Big, Biodiverse and Beautiful: can the centuries -old giant giants of Romania survive modern agriculture? | Biodiversity
GOld Haystacks in the shape of tears were a symbol of rural life in Romania for hundreds of years. The 3 meters (10 feet) Ricks are the culmination of days of hard work by families, from children to grandparents, in the culmination of summer.
Together they cut the tall grass, letting it dry in the hot sun and stacking it to be stored during the winter, combing the hay down to protect it from rigid winds, strong rains and snow. During the winter, the tufts are removed from the straw and fed to cattle.
The work is at high intensity of work and common and benefits much more species than humans and their cattle. The research shows these The meadows are among the most biodiversity terrestrial ecosystems Everywhere, full of grasshoppers, butterflies and spiders, as well as more than 100 species of herbs and flowers, including the hidden grass, the hedge and scarcely on the field.
It is the human activity that makes these habitats so rich in wildlife: hundreds of species of plants, birds and insects have adapted together with centuries of cultivation and collection of meadows, their life cycles intertwine with agriculture.
Studies have discovered that traditional Romania hay meadows can be richer in wildlife compared to meadows managed as natural reserves. From May to July, before the hay is cut, they are flooded with wild flowers and insects.
Romania hosts some of the largest grasslands in Europe Still managed with traditional methods. But while modern agriculture insinuates itself, hay pages are becoming a symbol of a lifestyle vanishes.
Sarig Attila, a farmer from Ghimeş-Fiant, a small mountain village in oriental carpathians, says: “I love the place where I grew up. I see the enormous value in what our ancestors have created: their kind touch on nature, their respect and the way in which the fields work, creating such a rich biodiversity.” His family lived in the village for at least four generations.
Ghimeş-fiant hosts 5,000 people, whose farms have been largely self-sufficient for 400 years, with a mixture of sheep, cows, wheat and other cereals. Many inhabitants of the village can Appoints more than 120 plant speciesthey found ethnoecologists.
In most western Europe, the advent of artificial fertilizers has put a Finish at Hay Meadows rich in wildlife This once would have the campaign. The United Kingdom lost 97% of his meadows of wild flowers from the 1930s. Things are rapidly changing in Romania: while young people leave the villages looking for work elsewhere in Europe, humans and horses are replaced by machines and fertilizers.
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Sarig Attila, a farmer, says small machines, so tractors were purchased to modernize the work
Over the past 15 years, small machines to cut the grass and put it in lines have arrived in Ghimeş-Fiant and larger tractors are also used. Attila says: “There has been almost no change in 300 or 400 years and now, in the last 30 years, everything is changing extremely quickly. In recent years it has been changing as lightning.”
Now there are only a few families that produce hay completely in a traditional way. As many young people have gone, Attila cannot pay someone to help him, so it’s cheaper for him to use a car.
“People are becoming tractors because they are stronger than the horses and can do many jobs,” says Attila, who is worried that a century with the earth is being lost.
Many people are working to ensure that golden hay pages do not become relics of the past.
Nat Page is director of The skilled FoundationAn organization of conservation and rural development of biodiversity based in Romania who works with farmers on the best way to manage the meadows in a profitable way. It helps farmers to access funding to protect biodiversity and create markets for their products.
His work covers 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) of southern prairies of Sighi 2011 in South-East Transylvania, which is managed by about 5,000 farmers on a small scale.
“You can walk through days through Hay Meadows,” says Page. “Transylvania is the last European country with large traditional agricultural landscapes on large scale. We are eager to give farmers on a small scale an incentive to remain.”
However, on the ground, the destruction of the traditional methods of Romania continues relentlessly, with Half of the hay meadows left by motorbike in some areas.
The loss of these traditional hay meadows is “happening everywhere”, says Attila and without human management, biodiversity decreases. “There are not enough people to do the job: young people are abandoning the village.
“For me, it’s sad,” he says. “I see a huge value in this, but the new generation does not.”
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