WWF CAUCASUS NEWSLETTER. In this issue: CAMERA TRAPS CATCH THE LEOPARD IN ARMENIA ANTI-POACHING UNIT IN SOUTHERN ARMENIA GO WITH A SWING

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1 WWF CAUCASUS NO 3. JANUARY / MARCH 2005 In this issue: CAMERA TRAPS CATCH THE LEOPARD IN ARMENIA ANTI-POACHING UNIT IN SOUTHERN ARMENIA GO WITH A SWING WWF CAUCASUS STARTS WORKING ON A FOREST STRATEGY CEPF PROGRAM S FIRST GRANTEES ARE KNOWN GEORGIA S RED LIST COMMISSION STARTS WORKING ON A LIST UPDATE WWF CAUCASUS NEWSLETTER SUPPLEMENT BORJOMI-KHARAGAULI NATIONAL PARK NEWSLETTER

2 CAMERA TRAPS CATCH THE LEOPARD IN ARMENIA On March 9, 2005 at 1:54 a.m. one of the four camera traps set by the Armenian scientists reacted to the Caucasian leopard on Armenia s Megri ridge. This is the first case of a leopard being depicted in its natural habitat in this country. Karen Manvelyan - WWF Caucasus Armenian Office s director is convinced that thanks to WWF s almost three-year involvement in the Leopard Conservation Project, this animal has now settled in this area. Our work here convinced us that there must be around experts assume that it should be a male but there have also been other conjectures. According to Igor Khorosian, - an independent expert, the leopard s swollen belly suggests it may be female. Mating of leopards in the Caucasus occurs in January and my field companion, who was tracking the animal, heard its rasping calls and later found many signs that proved mating behaviour. So it is quite possible that our leopard is female and it is pregnant. 5-7 exemplars of these fantastic cats in this area and we are doing our best to protect their privacy. Based on the considerable size of the animal the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Karen Manvelyan WWF Caucasus Programme Office Director, Armenian Office kmanvelyan@wwfcaucasus.am

3 ANTI-POACHING UNIT IN SOUTHERN ARMENIA GO WITH A SWING An agreement to set up an antipoaching unit within the framework of the WWF Caucasus Programme Office project Conservation of the Leopard in the Caucasus Ecoregion was signed between Armenia s Shikagoh reserve and Megri forestry and the WWF Caucasus PO in Since then the members of the unit, including three the unit that includes three rangers on duty in Kapan and three in rangers on duty in Kapan and three in the Megri regions are becoming more and more popular with the local population. One of the unit s concerns is the protection of the leopard s habitat, as well as that of its prey species. At the moment most of the access roads to all such areas are blocked by the APU. According to the unit protocol there have been several records made of poachers being detained; numerous traps have also been destroyed. One case even involved criminal charges against a person armed with Kalashnikov automatic gun AK-74. But everyday life of the APU staff is far from just adventures; they are also involved in many other activities including educational programmes at schools. Though the rangers would like more staff in the unit, they still somehow manage to be in right place at the right time. You can see traces of their activity everywhere, they are really serious about what they do, - says a local lady Adults respect them and feel happy to help, children love to watch them working and the poachers, well, they run when the APU guys appear. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Karen Manvelyan WWF Caucasus Programme Office Director, Armenian Office kmanvelyan@wwfcaucassus.am

4 WWF CAUCASUS STARTS WORKING ON A FOREST STRATEGY Degradation and loss of the forests in the Caucasus region is caused by a large number of factors, which all act together. The region s forests are threatened by unsustainable logging, unsustainable grazing and neglectful or environmentally harmful forest management practices, add to this a weak forest governance system. These topics and others were the subject of a Caucasus Forest Strategy Workshop held at WWF Caucasus between January 31 February 1. It aimed to elaborate Caucasus forests strategy. Based on assessment and analysis of the threats facing forests of the Caucasus, six priority programs were selected towards protection, management and restoration: 1. Protected areas establishment for a representative network of protected forest areas, 2. Restoration and sustainable management of forest landscapes to restore strategically important forest landscapes and demonstrate economically viable models of environmentally appropriate and socially beneficial forest management; 3. Developing forest management standards and benchmarking present practice, towards developing sustainable forest management standards and benchmark present practice; 4. Working with the supply chain to substantially reduce illegal and unsustainable logging of industrial timber; WWF Caucasus PO photo archive 5. Monitoring and detection of illegal logging to encourage forest management enterprises and logging companies to supply and purchase only legally harvested timber and 6. Influencing government policy, programmes and legislation so that national government policies, legislation and programmes in the southern Caucasus support environmentally appropriate and socially beneficial forest management; also to positively influence the levers that will bring this about. WWF Caucasus will take all these programmes and projects forward as soon as it is able to attract funds and partners. Meanwhile, WWF Caucasus will start by carrying out some essential preparatory work. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Malkhaz Dzneladze, Forest Officer WWF Caucasus Programme Office mdzneladze@wwfcaucasus.ge

