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Maciej Romański
Vascular plants
The earliest data concerning plant species occurring around Wigry date back to 1902 and come from an academic work for the general public by K. Kulwiec A journal of a trip to Wigry. The subsequent information on this subject appeared in the 1920s and was prepared by J. Woloszynska and B. Hryniewicki. B. Hryniewicki pointed out that a lot of rare plant species are found here, such as, for example, lady’s slippers Cypripedium calceolus, Neottianthe cucullata or Gentiana pneumonanthe. Unfortunately, many works from the period before World War II went missing and valuable information was lost.
Yellow marsh saxifrage (Saxifraga hirculus).
During the existence of the Wigry National Park its area has been visited by botanists from universities all over Poland, and the state of knowledge of its flora has been expanded further. Also the scientists from the Scientific and Research Laboratory of the Wigry National Park have contributed to better knowledge of the flora of this area. At present, on the list of vascular plants in the WNP there are 999 taxa of native vascular plants, alien species which have made the Park their home for good, and some cultivated plants. The list is, by no means, closed, and it will continue to expand with time. Particularly little is still known of species and varieties of cultivated and decorative plants grown in the WNP. |
Buxbaum's sedge Carex buxbaumii. Phot. M. Romański
After the war, the first mentions of flora of this area began to appear in the 1960s. More data were accumulated in the 1970s. However, they were fragmentary works, not presenting the flora around Wigry in a comprehensive way. The first exhaustive studies of the flora round Lake Wigry were carried out only in the 1980s., mainly thanks to the studies by prof. A. W. Sokolowski. A work by this author called Flora in the Wigry National Park came out at the same time when the Wigry National Park was established. In his work, on the basis of his own research and that done by others, the author lists the occurrence of 794 species of vascular plants, which are found in the Park. After the establishment of the Wigry National Park, a lot of new researchers and works appeared. The studies by A. Jutrzenka-Trzebiatowski, J. Dziedzic and T. Szarejko from 1994 contributed a lot of new information.
Pink Frog Orchid (Neottianthe cucullata).
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