FORESTS IN HUNGARY,    FORESTS IN EUROPE

Beech (Fagus silvatica) forests are primarily located in the mountains of medium height, at 600m above sea level and in the lower but cooler and more precipitated Trans-Danubian regions. Today in Hungary beech forests are of the greatest wood volume and are also extraordinarily important in environment and nature protection.

The oaks (Quercus sp.) are the most characteristic species in the country. They form forest stands with a number of other species. Hornbeam-oak forests are the stands of mounds and hills of medium height with a characteristically closed canopy level. Beautiful associations of the kind may be seen in more humid parts of the Great Plain. In their typical two-storied stands beside the outstanding trees of sessile and pedunculate oaks hornbeams comprise a second canopy underneath. 

Turkey (Quercus cerris) and sessile oak (Quercus petrea) forests are the most widespread associations, common in the mountains, mounds, mainly between 250-400 m above sea level.
The shrub and herbaceous level of turkey and sessile oak forests is usually very rich due to the light-demanding construction of the canopy of both species they permeate much light.

The loess-oak forests (Quercus robur) – below 200 meters above sea level – are a special relic forests with nature conservation priority of which only a few acres preserve the marginal lowland vegetation before human intervention period.
Beside the climate-zonal forests, the gallery forests accompanying rivers have a not negligible conservation, ecological and economic role.
The so-called hardwood-, oak-ash-elm grove forests follow the higher flood areas of our larger rivers and are primarily developed due to the presence of water which today hardly ever is flooded.
The main species are pedunculate oaks (Quercus robur), Hungarian ashes (Fraxinus angustifolia ssp. pannonica) and the fluttering elm (Ulmus laevis) which unfortunately decline due to elm tree disease.

Willow-poplar flood plain groves are the associations of the lower flood areas of the Plain rivers. They are commonly characterised by the water that floods their stands for a long time, many times a year. The major species of these associations are white willows (Salix alba), black and white poplars (Populus nigra and Populus alba) and the bush-willows (Salix sp.). Today, on their territory due to intensive forest management the Euramerican poplars have been planted as well.

The primary cultivated forests are the black locust „acacia” woods (Robinia pseudoacacia) with short rotation periods that. „acacia” is the most common species in the country’s forests. They have been acclimatised from America many hundreds years ago. They are especially important in areas of poor soil, where often this is the only one species that may be planted for forests. Its wood may be utilized in many ways (significant firewood as the wood is burning even when moist). Moreover the „acacia” nectar is a good feed for bees making honey.

Climate conditions in Hungary are not considered to be optimal for the pine forests. They usually form single species forest, or only Austrian and Scotch pines (Pinus sylvestris and Pinus nigra) are mixed with each other. The latter two are of primary importance in Hungary, but you also see spruces and larches (Picea abies and Larix decidua). Single-species stands are ecologically instable as many pests spread in artificially planted pine forests, thus endangering and risking forest management.

The rapid growth of Euramerican poplars (Populus x. euramericana) – planted typically on flat or flood plain areas –facilitates intensive economic activities. Due to the mechanical management trees are planted regularly and thus do not provide the expected landscape, but a considerable economic demand (like paper) is provided for from these stands. 

Wildlife
Game stock is the organic part of forest biocoenosis. Forests may not be imagined without game, they belong to forests like fresh air, humming birds, bugs, mushroom, colourful flowers, rocks or springs. 

In large forests primarily red and fallow deer, mouflon, roe and wild boar (Cervus elaphus, Dama dama, Ovis musimon, Capreolus capreolus, and Sus scrofa) can find perfect habitat. This does not mean that so called small games – hares, pheasants (Lepus europaeus, Phasianus colchicus) – are missing from Hungarian forests. However, their occurrence is not as frequent as in flat areas with smaller forests.

Experts unanimously agree that big game stock has exceedingly multiplied, and in some places animals cause serious damages to forests, mainly through their feeding. Game management must be considered carefully so that the game stock volume would not hinder forests themselves and their development, and by damaging and exhausting their habitat animals should not be their own enemies.
Over the past decades, due to the conservation interventions, predatory mammals such as wolves, lynx, or wild cat and golden jackal (Canis lupus, Lynx lynx, Felis sylvestris, Canis aureus aureus) have re-appeared in the highland forests where they were previously excluded or thinned from.
We boast world record keeper fallow deer and wild boar trophies, but red deer and roe hunted here are also considered among the best of antlers in the world.