Old-growth forests in Bulgaria: distribution, characteristics and conservation issues

Natural diversity of relief, climate variability, geographical as well as historical reasons contribute to the presence of old-growth forest patches in various forest types in Bulgaria. For reasons of biodiversity protection, scientific studies and forest certification several projects aimed at locating and collecting data for old-growth forests in Bulgaria. Our aim is to summarize the available findings and contribute for a general map of these forests. The sources of data combine inventory data, including fieldwork collection of forest structure data by members of our team, and verification of satellite and aerial images. Most widely distributed old-growth forests in the country are Fagus…