Environmental interests in the Forêt d'Orient Nature Park
An interesting heritage...
The diversity of the landscapes linked to a convergence of biogeographical influences(continental, mountain, mediterranean), as well as a privileged situation regarding the main migration routes of European avifauna, give this territory an important heritage value.
...nationally and internationally recognised
The Regional Nature Park constitutes one of the 17 French sites recognized by the international community as a humid zone of international importance, notably for water birds, according to the Ramsar Convention . The Park also has several sites of communal interest that is for the birds or the habitats of the wild flora and fauna. Finally, the Park shelters many zones of national ecological interest , with remarkable animal and plant species, some of which are protected by law.
A rich Fauna
The creation of vast reservoirs has without doubt considerably reinforced the ornithological interest of this part of the Champagne wetlands, already a favoured migratory stop by water birds because of the presence of many ponds and vast zones of humid natural meadow. More than 250 species of birds have been observed so far on the lakes and their forest boundaries, among which some prestigious feathered hosts, for whom the Champagne wetlands brings the only French site for regular wintering: the white tailed eagle, Bewick and Whooper swans ...
Place of refuge also for the thousands of Cranes who stopover, a few score of Bean and Greylag geese... , falcons and other osprey... The deep forests also shelter some remarkable birds (goshawks, woodpeckers...) but it is especially the big fauna (deer, roebuck and boar) that makes it important.... The Fauna in the Orient is rich, no doubt about it : hairs, feathers and scales..., claws, beaks and teeth.
As you turn a path, you may be lucky and get to observe Sir Fox, his accomplice the Badger or Lady Marten...
Diversified flora
As for the lovers of plants, they will be delighted ...several hundreds of species can be found here, living happily, from the most common to the rarest, from the most aquatic to the most earth bound from the most edible ... to the most beautiful and poisonous.