Restore nature

Our main tree planting project is in the Carpathian Mountains, Romania, where we have planted 170,000 trees to date, helping to create the largest forested national part in Europe

Romania contains some of the largest tracts of old-growth forest left in Europe, home to wolves, brown bear, lynx and over a third of European plant species. Large-scale, uncontrolled logging has decimated the landscape. Ecologists call it the biggest crisis of nature protection in Europe today and we are working to restore degraded land and to rebuild essential wildlife corridors. Our reforestation programme is regenerating previously forested areas through sensitive large-scale mixed-species tree planting (including fir, beech, spruce, rowan and sycamore), in areas adjacent to and buffering existing natural forests.

These are areas that have been brutally clear-cut, located at high altitudes closed to alpine areas and where natural regeneration has not occurred. Because of this reforestation requires dedicated teams working high in the mountains to get the saplings in the ground. In these kinds of areas, intervention helps to bring nature back much faster, enabling the restoration of complex ecosystems.

Our partner, Foundation Conservation Carpathia (FCC), has purchased thousands of hectares of land which will be included in a national park and Natura 2000 zone (protected by European law). Our contract gives us scope to plant trees which will be maintained and safe-guarded for the future. There are two planting seasons per year (Spring and Autumn).

After the first years, there will be no more human interventions as regeneration will happen all by itself and the plantations will evolve into closed forests (over the first ten years), during which time the trees will be monitored and maintained (for example some limited cutting of grass around saplings until they become established, and cutting back invasive plant species to stop them taking over in areas where they are not natural). Already, we have seen wildlife returning to the area, including lynx, red deer and a mother bear and her cubs who built their winter den near to one of our planting sites.

Rewilding

Forests Without Frontiers has also worked on an oak pasture rewilding project over 100 hectares on our Romanian partner’s land at Cobor Biodoversity Farm. Working alongside the local community, we have, to date, planted 100 native species of oak trees, over two planting phases. The initiative is aimed at the long-term regeneration and conservation of traditional grazing pastureland, increasing biodiversity alongside sustainable community land use.