FAUNA: CREATURES BIG AND SMALL

• Lords of the forest
• Animals of the Polish mountains
• Mysterious bats
• Kingdom of birds
• Closer to people
• Rivers, lakes and the sea

As Poland's flora evolved, so did its wildlife, undergoing similar changes. The country's fauna is made up of species that arrived in various epochs, starting from the last glaciation. The number of animal species greatly exceeds that of plants.
There are about 33,000 animal species in Poland, including invertebrates. Among the vertebrates, there are 85 species of mammals, 220 species of nesting birds, 8 reptiles, 17 amphibians, and 55 fish species.
In contemporary Poland's fauna, there are few species that survived in areas once covered by the glacier. An overwhelming majority of them held out in the south and came here once the glacier retreated. As the Alps and Carpathians form almost impassable barriers, animals arrived mainly from the east or west. In many cases they met in what is today's Poland, having evolved in the meantime into separate species.
Because the lowlands were conquered rapidly (in geological and evolutionary scale), there are hardly any endemic species. Most are animals that spread easily and quickly, living all across the temperate zone in Eurasia, such as the tench and carp, common toad, slow-worm and grass snake, chaffinch, mallard and goshawk, red squirrel, brown hare, roe deer and red deer, all typical of the zone of broadleaved and mixed forests.
There are 36 endemic and 38 relict species. Poland is the limit of occurrence for many animals: the southern limit for the snow hare, three-toed woodpecker and nutcracker; the western limit for the thrush nightingale and Eastern European hedgehog; and the eastern limit for the rabbit, which is a western and south-western species.
Climatic differences are responsible for peculiar species pockets in the eastern part of the country. In the north-east (Masuria, the Suwalki region, Knyszyn Forest, Bialowieza Forest) you can see animals characteristic of the tundra and taiga such as the Ural owl, great grey owl, snow hare, elk. In the south-east the fauna of the Black Sea steppes occurs: the hamster, spotted souslik, steppe polecat. Southern and eastern fauna is represented by species such as the bee-eater, lesser kestrel, Aesculapian snake and Helix lutescens, related to the edible snail.

Lords of the forest

The biggest animals in Poland are the European bisons. By the 18th century, the European bison was almost extinct, with only small herds remaining in the Bialowieza Forest and the Caucasus. In 1919 the last Bialowieza bison was poached and in 1927 the last Caucasus specimen was killed. The whole population in the world numbered then just about 50 animals in zoos and closed preserves, like the Pszczyna Forest in the Silesian Upland. Out of them, twelve individuals were selected for breeding, started by Polish scientists at a fenced site in Bialowieza.

Zubr (European Bisons), photo: Fot. M. Czasnojc, www.poland.gov.pl

In 1952, the first inmates were released, but the first calf was born only five years later. Luckily, the bisons began to reproduce quickly. In the early 1970s over 200 animals roamed freely, of which only 38 came from the breeding reserves. The Bialowieza bisons started to be caught and transported to clesed reserves or released in vast forests with a predominance of broadleaved trees. Today these impressive animals can be seen in the Knyszyn Forest, Borki Forest, Niepolomice Forest, Pila Forest and in the Bieszczady where the last Caucasian male was successfully crossed with Bialowieza females. However, the Bieszczady bisons do not reproduce so well as in other places.

Bison females are very caring mothers. A newly-born bison calf weighs about 30kg. Adult males can weigh up to 1000kg and they can eat as much as 60kg of plants a day. In winter, their diet is supplemented with hay by park wardens. European bisons live in herds of about a dozen animals, but in winter they form much larger groups. Only old bulls tend to live solitarily.

At present, some 250 bisons range freely in the Bialowieza Forest, with a similar number in Belarus. The entire population in Poland numbers about 660 animals. The species is now bred in most European countries, as Poland has presented many bisons to them. All European bisons around the world have ancestors from Bialowieza, and this is the only case in history when a species of this size has been saved by regeneration breeding. Today the only danger for their future is close blood relationship, which means low genetic diversity.