5 CEPF PROGRAM S FIRST GRANTEES ARE KNOWN The Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund s (CEPF) regional programme in the Caucasus, which awards grants to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other civil society groups working to safeguard high-priority areas for conservation in the region, is in full swing. By the end of February 2005 the procedure of reviewing the first round of small-scale grants for projects and proposals was concluded and the results communicated to the applicants. In total, 185 small scale project proposals were submitted. This included 30 from Armenia, 38 from Azerbaijan, 28 from Georgia, 81 - from Russia and 8 - from Turkey. 28 project proposals were approved (4 from Armenia, 5 from Azerbaijan, 6 from Georgia, 11 - from Russia and 2 from Turkey) and the Georgian grantees were invited to the WWF Caucasus PO office on February 26, 2005 for submission of their work plan and budget. These small grants encompass a great variety of activities, including assistance to protected areas, improvement of rangers professional skills, supporting governmental conservation agencies, conservation of species and many more. The same kind of workshops are scheduled for grantees from Russia, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Armenia. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Lana Ghvinjilia Communications Officer WWF Caucasus Programme Office lghvinjilia@wwfcaucasus.ge Photos: WWF photo archive and Kote Gabrichiodze www. gabrichidze.ge

6 GEORGIA S RED LIST COMMISSION STARTS WORKING ON A LIST UPDATE. Georgia s Current Red List of endangered species is a highly eclectic document and according to specialists it runs into numerous legal problems. It is mostly based on the combination of an outdated Red Data Book from the times of the former USSR (which was mostly the subjective preferences of individual specialists), and species of Georgian fauna and flora which are protected under various international agreements. To solve this problem, the Red List Commission, a subdivision of the Georgian Academy of Sciences, was created in March It includes nine botanists, zoologists, and foresters from Georgian Academic Institutions, universities, and non-governmental organizations, including the WWF Caucasus Programme Office. The latter also participated in preparation of a law on the Georgian Red List and Georgian Red Data Book. The commission aims to replace this temporary Red List with an adjusted one, in complete correspondence to the most up-to-date IUCN criteria (2001) and IUCN guidelines for regional and national red lists (2003). Without developed conservation policies, this task is a challenge. According to the internationally accepted IUCN criteria, the conservation status of a species should be based on one of the following: the total number of adult individuals of species (or its national population), the size and the shape of a species range, the level of isolation between individual populations, the dynamics of the individual number or range, the number during the recent past or in the foreseeable future. Therefore progress is cautious because of very little solid data. The commission members think that their long-term mission is to prepare a complete checklist of the species and their conservation status from LC (of least concern) to RE (regionally extinct). Only three IUNC categories CR (critically endangered), EN (endangered) and VU (vulnerable) represent a basis of the national Red List and Red Data Book. In order to evaluate the list of endangered and vulnerable species correctly, information on the conservation status of each animal and plant is necessary. Collecting and aggregating this information is a long and complicated but very interesting and important task. says the head of the commission Dr. David Tarkhnishvili. The final version of the Red List will be completed in FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Nugzar Zazanashvili Conservation Director/Commission member WWF Caucasus Programme Office nzazanashvili@wwfcaucasus.ge

