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Cave protection zones

Every cave in Slovakia is natural monument. The 12 show caves have an important place among the educational localities. They represent important geomorfological phenomena with rich and special flowstone, aragonite or ice fill, moreover some of them are significant archaeological and cultural localities.

Cave protection zones

Cave protection zone on the surface over the cave, which is or can be threatened by various activities, are declared by the territorially appropriate regional office for the environment according to § 24 section 8 of the act no. 543/2002 of the Legal Codes on nature and landscape protection on the basis of submitted project. The declaration aims to optimization of economic activities on the surface without disturbing influences on cave geosystems (exclusion of clear cutting in forests, limitation of fertilizing in agriculture, exclusion of erosion inductive activities, unfavourable influence of raw materials mining, construction and industrial activities etc.).

The Slovak Caves Administration has worked out the following projects of protection zones by now:

Caves Area of protection zone in hectars Year of working out the project Year of submitting the project to ROE State of the proceedings
Domica Cave 616,6912 2003 2003 Declared in 2005
Ochtinská Aragonite Cave 65,9635 2003 2003 Proceedings ended
Gombasecká Cave 758,4869 2003 2005 Proceedings ended
Brekovská Cave 15,2648 2003 2003 In the comment process
Bystrianska Cave 104,1694 2003 2003 Proceedings ended
Važecká Cave 967,6777 2003 2003 In the comment process
Liskovská Cave 15,8545 2003 2003 Declared in 2003
Demänovské Caves 634,3031 2003 2004 In the comment process
Ponická Cave 266,1791 2003 2004 Before the comment process
Podbanište Cave 168,5265 2003 2003 Declared in 2005
Malá drienčanská jaskyňa 30,6752 2003 2003 Declared in 2006
Krásnohorská Cave 195,6266 2004 2005 Before the comment process
Burda Cave 10,7563 2004 2005 Before the comment process
Čachtická Cave 379,3191 2004 2005 Declared in 2005
Brestovská Cave - 2004 2005 In the comment process

Further, it is planned to prepare the following projects of protection zones for caves: Milada, Ardovská (Slovak Karst), Bobačka, Ladzianskeho (Muránska Plateau), Driny (Malé Karpaty).