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photo 1: © Michal Stránský

Czech Republic Heritage Landscapes Natural fortress Moldau Area: 78,866 km² (approximately The Bohemian Massif occupies the Starting in the Sumava forest, the the size of Austria). major portion of the Czech Republic. Moldau (Vltava) river flows down Terrain: Bohemia in the west It consists of a large elevated basin through central Bohemia and on through consists of rolling plains, hills, known as the Bohemian Plateau, Prague before meeting the river, Elbe and plateaus surrounded by low which is encircled by low mountains its course musically described by cel- mountains; Moravia in the east and hills. ebrated Czech composer Bedřich Sme- consists of very hilly country, tana. The Vltava’s Moravian cousin, the The Šumava Mountains, stretched bounded by the Carpathians in Morava river, drains the eastern part along the Czech-Bavarian border in the east. Moldau (Vltava) river of the country, spilling into the Danube the southwest of the country, mark the flows south to north in the west, near Bratislava. high-point of the Bohemian (Šumava meeting the Elbe (Labe) river just in Czech) and Bavarian Forest, with The Czech Republic has a large north of Prague; the Morava river some 2,200 km2, making it the largest number of valuable wetland areas, flows through Moravia in the east. protected area in Europe. including ten sites given special pro- Elevation extremes: lowest tection under the Ramsar Convention. The Ore Mountains in the northwest point: Elbe River – 115 m, highest They include the floodplain forests trace the country’s frontier with former point: Sněžka in northern Bohe- of the Morava and Dyje rivers in East Germany, while the Sudeten mia – 1,602 m. the border area in southern Moravia Mountains in the northeast form shared with Austria and Slovakia. Land use: arable land: 41 %, most of the border with Poland. The permanent crops: 2 %, permanent western tip of the Carpathian moun- pastures: 11 %, forests and wood- range touches the Czech Repub- Cultivated land tain land: 34 % other: 12 % (1993 est.). lic, tapering down into rolling hills In contrast to some of its eastern Protected areas: 4 National along the Czech-Slovak border. neighbours, such as Romania or Parks (110,304 ha); 24 Protected Poland, most of the area of the Czech Landscape Areas (1,041,565 ha) Republic has been relatively densely – together comprise 14.6 % of settled from earliest of times. The long Czech territory; about 1,500 and rich history of human settlement small sites protected as natural in the area has shaped not only the reserves or monuments. country‘s rich store of cultural herit- age, but also left its mark on the land- Population: 10,264,212 (July scapes and natural environment. 2001 est.). The human impact has in part been Capital: Prague – population positive, serving to enrich the diversity 1,181,000. Prague’s fame, how- of habitats and species. In the White ever well-deserved, tends to over- Carpathians, settlers and shepherds shadow the Czech Republic’s gradually transformed the rolling hills many other attributes. This is unfor- along the Moravian-Slovak border into tunate, since the rest of the country a brilliant patchwork landscape of is not only packed with castles, pal- orchards, forests, fields and flowering aces, and baroque churches, but photo 2: © Michal Stránský meadows with rare orchids that are also a rich natural heritage. the area’s hallmark – attributes that park, and the cross-border Podyjí- For further information have earned the area international Thayatal national park that is shared contact: recognition as a UNESCO Biosphere with Austria. Reserve. The system of nature conservation Veronica Ecological Institute The human impact on forests, which in the Czech Republic, including Panská 9 cover about a third of the area of national parks, protected landscape 602 00 Brno, Czech Republic the Czech Republic, has been less areas, as well as other forms of protec- Tel: +420 542 422 750 benevolent. As in countries further tion, is generally well developed and Fax: +420 542 210 561 west, virtually all of the original forest implemented. The Czech Republic cover has been felled, and much of it has pioneered among its Central and [email protected] re-planted with fast-growing species, Eastern European neighbours the www.veronica.cz including spruce, canadian poplar development of ecological network and pine. Such non-native mono-cul- of nature areas and corridors that Useful links: tures not only provide less favorable was developed in the 1980s and has habitats for other species, but have been anchored in Czech law since the Czech Ministry also proven unstable given added beginning of the 1990s. of Environment pressures such as acid rain. Such The Czechs have also been front-run- www.env.cz unfavourable conditions led to sudden ners in the development of private and mass deforestation particularly in land trusts, which are usually man- Czech Agency of Nature the northern part of the country in the aged by nature conservation organi- and Landscape Protection 1970s and 1980s. sations and are given official support (Agentura ochrany přírody As elsewhere in Europe, agriculture and encouragement from the govern- a krajiny) has had the greatest hand in shap- ment. The tradition is reflected in the www.nature.cz ing the landscape. When the Com- country’s relatively good preparations munists came to power in 1948, they for the Natura 2000 network of nature Administration of Protected set about transforming the structure conservation areas, which is currently Landscape Areas of the of rural landscapes, abolishing tradi- involving some 700 people. Czech Republic: tional small and medium-sized farms schko.ten.cz to create large collective farms, trans- Black Triangle forming a checkerboard landscape NGOs: into massive fields – ultimately, not The process of industrialization that unlike large parts of the USA or West- began in the late 18th century and Czech Union of Nature ern Europe. The industrial agricultural made the Czech lands one of the Conservation practices that were introduced, includ- most industrialized areas in all Europe (Český svaz ochránců přírody ing reliance on chemicals, heavy had a significant impact on the natural – ČSOP) machinery as well as amelioration environment. But the greatest effect www.volny.cz/cdmcsop of fields, devastated the diversity of occured under the fifty years of the Czech Environmental plants and animals that long existed Communist regime, where concentra- Partnership Foundation together with agricultural fields, in tion of industry combined with poor (Nadace Partnerství) hedgerows or soil, and has contrib- environmental standards and controls www.nadacepartnerstvi.cz uted to recent catastrophic flooding. devastated some areas like northern Moravia or the infamous „Black Tri- Friends of the Earth Czech Changes in agricultural practices angle“ shared by northern Bohemia, Republic (Hnutí Duha) since 1989, including reduced reli- Germany and Poland. www.duhafoe.cz ance on chemicals due to increased costs as well as re-planting of hedge- Extensive strip coalmining turned rows and corridors, have lead to a large parts of the atptly-nicknamed gradual return of many birds, inverte- region – an area that the German Fortunately, thanks to massive invest- brates, as well as other wildlife. writer Goethe once called the most ments in cleaner technologies as well beautiful place on Earth – into moon as closure of many plants, the situa- landscapes; energy production and tion has improved markedly over the Iron Curtain, green veil related industry, especially chemicals, past decade. Outstanding natural treasures were, cut life expectancy of people living in paradoxically, protected within the the area by ten years; the toxic mixture folds of the Iron Curtain. Many of of SO² and other substances spewed the areas that for fifty years had been by area smokestacks produced acid accessible only to border guards and rain which denuded many of the hill- wildlife have been turned into national top forests of the region. Photo 1: The Czech landscape has been parks after the removal of the curtain shaped by centuries of human settlement. in 1989. They include the Šumava Photo 2: Waterfall of the Elbe river in the Krkonoše Mountains. national park, Czech-Saxony national Author: Andreas Beckmann, 2003. Layout: [email protected] | Produced with support from the Austrian Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Forests, Environment and Water / 2003 with support | Produced Ministryand Water the Austrian from Federal Environment [email protected] Forests, of Agriculture, Beckmann, 2003. Layout: Author: Andreas