7 WWF CAUCASUS NEWSLETTER SUPPLEMENT INTRODUCING BORJOMI-KHARAGAULI NATIONAL PARK By Kakha Tolordava I can t say that the 2 hours of leisurely drive from Tbilisi to Borjomi is completely dull and uninteresting but as soon as the car leaves Khashuri back and hits the Borjomi gorge via straight alley everything fades out of my mind and, as one of my colleague puts it, an idiot s smile appears on my face. I prefer to call it the smile of relief. It means that I m back to Georgia s most beautiful part and as I ve expected it, quite surprisingly though, everything s not the same as it was during my previous, frequent visits here. The gorge seems even more invitingly gorgeous but it has changed to unexplainable way and it s always like that. It moves, it breathes, and though it is not secluded from human civilization, miraculously, it is capable of defeating any kind of human impact with its beauty. Then, at the entrance of village Kviskheti, the billboard that says Borjomi- Kharagauli National Park Area passes by and it reminds me of two things: I m here on business and more beauty will follow. The first time I went to the Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park, then under implementation, was some four years ago. That also was my first week at WWF Caucasus Office, the Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park implementer, as a communications officer and though my head was already bursting with the information on the national park, I had little idea what it was at all. We had a planned meeting with the local population of Leghvani, one of the buffer zone villages of the national park. My only duty then was to listen and the things I actually heard that day were so shockingly controversial that it made me feel a bit shaky and uncertain. People, as I got it were scared of this new initiative; they were scared of being deceived. They fought their corner vehemently and when the meeting was over I was almost sure that this was a common attitude towards the park among ALL villages in the six surrounding districts of the park thus, its future was under a big question mark. Luckily, I was wrong but little I knew that following years of my life would be almost totally dedicated to persuading these people in contrary, and today I m hundred percent convinced that if my contribution to our team efforts means anything it is because of the beauty I encountered the very same evening when after the meeting I hiked the park territory for the first time. That was the beginning of my romance with the first national park in the Caucasus.

8 Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park, Photo: Kote Gabrichidze www. gabrichidze.ge www. nationalpark.ge The following, rather random excerpts are from my grey notebook that I bought a day before I came to WWF office. These are just plain facts mostly from WWF publications. As a communications officer I needed to learn and memorize them: The Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park covers 76,000hectares, which amounts to more than 1% of the territory of Georgia. It is one of the largest parks in Europe created according to the international criteria that is protected for conservation, recreation, appreciation and enjoyment, wile being maintained in an unimpaired state for future generations. It is located in central Georgia and is situated on the northern and southern slopes of the eastern Ajara-Imereti mountain range in the northern part of the Lesser Caucasus. The extreme northern end of the national park geographically coincides with the northern Ajara-Imereti mountain rage s merge into the Likhi mountain range. These ranges divide Georgia into eastern and western parts The support zone of the park covers six districts, - Borjomi, Kharagauli, Akhaltsikhe, Bagdadi, Adigeni and Khashuri. The core zone of the national park is formed on the basis of the State Nature Reserve in Borjomi district, which has been under protection for decades The large area of mountainous forest has been preserved here in its pristine state and a number of endemic and relict species of flora and endangered species of fauna can be found in the forests as well as among sprawling sub alpine and alpine meadows. In 1994 WWF put forward a new concept for the protected areas system in Georgia and submitted a management plan for Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park to the Georgian government; In 1995, the government approved the proposed management plan and forwarded it to the government of Germany for consideration; in 1998 the Government of Germany granted funds for the actualization of the management plan. The same year, Kreditanstalt fuer

9 Wiederaufbau (KfW) mission visited Georgia to amend the management plan in the fields In 1999, the German government granted funds for the national park s implementation, training/communication and support zone programs; In 2001, the population of Adigeni district called for the national park extension by voluntarily transferring its forest lands to the park. On April 11, the park was officially inaugurated by the president of Georgia and BMZ (Germany s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development) minister Amarati tourist shelter Photo: Karin Steinmetzer www. nationalpark.ge Park has two administration centers, - one in Borjomi and the other in Kharagauli. Its entrances are arranged in Borjomi (Borjomi district), Zanavi (Borjomi district), Abastumani (Adigeni district), Marelisi (Kharagauli district) and Nunisi (Kharagauli district). There are 8 ranger stations and 10 ranger shelters scatter all around the park territory and 4 tourist shelters at Amarati, Mount Lomi, Didi Sakhvlati and Abastumani. All tourist shelters are equipped with basic furniture Many in my country don t really know what to expect in the national park, but that s how it should be when you are new to the park and it is new to you. Staying with oneself is an art that requires patience and staying with oneself in the wilderness is more than that. One has to be an adventurer and an explorer deep in his/her heart, because, like any

