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Parco Regionale del Delta del Po dell'Emilia-Romagna covers some of the most productive and rich in biodiversity areas in Italy. The Park includes the country's largest protected wetlands, areas of great ecological value.
It is a territory rich in natural environments, housing hundreds of plant and animal species. The considerable number of existing species is deeply linked to the diversity of local habitats, whose characteristics depend on the different chemical-physical conditions of the soil and on climatic conditions.
The particular geomorphology of the territory, although not manifest to the non-expert eye, enabled the settlement of woods made of deciduous and evergreen plants. Only a few traces of the ancient Bosco Eliceo, quoted in historical manuscripts, remain on the ancient dunes of the Ferrara coast. Around Ravenna the wood is more recent and dominated by stone- and maritime pines: the pinewoods.
Among the most important elements of the Delta landscape there are the so-called Valli (lagoons) and the Wetlands.
The brackish Lagoons were created by the flooding of low lands by the sea or by the human transformation of the territory for production purposes (fishing, salt pans).
Within the Park there is one of the few examples of fresh-water wetlands in continental Europe: the so-called "Valli" in Argenta and Marmorta, which escaped the land reclamation activities thanks to their essential hydraulic function as “casse di espansione” (expansion basins).
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