KAMPINOS FOREST (Poland) - natural science information

European  Ecological "Nature 2000" Network

UNESCO 

MAB Biosphere Reserves Directory

This biosphere reserve is characterized by a high diversity of lowland habitats 

with dune belts separated by swamp areas and a mixture of forest types.  

The Kampinos Forest includes Europe’s largest area of inland sand dunes, mostly tree-covered and up to 30m high. It’s a strange feeling to have sand between your toes so far from the sea. In the depressions between the dunes there are peat bogs, meadows, and marshes covered with a growth of alder. They shelter much of its animal life. The park's flora abounds in rare protected species. Its wildlife includes such animals as elk, beaver, and lynx. 

 

The Kampinos Forest is inhabited by about 250 elks, a few hundred boars, 200 species of birds, 100 beavers and 10-15 lynxes.  Recently the Kampinos National Park has seen the return of the red deer and the white-tailed eagle, and the population of storks and cranes has grown too. 

Elks, beavers and lynxes live in the park but are hard to spot; you are more likely to see other animals such as hares, foxes, deer and, occasionally, wild boars. The park is home to some bird life, including black storks, cranes, herons and marsh harriers.

The Kampinos Forest is a mixture of forest types (bog-alder forest, ash-alder flood plain forest, pine-oak mixed forest and low oak-lime-hornbeam forest). 

Major ecosystem type:  

Temperate broadleaf forests or woodlands

Its flora is rich with around 1245 species of plants, of which 69 are protected. A plant curiosity is a small shrub – Leatherleaf (Chamaedaphne calyculata) – a relic of ice age.

 by Paweł and Adam