Celebrating 25 Years of Action for Biodiversity

Nearly 80 000 species have been recorded on the Czech territory. Five glacial lakes are located in the Šumava Mountains [ ] 89 Legal base creates positive effects for forest, ecosystem, and biodiversity Knowledge of biodiversity in the Czech Republic is good, especially due to a long tradition of research as well as recent research activity. Thanks the country’s Gazette on Forest law (the Forest Act), vari- ous positive forest, ecosystem, and biodiversity effects have taken place. The law specifies three distinct types of forest — protective (forests at extremely unfavourable sites, in high mountains and forests in the dwarf-pine vegetation zone); special purpose (forests in areas of the first degrees of water source hygienic pro- tection, sited in protection zones for natural medicinal and table mineral waters); and forests in national parks and natural reserves. Special purpose forests can also be those with a public interest in the improvement or protection of the environment or other qualified inter- ests to give non-production functions higher priority than forest production functions. Productive forests are clas- sified as neither protective nor special purpose forests. One of the provisions of the Forest Act is that a minimum proportion of soil for improving and stabilizing woody plants is required, making it a binding requirement of forestry management plans. The Forest Act sets the minimal proportion according to the individ- ual forest category and the economic unit (forestry management unit based on forestry typology). Due a number of factors, including legally binding regulation, reforestation/afforestation subvention programmes, subsid- iary schemes and other incentive measures focused on increasing the proportion of soil for improving and stabilising woody plants, there has been a continuous increase in the proportion of broad-leaved deciduous tree species, which have increased from 12 per cent in 1950 to 26 per cent in 2012. Forest cover has been gradually increasing over the last decade by 0.08 per cent annually and, in 2012, ac- counts for 26,661km 2 or 33.9 per cent of the whole Czech Republic’s terri- tory. In 2012 coniferous species ac- counted for 73.2 per cent, deciduous broad-leaved trees for 25.6 per cent, with only 1 per cent of forest land left for clearing and logging. In 2012 the proportion of natural regeneration reached 21.8 per cent in comparison with 13.5 per cent in 2000. Mount Sněžka Czech Republic D ue to its location on the boundaries of four biogeographical subprovinces: Hercynian, Polonian, West Carpathian, and North Pannonian, as well as its geological diversity, the Czech Republic has a relatively wide range of animal and plant species and habitats. Approximately 2,500 out of a total of 3,500 vascular plant species known in the Czech Republic are native and/or archeophytes, that is, species introduced until about the 15th century. A total of 886 species of bryophyte, 1,500 of lichen, and up to 40,000 species of fungi (about 4,000 species of macromycetes or higher fungi) have been recorded. Also documented are over 24,000 species of insect, some 8,000 species of other invertebrates, and 711 species of vertebrate. Jakub Kriz on Unsplash