Nature around Klánovice

The continuous forest Vidrholec originated in the 16 th and the 17th century after medieval villages had lapsed on the area of former lands, ponds and settlments  The main cause of it was an infertile ground (loamy and acid). A very important path from Praha to Moravia (presenly a road Praha-Kolín) went through the forest. Perhaps that´s why brigands called „Petrovští“ lived after the Thirty Years´ War in the forest and empty villages and were endangering wayfarers. Then several gamekeeper´s lodges were built in the territory of former villages to resist against them.

Most ponds were dried at the period of the constructing a railway in the 19th century. There are 5 ponds in the forest now. Two of them are utilized by anglers, the rest ones belong to the local sewage cleaner as its last stage of a biological cleaning.

The educative path going through the forest has been established in 1995. It´s 12,5 km long and includes 10 cessations with informative boards (about the history of the Klánovice forest, its flora and fauna...). The path also passes remainders of the extinct medieval village Žák. There are also marked touristic and cycling tracks in the forest.

The educative path going through the forest (start in no. 1)

In the Klánovice area several protected areas were established: the Cyrilov natural monument and the Klánovický les (Blatov, Vidrholec) nature reserve in the territory of Prague and the Klánovický les natural monument in the district of Prague-East.

A considerable part of the wood is decidous, the most frequent trees are oaks (common o., durmast o.), birches (the hairy birch and the silver birch which comprize hybrids with each other), beeches and maples. Also pines (scots pine), spruces (Norway spruce) and larches grow there. Other important plants: the pipe-stick plant, the mountain arnica, the mat-grass, the woodrush, the sheep fescue, etc. There is a rich mycological site.

An usual game like pheasants, hares, roe deers and boars occurs in the forest. Minor mammals such as the longtailed field mouse and the fox occur. Avifauna is rich too, e.g. the buzzard, the kestrel, tha sparrow hawk, the goshawk, the tawny owl, the bullfinch, the great spotted woodpecker, the black woodpecker. There are also reptiles like sand lizards and rarely vipers there. Amphibians are represented by the crested newts and common newts, sporadically the Dalmatian frog. It´s a enthomologically significant area with many typical species of beetles. There are also protected ant hills of the red wood ants in the forest.