Research, Surveys and Data Management

Nature Conservation 5/2009 — 21. 10. 2009 — Research, Surveys and Data Management — Print article in pdf

Non-intervention So To Speak Unintentional. Spontaneous Succession Processes in the Current Landsca

Samovolné sukcesní procesy v krajině současnosti

author: Jiří Sádlo

For a long time, nature conservation has had enough to follow the paradigm based on the assumption that nature means particularly absence of human impacts.

At present, we experience the crisis of the old concept. It has become clear that our cultural landscape is not a result of a conflict between nature and culture, in which nature has been more and more losing. It is much more a co-existence, a permeation, a complicated mutual rearrangement in strata. One of the consequences of the above paradigm shift is a continuing change in evaluating the succession stages formed by reducing the previous human influences. Such habitats were often underestimated as a mere manifestation of ongoing landscape devastation and destruction. Nevertheless, nowadays opinions that they display the remarkable species diversity and that they are valuable due to their spontaneous developmental processes have become stronger. For instance, some old parks and gardens with the absence of management have changed into climax growths with the dynamics close to primeval forests. After a half of the century of non-interventions by humans, peat-bogs near the town of Doksy (North Moravia) have been almost reaching the natural state which corresponds with the boreal forest. On the other hand, non-intervention can make damage to nature conservation aims. At the sites after mineral extraction, early and intermediate stages of the succession are the most valuable. Marlite slopes, in past kept by grazing in the stage of species-rich thin forests or steppes, have been at present also overgrown without grazing and from a point of view of nature conservation less valuable shady forests have been developing there.