In a similar way, other species were reintroduced in Polish reserves. In return for bisons presented to Belarus, Poland was given several elks, which otherwise survived the war only in the Biebrza swamps. Elks are the biggest cervids in the world. In Polish forests, only bisons are bigger. An adult male may weigh over 400kg. Apparently clumsy, elks are perfectly adapted to living in marshlands with willow shrubs and pine thickets. Excellent swimmers, they can find food under water, even diving in search of tasty plants if necessary. Their most surprising trait, though, is a predilection for long wanderings: Polish elks have been seen as far as in the Rheinland!

The beaver is another species that has returned to Polish landscapes. Once very common, as proved by numerous place names deriving from its name (bobr): Bobr, Bobrek, Biebrza, Bobrka etc., in 1945 it numbered only a few animals, all of the Canadian variety brought to Scandinavia. European beavers came to the Suwalki region as they wandered up the rivers that flow from there to Lithuania and Belarus. Also, beavers from a breeding station in Voronezh, Russia, were brought to the Biebrza valley.

The beaver Photo: www.poland.gov.pl

These skilful animals are called river architects, and for a good reason. They build dams to lift water and keep it in their lodges which can be up to two metres high and 30 square metres big. With its powerful incisors, an adult beaver can cut down a 30cm-thick aspen in about 15 minutes. Poland's biggest rodents, they live in rivers with riparian forests of willows and poplars. Today their population exceeds ten thousand. Bred in captivity, they are subsequently released. Beavers inhabit a variety of places in the country's lowlands and occasionally in the uplands as well.

Animals of the Polish mountains

An area with exceptionally rich fauna is the Tatras. Mammals living there include the bear, lynx, wolf, otter, badger, deer and roe deer. Birds include the golden eagle, lesser spotted eagle, red kite, northern hobby, buzzard, eagle owl, a few species of owls, black grouse, capercaillie and hazel grouse. The most characteristic species in the Tatras is the chamois. It moves over the steep slopes with great ease, jumping from one rock ledge to another. Chamois resemble common goats, but their grace and elegant way of moving are reminiscent of agile antelopes. They represent the Caprinae subfamily which belongs to even-toed ungulates including such mammals as the roe deer, deer, girafe, antelope and buffalo. Well-developed leg muscles, hoofs with cushioned pads, a heart larger than in other mammals, and low weight all allow the chamois to climb easily even the steepest rocks.

Kozica (chamois). Photo: Fot. R. Czerwinski, www.poland.gov.pl

In summer, chamois stay in the alpine zone above the tree line, where they graze on the hale (pastures). In winter, when the weather is harsher, they go down to the two regiels, where they feed on conifer and broadleaved twigs, mosses, lichens and dry grasses. A thick hair coat protects them against sub-zero temperatures. In summer it is brownish-red with a black stripe on the back, while in winter it turns brownish-black to absorb more heat from the sun.
Chamois are most active at dawn and dusk. They give birth to single offspring in May and June. Adult males live a solitary life while females and calves form small herds. In the Polish Tatras, ten such herds have been identified, which occupy the area along the entire main ridge. Four of them are "international" herds living on both the Polish and Slovakian side.

Poland's chamois were taken under protection as early as in 1869. Since 1957, when only 77 animals were spotted, the Tatra National Park has been counting them every year. In late 2001 there were 70 chamois in the park, 25 in the High Tatras and 45 in the West Tatras. On the Slovakian side, they slightly exceed 200. The species is threatened with extinction.

Another symbol of the Tatra National Park is the marmot. These lovely rodents live in high meadows, forming colonies of about a dozen animals. They build elaborate underground burrows, sometimes dozens of metres deep, in which the whole colonies hibernate during winter. The marmot's body temperature drops then to just 4.6-7.6*C, with 2-3 breaths and 10 heart beats per minute.

Marmots feed on grass, herbs and plant roots. When the colony forage for food, one sentinel looks around warily, standing on its hind limbs and warns others with a whistling sound when it senses a danger. This is also an alarm signal for the chamois.

The Tatra marmot is slightly smaller and has brighter hair than the Alpine marmot. Its population was dramatically reduced as a result of hunting. For centuries their tallow was much sought after as a traditional remedy. A few years ago the Bayer Company examined it and found it to have no particular medical properties, yet there are still cases of poaching the marmot. In Poland the animal has been under strict protection since 1869. Today, there are some 200 marmots in the Tatras.
The range is also home to about a dozen brown bears. Their synanthropization is an increasing problem. Keen to experience nature, tourists sometimes act irrationally, provoking wild animals instead of avoiding them. The Park's authorities ask visitors to stay away from the bears, neither to feed them nor leave any food in cars and throw to leftovers only into special containers. Currently about a hundred bears live in Poland, which is as many as in the entire European Union. After the war there were just ten of them.

The largest refuge for big animals in Poland is the Bieszczady. In autumn the mountains see spectacular deer ruts. The stags from the Bieszczady, numbering about 1500, are the biggest in the country an have the most impressive antlers. The vast wilderness also supports some 60 bears, which outside this range and the Tatras can be seen in Poland only in the Babia Gora area in the Beskid Zywiecki. Deceptively ponderous, they move lightly and softly, capable of running up to 65 km/h at short distances.

The uninhabited Bieszczady provides shelter for wolves, once killed off but now under protection. Their population here is Poland's biggest. Wolves mainly live off deer, roe deer and elks. In search of prey, they roam from 10 to even 40 kilometres a day. They play a major role in eliminating weak and sick animals, though in winter they may attack sheep, therefore some local farmers demand that their population be culled.

The Bieszczady is also home to lynxes, wildcats, otters, eagle owls, foxes and a few extremely rare birds of prey such as the golden eagle and peregrine falcon. Particularly impressive are golden eagles, once common in lowland Poland and all across Europe. Today, as a result of intensive logging in the lowlands, they live mainly in mountainous areas. There are only 15 couples of golden eagles in Poland, found chiefly in the Carpathians. Their other nesting area is Masuria.

The golden eagle is up to 90cm long and weighs about 4kg, its wingspan exceeding 2.2m. It has dark brown plumage with a black tail. Only the head and neck are golden. Females are much bigger than males. The eagle hunts mainly medium-sized mammals and birds, grabbing them with its talons and dropping the prey from high above the ground. Then the kill is taken to the nest. The golden eagle also feeds on carrion and may live up to 100 years. When diving through the air, it attains a speed of up to 160 km/h. The bird nests on cliffs and in tall trees, with most pairs having a few nests which they change from time to time. A nest used for many seasons may be two metres wide and 1.5-2 metres high. The female lays two eggs which hatch out after 41-45 days. The eaglets stay in the nest for about 80 days. In Poland, the golden eagle is extremely rare and strictly protected. There are regulations that specify how close to the eagle's nest forestry and farming work can be done.

Orzel bielik (white-tailed eagle) Photo: Fot. M. Czasnojc www.poland.gov.pl

Poland's national emblem was probably modelled after the white-tailed eagle, the biggest bird of prey in the country, found in the north, mainly in Wolin Island and along the Baltic coast. Like in the case of the golden eagle, not only the species is strictly protected, but its nests as well. The white-tailed eagle is up to 95cm long, weighs up to 6kg and has a wingspan of 250cm. Both males and females have the same plumage: beige head and neck, dark-brown back, wings and abdomen, and white tail. It mainly feeds on fish and water birds like ducks, coots, geese and grebes, often supplementing its diet with carrion. It nests in high trees, on rock ledges or directly on the ground, on islets without any predators. Poland's smallest eagle is the lesser spotted eagle, whose wingspan may reach about 160cm. It lives in the Beskid Niski, the wildest and most extensive part of the Polish Beskids.

