Zprávy památkové péče 2022, 82(4):523-528 | DOI: 10.56112/zpp.2022.4.04

The impact of the bark beetle calamity on archaeological heritage in the forest environment with examples of damaged or destroyed archaeological monuments in South Bohemia

Jiří Havlice¹, Lenka Militká², Martin Tomášek²

¹ NPÚ, ÚOP v Českých Budějovicích

² NPÚ, Generální ředitelství v Praze

We are currently witnessing the largest and longest bark beetle calamity in the history of forest management in the Czech Republic. The calamity is associated with extremely intensive clear-cut logging with heavy machinery and pressure for subsequent rapid reforestation. These interventions put a number of immovable monuments and archaeological sites at risk. It is not easy to set logging and afforestation rules that are as gentle as possible to archaeological immovable and movable finds in the forest landscape. Since 2021, this topic has been one of the main tasks of the Archaeology Department of the National Heritage Institute due to its topicality. The paper summarizes the issue, tries to propose partial solutions and also presents several concrete examples of disturbed sites from one of the most endangered regions in the Czech Republic, which is South Bohemia. It emphasizes that quality information provided in a timely manner by a professional conservation organization to the owner is one of the possibilities of compensation that the owner receives for the restriction of his property rights in the public interest, and introduces the idea of creating care plans (at least) for monuments of archaeological nature.

Keywords: forest; bark beetle; historic preservation; forest management; archaeological sites

Published: April 12, 2023  Show citation