Specially Protected Nature Areas of Armenia
Armenia has 28 specially protected nature areas - 3 reserves, 2 national parks and 23 reservations. Their total area covers about 10% of the country territory. The protected nature areas cover a wide swath of Armenia’s habitat, and a surprising complexity for first time visitors. This remarkable diversity of landscape in Armenia fosters plant life that it is hard to imagine until you visit our national parks and nature preserves.
To give just an idea of how unique our nature areas are, in Armenia there are about 3500 species of flora, out of a total of 6000 in the Caucasus, but Armenia’s land is only 6.7 % of the total Caucasus. Armenia’s flora includes 120 endemic species (plants only growing in Armenia), a rich diversity of wild-relatives of cultivated plants (iris, tulip, gladiolus, cereal grains), including the oldest known field of wild-growing wheat and barley in the world. The diversity of ecosystems and landscapes ranges from sand deserts and wormwood semi-deserts to subalpine and alpine meadows with numerous transition zones. Plant density in Armenia is rather high - about 100 species per square kilometer. The number of vertebrates in the fauna is over 500 species where birds prevail with about 350 species, while the number of invertebrate species is about 17,000.
A History of Armenian Nature Preserves
Though Armenia’s first national reserves were formed in the 20th century, it has a long history of designating preserves as protected spots. The formation of protected areas began back in ancient times, when man started the cultivation and breeding of plants and animals. The first reserves were created by religious cults and ruling classes. Unique territories, certain tree and animal species or individuals were protected as sacred. Among these the most famous were the yew (Taxus baccata L.), oriental plane (Platanus orientalis L.) and other plants that were regarded as sacred. They were grown near shrines and were not used for economic purposes. In rare cases they were used in households as symbols; for example the red wood from the yew was associated with victory and was used exclusively on sword hilts. For this reason alone the trees probably survived to our times: the yew in Mediterranean countries and the Caucasus; and the oriental plane in Asia Minor, Central Asia, Iran, Afghanistan and the Himalayas. Both species occur in Armenia as rare tertiary relics. The prototypes of protected areas in Armenia can be traced back to the late 3rd - early 2nd century BC.
The last king of the Yervanduni dynasty - King Yervand (circa 200 BC) founded a number of towns and a new capital Yervandashat as well as ordered to plant a forest named “Tsn'ndots Forest” on the River Akhurian somewhat north of the capital. During the reign of King Khosrov II Kotaik (330-338 AD) the “Khosrov Forest” was established at the same site as the present reserve with the same name. These forests were planted for the reproduction of big game for royal hunting.
At the same time, there was careful regard to preserve nature itself in the process, and they were the prototypes of protected areas in Armenia.
Numerous accounts of local Ishkhanner (princes) planting forests, designating protected areas, planting groves, orchards and woodlands fill Armenians chronicles and histories of the medieval period. It is not until the 20th century, though that serious effort to preserve the remaining nature areas in Armenia took hold, and this under Soviet authority.
These areas are threatened in the 21st century for a number of reasons, among them mineral extraction, a lucrative illegal wood trade and disregard for the natural world by the average Armenian. Environmental groups are highlighting the need to preserve the future, in part through green-tourism that is encouraged as a way for rural locals to earn income to supplant that lost by exploiting the nature around them.
