When we started to create a philosophy of Bioclimatic Park, we soon realized that the water restoration project would be the major challenge. Smaller part of the area was covered by permanent grasslands, half of in hard-to reach terrain.
The other half of the area was totally devastated: dead soil without humus, monoculture, zero nearing biodiversity, and a completely non-functioning water cycle. When the rain was wet, most of the year was dry. Worst conditions for a well-functioning environment. It was the result of extensive meliorations, stream regulation, dead ends, destroyed wetlands, and hollow forest extraction. Around the creek grew heavily infiltrable crops of reactive thorns. Already in April the water stopped flowing in the stream from Vraninov and from May until October it did not come at all.
We soon realized that we had to start water management. Our main advisor was Michal Kravčík, a highly respected man everywhere in the world, but not in Slovakia. He is the winner of the World Goldman Prize for the Environment in 1999.
Under the leadership of Mr. Kravčík, we started to take small steps in 2015. We realized it was an endless job. Many low-cost manual work. Gradually, our water began to stay much longer, as if we had done nothing. And that is the most important thing – the retained water feeds our surrounding soil and so the stands are much longer green and form more plant biomass and so our animals still have fresh food and have enough. Goats, sheep and horses have begun to settle with dense grasshoppers, so we can reach more suitable trees (poplar, jasmine, lime, apple and murabella) in the coastal stands. They bring the livelihood for birds and other animals.
The water is not only in the trough, but mainly in the neighborhood, and frogs, bats, snake and pool go back and the ducks reproduce nicely. Even in 2018, there were crayfish and some species of fish we did not have. There was an extremely long summer from April to October, water in the stream stood until June, dried out and by December the bed was dry. All the more we were pleased to see that all the reservoirs and the stream were flowing in slow flowing water in December 2018. We want to believe that this current state will help in the summer of 2019 and thereafter, and that we will again have a longer water in our territory.
We are very much discussing our experiences and constantly looking for some simple solutions to help nature. There are so many people who are interested in it and who understand that climate change does not need to talk so much, but it is absolutely essential to act. Only in this way can we at least mitigate their impact.
Through these measures, we want to show people, and especially children, why it is of utmost importance to engage in nature in order to provide us with a lasting adequate chance.
Ladislav Židek
Video: