“TURJÁNVIDÉK” – THE HIDDEN TREASURE OF THE HUNGARIAN LOWLANDS
An EU financed project for saving the “Turjánvidék”
In Hungarian „turjános” is called a vegetation that is found on soggy, waterlogged areas that are difficult to walk through. That is where the name of the project area and the entire Natura 2000 area around it comes from. The conservation project could be launched with the help of the European Union’s LIFE-Nature Fund, the aim of which is to elaborate and maintain a conservation-oriented habitat management scheme that sets a good example. The Natura 2000 network supports the conservation of habitats and species that are endangered, rare, or characteristic of Europe’s nature.
The Turjánvidék LIFE project focuses on two areas. One of them is the Dabas Turjános Nature Conservation Area that has been under national legal protection for almost 50 years, i.e. since 1965. The other one is the Táborfalva Military Shooting Range and Training Area, one of the largest active military shooting ranges of Hungary. But it is also the place of the largest continuous wetland and sandhill habitat system in central Hungary. Many species live here that are only characteristic for the Carpathian Basin, so their preservation is our task. Such species is for example the Hungarian meadow viper (Vipera ursinii rakosiensis), one of the most endangered vertebrates in Hungary and Europe. Also on the shooting ground occur the greatest populations of the indigenous sand iris (Iris arenaria) and the Hungarian ground beetle (Carabus hungaricus) in Hungary.
