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Introducing Białowieża National Park
The Białowieża (byah-wo-vyeh-zhah) National Park (Białowieski Park Narodowy) is the oldest national park in the country, and is famous as the place where the European bison was successfully reintroduced into the wild. The park protects a small part of a much bigger forest known as the Białowieża Forest (Puszcza Białowieska), which straddles the border between Poland and Belarus.
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The puszcza (primeval forest) was once an immense and barely accessible forest stretching for hundreds of kilometres, but is now reduced to an area of about 1200 sq km, distributed approximately evenly between Poland and Belarus. In the 15th century it became a private hunting ground for Polish monarchs and later for Russian tsars. During WWI the Germans exploited it intensively, felling around five million cu metres of timber. The gradual colonisation and exploitation of its margins has also diminished the forest’s area and altered its ecosystem. 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 puszcza 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. Unfortunately the region of forest outside the national park’s borders is still under threat of logging.
Last updated: Mar 2, 2009
