Idea
The project Wolf Mountains is an initiative of the Slovak NGO Wolf Forest Protection Movement in the area of the Eastern Carpathians. The aim is to create a functional long-term, fair and society-wide supported protection of wild nature on large areas in the Wolf Mountains. This unique area has tremendous potential to be a protected area without human intervention, which would give space to wild nature to express itself in its richness and beauty. And thanks to this, it can become a great attraction for people, who have nowadays often a distorted perception about wilderness. A reasonable alliance of the high value of such area with ecotourism can help not only to stabilize the economic and social conditions in the region, but ultimately it will help wild nature, whose value will suddenly be measurable and even more appreciated.
We want to create a large area (approx. 10 000 hectares), in which wilderness will have its own living space. An area, in which nature conservancy will be closely linked with the support of the local economy and local residents. It is not our aim to create wilderness areas without people, but rather for people. We believe that a proper protection of nature, coupled with professional promotion of the region and a responsible development of entrepreneurial activities in the field of nature tourism, can create more employment opportunities and better prospects for the future. And for the general public it will show wild nature in a new, unconventional, but the more fascinating perspective.
We believe that in the following years the Eastern Carpathians can be known throughout Europe as an attractive destination for people who want to spend time in the wilderness. We are convinced that this path can be beneficial to people and nature. An important precondition for this is a nondestructive use of land without logging, hunting and other types of human intervention in areas set aside for wilderness. This ambitious project requires a major commitment, a long-term effort and extensive cooperation. Stepwise through pilot projects we want to show that this model can work and be sustainable.
Locality
The Wolf Mountains are situated in the north-eastern part of Slovakia, the area from Čergov Mountains on the west to Slovak-Ukrainian border on the east.
The name comes from old maps from 16th century, where the area was called “Mons Lupi” – The Wolf Mountains.
Wilderness Return
All continents of the world, with the exception of Europe, have preserved at least small samples of truly wild nature. Africa has its Serengethi, America its Yelowstone and the Amazonian rainforests, Asia the endless Siberian forests etc. We know that prior to the arrival of Europeans to North America there used to live herds of millions of bisons, pronghorns, deers and reindeers. We know how the ancient sequoia forests once looked like. We know hardly anything about the way European wild nature looked like. Current Europeans have the feeling that wild nature exists exclusively outside Europe and that it has never been part of Europe. We have completely forgotten that numerous herds of wisents and wild horses accompanied by their predators used to live here as well. In Europe, too, giant trees comparable to African baobabs or American sequoias used to grow here. We have forgotten that formerly we used to be part of this wild landscape.
We are reminded of this fact by the magnificent prehistoric paintings in the French cave Lascaux or the oldest written records of the ancient wilderness. From the historic records and archaeological finds we assemble tiny fragments, from which a picture of the real European wilderness emerges. Today, we are trying to imagine, how 6-metres long belugas swimming in great swarms in the Danube River looked like, or the bears catching the salmons running from the Tatra Mountains to the Baltic Sea. Freely flowing rivers were bursting their banks and flooding large areas of the lowlands. On the hills towering from this flooded world thousand-year-old oak forests were growing, which seemed immortal to the contemporary people. In this diverse environment full of life our predecessors were able to meet terrific animals: aurochs, wisents, wild horses, water buffaloes or even European lions, which became extinct only at the beginning of our era.
Nowadays we cannot find any sample of European wild nature anywhere. Its last remnants were destroyed centuries ago. There are no areas in Europe, which would be large enough and protected well enough for us to see migration of animals from the mountains into lowlands without these animals being hunted for. We don’t know how many herbivores these ecosystems are able to support and how these animals affect the vegetation or the populations of their predators and scavengers. Most of the rivers and their flood zones are polluted and regulated to such an extent that the life in them is only a tiny fraction of their real potential. However, nothing is lost. Nature has a fascinating ability to recover. We want to create a space, which wilderness need for it to return. To return to the ancient mountains of Europe.
Introduction of NGO Wolf Forest Protection Movement
WOLF Forest Protection Movement
www.wolf.sk
In our activities we keep in mind that „Wilderness will save the world“.
WOLF is a non-governmental organization working on the protection of Slovak natural forests. It has been active in influencing the protection of nature in Slovakia for 23 years already. So far WOLF has achieved creation of over 1,000 hectares (2471 acres) of non-intervention forest areas; better protection of Slovak wolves and bears by decreasing hunting; and influencing people’s attitude in favor of the need for wilderness protection. The main aim of “The Wolf Mountains” project is to create an extensive strictly protected non-intervention territory in the border area between Slovakia, Poland and Ukraine and develop soft wilderness tourism there in order to contribute to the development of local economy.
E-mail: alfa@wolf.sk, phone: +421 911 800 623