NEWS /The Green Symbols of Rila Monastery Nature Park
for understandable reasons, the traditional celebration of Forest Week will not take place in the way we would all like, visiting events at Rila Monastery Natural Park. However, this does not prevent us from offering you an interesting virtual walk through the territory At the park, which the famous Bulgarian writer Ivan Vazov felt like his home:
" I'm home now. Around mountains
And peaks sticking out; forests high, wild
noise; streams, crystal and sparkling."
Ivan Vazov, "At Rila Monastery", 1891
Rila Monastery Natural Park is located in the heart of Rila Mountain and is a protected territory that combines raw alpine landscapes with the pastoral colors of forest habitats. Mountain ridges are cut from the picturesque valleys of the rivers Rila and Iliena, around which centuries-old forests rise and spread wide meadows inhabited by extreme biodiversity of animal and plant species.
In Forest Week, we would like to present to you three extremely interesting wood species, namely Rila Oak, King Borisova come and Tis.
Rila Oak / Quercus protoroburoides / is a relic species for the territory of the Rila Monastery Natural Park. It differs from other oak species by growing at the upper border of the forest and reaches 1 m.н.н.в.
Rila oak was first described in 1969 from eng. Buzov, who is the then director of the forestry "Rila Monastery". three fields of different trees were found on the territory of the park, with some of them reaching over 200 years old.
Tsar Borisova Ella / Abies borisii-regis / is a Balkan endemic to Bulgaria and Greece, as well as a relic species. The species is a hybrid between the Greek and the European Ella. It is found in the territory of the Rila Monastery Natural Park along the Valley of the Rila River in the direction of Quiha Rila, with a range of 1500 to 1700 m n.V. Grows single or small groups of trees in spruce and murovi plantations.
Tsar Borisova come is also referred to as the witty-top come. The Latin name was given by her discoverer, German botanist Johannes Matfeld, in honor of King Boris III, whose rule (1925 ) the Bulgarian Ella has been described as a new species.
Ordinary yew / Taxus baccata / is a protected species listed in the Red Book of Bulgaria as endangered.
The yew is a coniferous slow growing tree reaching 10 to 20 meters high. The wood of the yеw is healthy, its annual circles are tight, no resin channels and it's not rotting.
On the territory of the Rila Monastery Natural Park is found, as single pieces in the Kirilova meadow area, with an altitude of 1500 m n.в. It should be known that the whole plant is highly poisonous, the exception only the small red fruits that are the favorite food of some species of birds and are called arilus. In order to protect it against unwanted impacts by tourists, the yew in the park territory is marked and fenced.