Poland’s Primeval Forest: Puszca Bialowieza

The Białowieża National Park is the oldest national park in Poland is famous as the place where the European Bison has been successfully reintroduced into the wild. The park protects a small part of a much bigger forest known as the Puszca Bialowieska (Białowieża Forest) which straddles the border between Poland and Belarus.

The Puszca – or primeval forest – was once an immense and barely accessible forest stretching for hundreds of kilometers, but is now reduced to an area of about 1,300 sq km distributed approximately evenly between the two countries.

In the 15th century the forest was a private hunting ground for Polish monarchs and later for Russian tsars. During WWI the Germans exploited it intensively, felling around 5 million cubic metres of timber.

The gradual colonisation and exploitation of its margins has reduced the forest’s area and altered its eco-system. Even so this vast forest, protected for so long by royal patronage, has preserved its primeval core largely untouched and is the largest area of original lowland forest left in Europe.

Soon after WWI the central part of the puszca was made a nature reserve and in 1932 it was formally converted into a national park. Today the total area of the park is 105 sq km – of which 47 sq km is strictly protected. It is included on Unesco’s World Heritage List.

The starting point for excursions into the park is the village of Białowieża which offers food, accommodation, and travel agencies able to organize visits to the strictly protected areas of the park.

The Białowieża Forest is mentioned in the book “The World Without Us” by Alan Weisman where the author offers an original approach to questions of humanity’s impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us. From places already devoid of humans (a last fragment of primeval European forest (Białowieża); the Korean DMZ; Chernobyl), Weisman reveals Earth’s tremendous capacity for self-healing.

Destination: Poland