Plitvice Lakes National Park

The Plitvice Lakes (, ) is a national park in Croatia, situated at , in the Plitvice Lakes municipality, in the mountainous region of Lika.

Geography and geology

[[wikipedia:File:Kalktuff-Mosscrusts.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Calcium-carbonate-encrusted, yet growing moss, early stage of porous travertine formation. This apparently European image shows travertine formation as in Plitvice.]] Plitvice Lakes National Park lies in the Plitvice plateau which is surrounded by three mountains part of the Dinaric Alps http://www.preserveworldheritage.org/en/Training-Workshop/Plitvice/Docs_Pics/Presentations/PlitviceLakesNationalPark_1_1-13.pdf: Plješevica mountain (Gornja Plješevica peak 1,640 m) and the Mala Kapela mountain (Seliški Vrh peak at 1,280 m) and Medveđak (884 m).

The national Park is underlain by karstic rock, mainly dolomite and limestone with associated lakes and caves, this has given rise to the most distinctive feature of the lakes.

Lakes

The lakes are separated by natural dams of travertine, which is deposited by the action of moss, algae and bacteria. The encrusted plants and bacteria accumulate on top of each other, forming travertine barriers which grow at the rate of about 1 cm per year.

The sixteen lakes are separated into an upper and lower cluster formed by runoff from the mountains, descending from an altitude of 636 m to 503 m over a distance of some eight km, aligned in a south-north direction. The lakes collectively cover an area of about two km², with the water exiting from the lowest lake to form the Korana River.

The lakes are renowned for their distinctive colours, ranging from azure to green, grey or blue. The colours change constantly depending on the quantity of minerals or organisms in the water and the angle of sunlight.

The lakes are divided into the 12 Upper Lakes (Gornja jezera) and the four Lower Lakes (Donja jezera):

thumb|250px|Satellite map of the Plitvice Lakes

http://www.np-plitvicka-jezera.hr/eng/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=22&Itemid=37

Travertine caves and crags

Under the travertine waterfalls Cratoneuron moss sometimes grows, the moss gets encrusted with travertine and fresh moss grows further out, first a crag is formed but later a cave roof forms under the crag. If the water continues flowing the cave becomes progressively bigger. Limestone caves are present as well.http://www.np-plitvicka-jezera.hr/eng/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=26&Itemid=41

Flora and fauna

The Plitvice Lakes national park is heavily forested, mainly with beech, spruce, and fir trees, and features a mixture of Alpine and Mediterranean vegetation. It has a notably wide variety of plant communities, due to its range of microclimates, differing soils and varying levels of altitude.

The area is also home to an extremely wide variety of animal and bird species. Rare fauna such as the European brown bear, wolf, eagle, owl, lynx, wild cat and capercaillie can be found there, along with many more common species. At least 126 species of birds have been recorded there, of which 70 have been recorded as breeding there.

History

Humans have inhabited the Plitvice Lakes area for thousands of years. It has been settled in turn by Illyrians, Thracians, Celts, Japods, Romans, Avars, Slavs and Turks. In 1528 the area fell to the Ottomans before being retaken by the Austrian Empire 150 years later. The Austrians subsequently incorporated it into their Military Frontier and, in addition to the native Croats who already inhabited the region, Serbs who had fled Ottoman repression settled there.

The Plitvice Lakes had become a major tourist attraction in the late 19th century. The first hotel was built there in 1896, and as early as 1893 it already had a conservation committee - the predecessor of today's national park authority. In 1949 the communist government of Yugoslavia nationalized the lakes and made them a national park. The park was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1979 in recognition of its "outstanding natural beauty, and the undisturbed production of travertine (tuff) through chemical and biological action".

The park soon became one of Yugoslavia's most popular tourist attractions. However, in March 1991 it became the scene of the Plitvice Lakes incident - the first armed confrontation of the Croatian War of Independence that resulted in fatalities. The park was held by forces of the Republic of Serbian Krajina during the conflict and suffered some damage in the process, with hotels and other facilities being used as barracks. At auto-camp Grabovac there were civilian deaths (three children) from a Yugoslav Army shell in September 1991[1] Incident at Grabovac, Plitvice Lakes, article from Glas Koncila. It was retaken by the Croatian Army in August 1995 during Operation Storm, which ended the Croatian war.

The Plitvice Lakes are today one of Croatia's biggest tourist attractions. In 2000, the national park was expanded by a further 102 km².

Gallery

See also

• Plitvice Lakes (municipality)

References

• International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, Review of World Heritage Nomination, April 1979
• UNESCO World Heritage Committee report, December 1998
• Jeanne Oliver, Lonely Planet Croatia, pp. 164–166 (Lonely Planet, 2005)
• Radovan Radovinović (ed.), The Croatian Adriatic (Naklada Naprijed, Zagreb)
• Plitvice Lakes National Park Website

External links

• Plitvice lakes national park official website
• Detailed map with individual lakes marked
• High resolution photos of lakes and waterfalls in Plitvice National Park
• Plitvice Lakes National Park Picture gallery
• Nature: Land of the Falling Lakes
• Free Pictures of Plitvice Lakes

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