Programme
Our proposal is to hold the opening of our Workshop in Toruń – a city located in 1233 by the Teutonic Knights, where Nicolaus Copernicus was born in 1473, and which for more than ten years has been included on the list of the World Cultural Heritage UNESCO. The first presentations, field sessions and discussions will be held here. During the first trip, we will show you the heaths of Arctostaphylo-Callunetum type occurring on the military training ground existing in the vicinity of the city since the 17th century. Furthermore, we will discuss the threats to heath ecosystems in urban areas and we will present the use of an unmanned vehicle to monitor the heats. We will also introduce you to allures of the Old Town situated on the right bank of the Vistula River.
This will be followed by a trip to a small town – Borne Sulinowo – which in 1934-1945 was a centre of the German military training ground, and in 1945-1992 housed the headquarters of the Soviet armed forces in Poland. During the journey, we will explore the effects of active conservation of xerothermic grasslands by sheep grazing in the reserve “Zbocza Płutowskie”, and post-fire regeneration phases of heathlands located near the town of Nadarzyce. In “Kłomino heaths” near Borne Sulinowo, we will analyse Pohlio-Callunetum and Genisto-Callunetum associations and their active protection against forest encroachment. Furthermore, we will learn about management methods applied by local authorities to use heathlands on the former military ground as a tourist attraction, recreational area, a source of honey, meat and mushrooms.
The third part of our Workshop will be held in the Kashubian Lake District, by the Baltic Sea, in the Kashubian Landscape Park and the Coastal Landscape Park. The trip from Borne Sulinowo to the Kashubian Lake District will be led through Tuchola Forest, which is part of the largest Biosphere Reserve in Poland and the largest Natura 2000 area in Poland. We will visit the archaeological reserve “Kręgi Kamienne” (“Stone Circles”) and places where treatments have been applied to preserve small heathlands which increase the landscape diversity. In the Kashubian Lake District and by the Baltic Sea (near the towns of Szymbark and Jastrzębia Góra), we are going to observe the results of active conservation of peat bogs covered with Calluna vulgaris, which are conducted as part of the Life-Nature project implemented by colleagues from the University of Gdańsk, and wet heathlands with Erica tetralix located in the eastern limits of their eastern range. We will see coastal pine forests, heaths with Empetrum nigrum and thickets with Cytisus scoparius.
The 14th European Heathlands Workshop will be terminated in Gdańsk and in Toruń. The route and some of the sites are presented on the enclosed maps and the photographs.