Carpathians mountains of Ukraine photo gallery
Ukrainian Carpathians primeval beech forests are protected as a UNESCO World Heritage site. The woods are home to wolves, bears, wild cats, and other animals. However, as in other places, forests are destroyed by illegal logging.
Carpathians mountains in Ukraine
The Carpathians dominates the western part of Ukraine. In the south, they continue to Romania; the northern part curls towards the west and goes on to the Slovakian-Polish borderland.
Most of the ridges are about 1500 meters high, the highest peak, Hoverla (Говерла) have 2061 meters.
There are only a few towns and a handful of villages. The hillsides are mainly covered by forests; however, the top of the ridges is mostly without trees.
Poloninas
Tops of the mountain ridges have characteristic montane meadows called poloniny. Some still serve as a pasture for livestock, but most of them are utilized for picking blueberries at the beginning of each summer.
Nature parks
Due to unique biodiversity, many of poloninas are protected as nature parks or reserves. The most important are polonina Borshava (Полонина Боржава), National Nature Park Synevyr (Національний природний парк Синевир), Uzhanskyi National Nature Park (Ужанський національний природний парк), Boikivshchyna National Nature Park (Національний природний парк Бойківщина), National Nature Park Skolivski Beskydy (Національний природний парк Сколівські Бескиди), Gorgany Nature Reserve (Природний заповідник Ґорґани) or Carpathian Biosphere Reserve (Карпатський біосферний заповідник).