Mysterious bats

West Wielkopolska boasts an underground bat reserve, unique in Europe. Dozens of kilometres of 30-50m deep concrete tunnels built between 1925 and 1941 by Germans provide winter shelter for a few thousand bats a year.
These fascinating though little known animals are the only mammals that can fly. They appeared as early as 55 million years ago and have always lived near human settlements. They don't build any homes but live in caves, tree holows and attics. They sleep during the day and become active at night. To get their bearings, they use ultrasonic echolocation rather than the sense of smell or sight. They are extremely useful animals - one bat can eat several thousand insects a night. Scientists know more than 900 species of bats, of which 21 occur in Poland. The most liked are the species that live near water bodies such as the common pipistrelle, Poland's smallest bat, with a weight of just 5g and a wingspan of about 20cm, which eats some 1000 mosquitoes a night.
Of the 18 bat families, only three European ones can hibernate in winter. Two of this trio - Vespertilionidae and Rhinolophidae - live in Poland and both are insectivorous. When they hibernate, they are totally defenseless. They lower their body temperature almost to that of the surroundings and slow down their vital functions. This allows them to use economically the fat that they accumulated in the autumn and wait until spring comes.
The bat is an unusual hibernator resembling a TV-set left in the stand-by mode. It wakes up as soon as the climatic conditions change. When the temperature exceeds the bat's tolerance range - becoming too low or too high - or when air humidity drops, it moves to a more suitable place. With a high body surface to weight ratio, keeping body moisture at a sufficient level is crucial for survival. A hibernating bat cannot drink, so it has to find a shelter with air humidity close to 100 percent, ideally a cave, which also has a relatively stable microclimate and temperature. This is why most Polish bats live in the Cracow-Czestochowa Upland, which abounds in caves. One of them is even known as the Bat Cave (Jaskinia Nietoperzowa) and the bats living in it include horseshoe bats.
In Poland's climate, bats may hibernate for about 180 days because this is for how long their stored fat reserve will suffice. Five-six months of winter (which for bats means lack of insects) are close to the creatures' physiological limit of hibernation. For this reason, there are hardly any bats living further north.

Facts

Bats have been regarded as ominous creatures only in European culture. In the Far East, they are believed to bring fortune. The Chinese, for example, know a talisman called wu fu, which stands for "five bats". They have intertwined wings and heads looking at a tree of life in the centre. For native American peoples, such as the Aztecs and Mayas, bats represented gods, including the god of fertility.

All bats are protected. Suggestions to protect them were put forward already in the 19th century when it was realized that they feed on forest pests. In 1868 the autonomous parliament of Galicia made the world's first draft of such a bill (which, amusingly, referred to them as birds), but it was never passed. Today bats are under protection in almost all European countries including Poland (since 1952). This was a necessary step as their number dropped dramatically when pesticides began to be widely used against insects, bats' staple food, and when old houses, forests and caves, which always provided them with shelter, were destroyed.
Recently their population in Poland has grown, partly owing to a ban on using some pesticides. This is also a good indicator of an improvement in the condition of the country's environment as these delicate creatures are very sensitive to pollution and observing them may be a kind of environment monitoring.

Typically, bat females give birth to just one young. Pregnancy lasts about eight weeks, but depends on the surrounding temperature. In our climate, a mechanism has evolved to prevent the offspring from being born at a time when there is no food, that is in December. Females form nursery colonies in early May and produce the young by mid June. For the first few days, mother carries the pup with her, but then begins to leave it when she goes hunting. The young is always fed with her milk. Within 6-7 weeks it grows up, learning to fly and hunt. As July passes into August, the colonies disperse. During that time males live solitary lives.

