The Tecchie Forest
Instituted as a public park in 1986 by the Town Council with
support from the WWF and LIPU associations, the Tecchie Forest Natural
Park is located in the northwest corner of the Cantiano township
territory. It extends for about 180 hectares into the interesting “Serre
di Burano” area in a series of ridges and narrow valleys carved into
the geological formations of the sandstone which forms Mt. Vicino (Middle-lower
Miocene).
The Tecchie Forest is characterised by its high degree of natural
environmental integrity, making it one of the unexpected beauties of the
Marche region. The exceptional combination of flora, fauna and
vegetation found here is due to the unique geo-morphological
characteristics of the “Serre”, very different from those of the
limestone or sandy marl areas in the neighbouring region of Umbria. Many
of the flora species are rare or of great phyto-geographic interest:
here we find the lovely Roman Orchid (Orchis romana) typical of
the Adriatic regions exclusively in three areas of the Province of
Pesaro-Urbino, the common Adder’s Tongue (Ophioglossum vulgatum),
a small, rare fern sited in several locations in Lazio and the Marche
Apennines, the Calluna (Calluna vulgaris) which, on the Italian
peninsula, touches its southernmost limits in several Umbro-Marche areas,
including the Tecchie Forest.
The forest cover can be roughly divided into two types of species:
those that tend to form Turkey Oak Woods and those that tend to form
Mountain Beech Woods. On the dryer, more external slopes, we find the
species associated with Turkey Oak (Aceri obtusati - Quercetum cerris),
while on the more internal, slightly more mesophilic slopes, there is
sub-association characterised by the presence of the Wild Pear tree (
Pirus pyraster Aceri) (obtusati - Quercetum cerris pyretosum)
.
The Mountain Beech Wood covers the cooler, more internal slopes, higher
in altitude; here the wooded stage differs from that of the neighbouring
limestone environments for the various acidophil and sub-acidophil
species.
There is a rich animal population in the Tecchie Forest. The forest community of birds includes the goshawk (Accipiter gentilis), the great sparrow hawk (Accipiter nisus), the buzzard (Buteo buteo), and the honey buzzard (Pernis apivorus). But the most important birds in the Tecchie forest are the lesser-spotted woodpecker (Picoides minor) and the middle spotted woodpecker (Picoides medius), species considered extinct in almost all of the regional territory.
Among the amphibian species, we note the endemic Spectacled
Salamandre (Salamandrina Terdigitata) and the more common
Speckled Salamandre (Salamandra salamandra ).
The naturalistic fauna component si completed by the mammal species,
including the common fox, badger and hedgehog, as well as the wolf (Canis
lupus) and the roedeer ( Capreolus capreolus).