Scholarly record

MONITORING OF HEAVY METALS, BIOACTIVE SUBSTANCES AND NUTRITIONAL COMPOSITION OF CRANBERRY (VACCINIUM VITIS-IDAEA) FRUITS IN TATRA NATIONAL PARK FOREST ECOSYSTEM HIGH-ALTITUDE TRANSECTS.

Ján Mezey

Abstract

The Tatra National Park (TANAP) in Slovak republic is one of the oldest national parks in Central Europe and is also included in the NATURA 2000 system. Forest ecosystems in the Tatra National Park are made up of ecosystems, which include also the spruce-cranberry ecosystem and belong to the highest level of zonal protection, with the exclusion of any activity, including the fruit harvesting. In recent years, there has been a massive pressure from developers for tourism development in the area, new recreational facilities are increasing, and traffic to the area has also increased. The cranberry is an evergreen shrub; its edible fruits are also collected from commercial plantings for consumption on nutritional supplements, teas, medicines. The evaluated area was divided by elevation transects to 8 parts from 900 to 1700 m a.s.l. with the primary objective of determining whether the development has contributed to environmental pollution, in particular by increasing the content of heavy metals in fruit above the set limits, as well as to determine the linear dependence of evaluated attributes in relation to altitude. The excessive occurrence of heavy metals was not confirmed in evaluated fruit. Also, the linear relationship between altitude and measured attribute content was not confirmed. It can therefore be concluded that the management of the protection of this area is still sufficient for the pollution of heavy metals, nevertheless is important to continue in such observations.

Publication details

Back to publication list