Kingdom of birds

406 species of birds have been spotted in Poland, including 220 species that nest within its borders. Only one fourth of this number spend the whole year in the country. Some northern species come to Poland for winter, but most migratory birds, notably swans and storks, stay here for summer.
The most common birds found in Poland are the coot, great crested grebe and mallard. Nesting birds that rarely fly off include 21 species of European origin, 14 from the Arctic and 118 from Siberia. Others are southern species which spend the winter sometimes as far away as in south Africa.
A real kingdom of birds is the Biebrza Basin, its wildlife making it one of the most unique areas in Poland. It is Europe's most valuable peatland/marshland and an important wildfowl breeding area on the continent, providing refuge for 263 bird species, including 185 nesting species.
A stunning number of birds can be seen in the Biebrza flood plains both in the breeding season and during the passage periods. In spring and autumn dozens of thousands of geese, ducks, cranes, ruffs and sandpipers rest here en route south. You can hear their fluttering wings, gaggling, quacking and other noises for kilometres away.
For water and mud birds, the valley of the Biebrza is one of the last refuges, as most natural marshlands in Europe have been reclaimed. This area is also home to many birds of prey, which number here a record 25 species. Well represented are birds typical of the taiga and tundra. The valley is their southern or western limit and some of them even make up isolated populations beyond their normal range.
Out of Poland's 56 endangered bird species, as many as 21 nest on the Biebrza. These include the bittern, greater and lesser spotted eagle, dunlin, ruff, great snipe, wood sandpiper, western curlew, little tern, short-eared owl and European roller. Their populations are particularly big, sometimes among the biggest in West and Central Europe. A few populations, like the 2000 breeding pairs of the aquatic warbler, a small singing bird, are believed to be the biggest in the world. The Biebrza valley has over twice as many ruff nests (about 300) as the entire Central Europe (about 140). Not a single nest of the great snipe is known in Central Europe, while about 400 males of that species have been counted on the Biebrza.
One of the greatest attractions for bird watchers is the tooting of the great snipe. The performance starts in the evening and continues until late in the night. A tooting male stands on a sedge clump and does not move for about half an hour, taking air in. Then he lets it out producing a sound that you can hear for hundreds of metres. Finally he flaps his wings and again becomes motionless. This is all to assert his territorial rights.
Even more spectacular tooting is done by the capercaillie, one of the biggest and rarest birds in Poland, living in places like the Sol Forest (Puszcza Solska). Spreading their tails, capercaillies sing a song of four different stanzas. During the last one they lose for a moment their sight sharpness and hearing. Because of hunting, poaching and forest logging, they have become extremely rare, their population estimated at a mere few hundred. The capercaillie lives predominantly in spruce forests, while its relative, the hazel grouse, is found mainly in mountain forests.
One refuge for the capercaillie is the Tuchola Forest, which is also home to many other rare birds such as the black stork, black grouse and cormorant. Another bird haven is Polesie, where you can spot the harrier, western curlew, great snipe, black-tailed godwit, black grouse, short-eared owl and crane. The Masurian lakes provide shelter for the grey heron, grey lag goose, osprey and buzzard. Lake Luknajno in the Great Masurian Lake District, designated a world biosphere reserve, is one of Europe's largest nesting grounds of the mute swan. It also attracts an increasing number of herring gulls, the biggest gulls nesting in Poland. with a wingspan of 1.5m. Thirty years ago the country had just two colonies of these birds; today their number and range have increased substantially.
Huge numbers of migratory birds nest at the confluence of the Warta and Odra rivers. Some 200 bird species live in this national park on permanent basis; half of them nest there, including many water birds whose colonies are particularly big. The local population of the black-headed gull is estimated at some 6,000 nesting pairs, of the coot - at 14,000 pairs, of the mallard - at 2,000 pairs. There are also an impressive 500 cormorant nests. The population of the grey lag goose is the biggest in Central Europe.

