Employees in the environmental sector can rejoice, because as they approach the end of one financially intensive project - the Nature Census - politicians have organized a new and even more generous source of income for them. Habitat restoration project. On the positive side, this time nature will also benefit from the millions alongside researchers and EU project managers.
These are two grand and financially intensive projects in the environmental sector. The first - the one that is now concluding - is “Preconditions for better biodiversity preservation and ecosystem protection in Latvia”. More commonly known as Nature Census or Habitat Inventory. Project funding is grandiose, and so is the scale. 10.2 million euros in five years provided income for hundreds of researchers because it was necessary to count all Latvian habitats - meadows, forests, dunes, bogs, waters. Everywhere. No one has any idea what to do with all the information obtained. Should we increase the size of protected areas or, on the contrary, reduce the level of protection so that areas can be used for economic activities? The decision will one day be made at the government level. Meanwhile, nature researchers must complete the compilation of the results of the Nature Census.
Currently, the fieldwork is nearing completion, and the Nature Protection Board reports that many new discoveries have been made during the project - a total of 52 new species have been discovered in four seasons. “Among them, two are plant species not previously discovered in Latvia, seven species of moss, 12 lichens, 15 species of slime molds and 16 species of fungi. Some of the newly discovered species are rare not only in the Baltics but also in Europe. The number of new discoveries in different groups indicates how much each of them has been studied so far. For example, botanists have known Latvian wild plants very well, thus only a few species have been rediscovered. Slime molds, on the other hand, have been little studied in Latvia, so the number of new discoveries has increased by 15 species in the last four years.”
In Ķekava municipality and Jūrmala, in the second season of the nature census, researchers found the downey-fruited sedge Carex tomentosa. In Daugavpils and Naukšēni municipalities, experts found another new plant species - the fragrant agrimony Agrimonia procera. In 2013, the poroid crust fungus Skeletocutis chrysella was recorded for the first time in Kurzeme. The bracket fungus Amylocystis lapponica was found in Ķemeri National Park. Last year, in the fourth nature census season, more than half of all new species were discovered.
Irisa Mukāne, the head of the Nature Census, is pleased with the flood of discoveries. She shares this in a press release: “In addition to these amazing discoveries of Latvian, Baltic and European significance, experts have also identified new deposits of already known species, which are also unique values of the nature of Latvia. For example, Goblin's gold - Schistostega pennata. When their protonema is under the rays of the sun or lantern, they glow golden green.” Two new deposits of the great horsetail Equisetum telmateia have also been discovered in Kurzeme. In suitable weather conditions, this plant can outgrow even the largest basketball player in height, reaching a height of 260 cm. And in two places species whose observations were last dated in Latvia almost 100 years ago have been found: slime mold Diderma cinereum and fern moss Hypnum imponens.
The only thing that could obscure the joy the researchers involved in the project get from slime molds, visions of Goblin's gold in the light and the practically inexhaustible richness of Latvia's nature was the feeling that the research funding would soon be exhausted.
But now this problem has also been solved.
The Nature Protection Board is launching a new project this year, in which the planned funding, if calculated by the years, is even more generous than the Nature Census. 3.52 million euros for the 2021-2023 period.
Project title “Implementation of management measures in specially protected nature territories and micro-reserves to improve the conservation status of habitats and species.” Public funds will be spent on restoring protected habitats in more than 40 specially protected nature territories throughout Latvia. The Nature Protection Board informs that this project will be implemented together with state enterprises Latvian State Forests, Latvian State Roads, more than 10 local governments and private landowners. Here's the work that will be done:
“During the project, restoration and management will mainly take place in habitats that depend on management, i.e., grasslands and park-like landscapes, grass bogs, gray dunes and heaths. In turn, with forests it is planned to promote their diversity and reduce the impact of human activities, for example, it is planned to create conditions typical of natural dune forests in planted wooded coastal dune pine stands. It is also planned to improve the condition of the rivers of the Gauja National Park by clearing 15 rivers from tree falls and beaver dams, thus restoring the water flow characteristic of the rivers and promoting the migration and spawning of salmonid fish typical of the tributaries of the Gauja.”
An important section of the project activities is dedicated to the management of protected alleys. There are a total of 62 protected tree alleys with cultural, historical and ecological value in Latvia. Many alley trees are over 100 years old. "In the coming years, it is planned to create and clean up tree crowns in 13 tree alleys, so that it would allow to prolong their life and preserve the landscape value of old trees."
It is often heard that the alleys that people love are cut down in the middle of the night, in the name of road safety or greed. In this case, the old alleys will be taken care of. Thus, it can be concluded that, unlike the previous Nature Census project, where the material beneficiaries are only researchers and other project managers, the new project will benefit nature, the environment and, through it, the general public.
| Information Habitat restoration is planned in specially protected nature territories throughout Latvia, for example, in nature reserve Lielupes grīvas pļavas, nature park Abavas senleja, nature reserves Randu pļavas, Vecdaugava and Ziemeļu purvi, Grīņi nature reserve, nature reserve Ances purvi un meži, Gauja, Slītere, Ķemeri and Rāzna national parks and 20 more protected nature territories, one micro-reserve and 13 specially protected alleys. |
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