FRUIT TREES IN BEAR COUNTRY

The brown bear (Ursus arctos) is listed as “threathened” by the Spanish Catalogue of Threatened Species. Although the population of cantabrian bears has been growing in Spain in recent years, this growth has been significantly slower in the eastern subpopulation, which includes the palentino hills in Palencia and Liébana as well as Polaciones hills in Cantabria. This subpopulation slightly exceeds 40 individuals.

Various scientific studies indicate that reproductive success and the survival of the cubs appear to be directly linked to the availability of food, hence greater feed diversity would be supremely important for their recovery. This is why ACCIONA and the Brown Bear Foundation (FOP) initiated this project, with the main objective of enriching the hills where the bears live in Palencia and Cantabria by planting fruit trees to improve the availability, in terms of variety and amount, of food for brown bears.

As a continuation of the project begun in 2012, ACCIONA during 2016 has planted 5.000 fruit trees, which along with those planted in previous years, make a total of more than 21.0000 fruit trees of different species, such as cherries, apples, whitebeams, buckthorns, spindles and rowans, distributed in various copses to cover a larger enriched territory.

With these activities biodiversity and CO2 fixation are favoured, improving the habitat for brown bears and efficiently contributing to the recovery of one of the most symbolic animals of our fauna.

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The Complete History of  the Brown Bear at ACCIONA Experience