Landscape Areas (PLAs) and Natura 2000 sites. An analysis of landscape changes, their assessment, and understanding may lead to better management and future governance of these areas.

The Nature Conservation Agency of the Czech Republic (NCA CR) is tasked with monitoring the condition of habitats and species, which can broadly be referred to as biodiversity monitoring. The monitoring and mapping of species and habitats significant for the European Union, which serve to fulfil the reporting obligations under EU directives, are funded by the state budget. However, the data collection needs are broader, and to meet them, the NCA CR proposes and manages a range of projects. The most extensive in terms of both objectives and funding are financed by the Operational Programme Environment.

In June 2024, a two-phase “consilium/review board” attended by leading experts was held in the Jeseníky and Krkonoše/Giant Mts. on the needs and possible ways of preserving and restoring biodiversity in the Alpine zone in both mountain ranges. The reason for convening this consultation was the ongoing changes in the vegetation of the Alpine treeless habitats over the last decades. Their probable drivers include the abandonment of long-term farming after the displacement of the German population after World War II and other societal changes in the 20th century, as well as in the increasingly rapid and pronounced global changes, particularly the increase in temperature and high atmospheric nitrogen deposition.

Changes in the woody plant species composition and simplification of forest habitat structure are the accompanying features of forest management in the Czech Republic over the last two centuries. In addition to forest management itself, the reduction in the size of habitats that are little affected by human activity is also related to the overall human use of the landscape. 

Brown coal or lignite surface/open-pit mining, together with subsequent infrastructure and industry, has damaged the landscape in the region below the Krušné hory/Ore Mountains (northwestern Bohemia) over an area of over than 300 km², including structural changes in the human settlement pattern. 

The Czech Republic’s ecological network consists of a system of large core areas (protected areas, biocentres) interconnected by linear ways or routes (biocorridors) or stepping stones. It is thus a spatial network of landscape elements ensuring the preservation or improvement of the state of species populations and habitats, and thereby the health of ecosystems, including the processes taking place in them. It essentially strengthens the resistance and resilience of the landscape structure, and the sustainability of renewable natural resources during ongoing climate change.