Closer to people

Many animals live in man-altered landscapes. Meadows are breeding grounds for birds. Crop fields are home to mice, voles (especially field voles) and hamsters. Partridges are still a relatively common sight. Country and town buildings provide shelter for the house mouse, house sparrow and swift, an excellent flier able to reach a speed of about 170 km/h and resembling the swallow. Swifts are the third most numerous group of birds living in Warsaw (after pigeons and sparrows) despite the fact that they come from rocky terrains.
At country houses you can often see swallow nests. Swallows build them from clay mixed with saliva. House martins stick their semicircular nests to house walls, while barn swallows prefer farm buildings like stables and their nests have elaborate entrances.
Some species have changed their habits and moved closer to people's houses only recently. Birds characteristic of forests colonized towns: the starling did it at the turn of the 20th century and the blackbird in the mid 20th century, followed by the magpie. Similar tendencies are observed in the case of the wood pigeon, kestrel and crow. In 1943 the collared turtle dove came to Poland; since about 1920 it had been spreading north-west from the European part of Turkey, always settling in towns. In urban parks, swans have become a common sight, more and more frequently joined by woodpeckers, flycatchers and thrushes, once found only in forests. Mountain wagtails now feel at home in Warsaw, where their breeding grounds change as the underground construction proceeds. The latest newcomers in the urban landscape are gulls. Their nests appear on roofs in such cities as Kolobrzeg and Slupsk.
Many species have been brought to Poland by man. These include escapees from fur animal farms such as the muskrat, which came to the country via Czechoslovakia in the late 1920s, American mink and raccoon dog. Other species have been deliberately brought and acclimatized as game animals: partridges, mouflons (sheep ancestors, living now in the Sudetes and the Swietokrzyskie Mountains), fallow deer and sika deer.

Rivers, lakes and the sea

Poland's big rivers are too polluted to harbour much wildlife. The short rivers of Pomerania and Masuria as well as many mountain streams are home to the trout and spawning grounds for the sea trout, a migratory variety of the salmon. To protect the fish, the entire 200km-long Drweca River and the slightly shorter Pasleka have been designated a nature reserve. The Drawa, cutting across Pomerania's forests and one of the cleanest rivers in the country, is a spawning ground for the salmon.
Fish commonly seen in clean waters are the bleak and roach, one of the best known fish species in Poland, found everywhere except for fast-flowing mountain streams. Other abundant species are the tench, carp, perch, pike, eel, bream and crucian carp, which prefers shallow and warm lower courses of rivers. Related to the perch, pike perch may weigh up to 10kg and occasionally even more. The crucian carp is resistant to pollution and recently the sheatfish has also appeared. It is one of the biggest fresh-water species in Europe - if you're lucky, you can catch crucian carps that weigh up to 30kg. Middle rivers are home to the barbel. As it needs clean water and relatively swift current, it is rather rare in Poland.
Clean, deep lakes rich in oxygen teem with pike perch, powan and whitefish. Whitefish feed on plankton which they catch while swimming just below water surface. When a lake becomes more abundant in food, they are surpassed by other fish species. The cool lakes in north-east Poland are ideal for the burbot and thunderfish. The only naturally fished Tatra lake is Morskie Oko, where you can see trout.
The Baltic Sea has little fauna due to its low salinity. Baltic water is five times less salty than in the North Sea and Atlantic. This is why you'll find in it no common marine creatures such as echinoderms and cephalopods, while snails and mussels are represented by just a few species. There is only one common jellyfish species. Baltic mussels and jellyfish are half the size of their relatives in the North Sea.
One glacial relict common in the Baltic Sea is the Mesidotea entomon, a millipede-like crustacean. The most abundant fish species are the herring and cod. Other commonly caught species are the sprat, a few kinds of flatfish and salmon. Grey seals, once often seen in the Gulf of Gdansk, today occur mainly in the northern part of the Baltic. Along the Polish coast they appear only occasionally, as do sea seals, ringed seals and porpoises. Whales and other big cetaceans are an extremely rare sight in the Baltic. This is caused by scarce food, shallow sea and problems with passing through the Danish Straits that close the sea.

Source: www.poland.gov.pl