Natural reserve fund of the western part of the North Pokuttya highland: structure and problems and prospects of optimization

Abstract

Analyze the structure and features of the nature reserve fund  within the western part of the North Pokut highland and find out the problems and prospects for its optimization.

Methods. Field, analysis, processing of stock materials of environmental services, remote sensing methods, cartographic.

Result. The nature reserve fund of the western part of the North Pokuttya highland forms one regional landscape park, 15 reserves, 37 natural monuments, 12 protected tracts, three arboretums and five parks-monuments of garden and park art. The largest in area is the Dniester RLP (19,556 hectares), which accounts for 96% of the total area of the NPF in the region. A large number of valuable natural objects: caves, rocks, ledges, karst funnels and abysses, springs are located outside the Dniester RLP. Suggestions for optimizing the protection of valuable objects that need to be preserved. Valuable objects need protection in the form of geological monuments of nature and karst-speleological reserves for their further preservation, as karst abysses and funnels, occasionally at the foot of rocks become places of accumulation of household waste of the local population. This leads to loss of value of the natural object, pollution of the environment, deterioration of the ecological condition of the territory.

Conclusions. We propose to create a karst and speleological reserve for the preservation and protection of caves, karst fields in the vicinity of Isakiv. As a geological monument of nature, it is necessary to protect large karst abysses ("vertebrae") and the cave "Pokutyanka" with a length of about 935 m. It is necessary to create hydrological monuments of nature to preserve high flow sources, waterfalls on travertine rocks. They are concentrated along the slopes of the Dniester.