10 other national park, Borjomi-Kharagauli offers something entirely different from the usual daily hustle and bustle of town. It offers many things at once and you may be setting yourself up for disappointment if you dash from spectacle to spectacle, seldom stopping to get to know the area. And the area is breathtaking with awe-striking, superlative scenery caused by pristine landscapes and mountains, water and air, birds and animals, insects and the cacophony of sounds, forest, valleys and canyons, serenity and tranquility. National Park support Zone Bagdadi Region Photo: Karin Steinmetzer www. nationalpark.ge Major vegetation such as Colchic, dark coniferous and broad-leaved forests in the northern part of the park and mixed broad-leaved, hornbeam and beech forests in the southern part, make Borjomi-Kharagauli a delight. At the elevations of m, the sub-alpine zone is populated with an entire spectrum of vegetation characteristic to the zone: sub-alpine forests, sub-alpine bushes, tall grasses and meadows. The circle of life here is complete with the existence of its rich diversity of wildlife and although there s not always an excellent chance to meet in person many wild animals who made Borjomi- Kharagauli its home, such as Caucasian red deer, chamois, brown bear, wolf, lynx and wild cat, Borjomi-Kharagauli has plenty to offer to naturalists, nature lovers, bird watchers and ordinary travelers. Apart from infrequent visitations by illegal hunters, most parts of Borjomi-Kharagauli are very much untouched by human activity. Today, there are 8 well-marked nature trails officially functioning in Borjomi-Kharagauli and they all traverse a wide range of exciting wild lands. All trails vary in length, duration and complexity but all of them offer adventurous tours and amply reward the visitor with unique wildlife. The park gives you a lot even in case if you start your warm up tour with the shortest of the trails, - that is trail #7, just behind the park s administration

11 National Park support zone Surami fortress Photo: Karin Steinmetzer www. nationalpark.ge building in Borjomi. It is three kilometers long loop which is not long enough to grasp the essence of Borjomi-Kharagauli but nevertheless, it instantly puts an edge on your appetite to see and explore more. Recently, the students of Georgia s Academy of Fine Arts decorated the trail with wooden sculptures and installations that suggest the fairytale atmosphere and lost harmony between the humans and nature. Longer trails require more than just a pleasant walk and that s exactly when Borjomi- Kharagauli gets the most inviting to the brave and daring km trails like, for instance, trail #2 from Marelisi Ranger Shelter in Kharagauli district to Atskhuri Ranger Station in Akhalkalaki district are not an easy walk or ride but only longer trips can encompass entire sets of relationship between the living things that inhabit these areas and their environment. That s where the drama starts and it involves not only you and wildlife but rich history of all surrounding six districts, culture and lifestyle of the local peoples, unbelievable stories and numerous cultural monuments that date back to the early years of Orthodox Christianity and beyond. You must be very unlucky if you don t come from one of these trips with your own story to tell Getting back to my first day in Borjomi-Kharagauli It was past eleven in the evening and we, a group of five, were descending from Lomi Mountain towards the park s Likani entrance. Our soft footsteps echoed the forest floor and once we stood still in the dark just to experience the thrill of night. Suddenly, I noticed that I and everything around me, including trees, grass and my colleagues were much brighter or shiny. As my eyes become accustomed to it, something unusual became apparent: we all were covered by fireflies and we shone like the starlit sky. I was dumbfounded! I stood there and couldn t get my eyes off this magic scene. The guy s hooked the voice behind me said and I realized that I was a figure of fun for the rangers. Welcome to Borjomi-Kharagauli, mate, - said one of them, reached for his sack and passed a bottle to me: Want to have some wine before we walk again?

12 The article first appeared in CAUCASUS ENVIRONMENT magazine 3 (4) 2003 For promotional video VHS cassettes: Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park, The Borjomi-Kharagauli National Park Landscapes, Borjomi-Kharagauli Flora and Fauna, Animals of Borjomi- Kharagauli and further information please contact: Karin Steinmetzer Tourism Coordinator TEL: ksteinmetzer@web.de Natia Muladze Chief of Visitors Service TEL: www. nationalpark.ge Prepared by WWF Caucasus Programme Office Aleksidze str Tbilisi, Georgia To subscribe, unsubscribe or contribute to the WWF Caucasus Newsletter, please send an to: ktolordava@wwfcaucasus.ge