RELIEF, HYDROGRAPHY, CLIMATE, FLORA AND FAUNA, PROTECTED AREAS, MINERAL RESOURCES
Romania has three major forms of relief: mountains, hills and plains. The Carpathian Mountains are the highest form of relief with the Moldoveanu peak reaching 2544 meters in altitude. The Sub-Carpathian region, made up of hills and plateaus, has an average altitude. Lowest lying are the plains, meadows and the Danube Delta. The Delta, the youngest form of relief, has an average altitude of 0.52 meters.
The three forms of relief are concentric radiating outwards from the natural amphitheatre of the Carpathians, a U-shaped outcrop in central Romania. The mountains cover 31% of the country’s surface, the hills and plateaus 36% and the plains and meadows 33%.
Romania’s climate is temperate-continental of the transitory type, with ocean, Mediterranean and excessive-continental influences. The annual average temperature varies according to latitude, reaching 8 degrees C in the north and exceeding 11 degrees C in the south, and according to altitude, ranging from minus 2.5 degrees C in the mountains and 11.6 degrees C in the plain areas.
Over recent years, there have been instances of some particularly extreme meteorological phenomena, unusual for the country. Many resulted in casualties and huge material damage: heavy and fast rainfalls, tornadoes, or heat waves followed by prolonged draught.
Romania’s running waters follow a radial distribution, most of them springing from the Carpathians and flowing into the Danube, which flows along the southern border of the country and covers 1075 kms. The Danube flows into the Black Sea through a delta. Most of Romania’s lakes are natural and spread across all the forms of relief. There are glacial lakes in the mountain ranges (such as the Mioarelor Lake in the Fagaras mountains at an altitude of 2,282 m), seashore lakes such as Lake Techirghiol at 1.5 m altitude. There are also artificial lakes all across Romania.
The flora is distributed across different altitude levels, in accordance with the forms of relief, with soil and climate characteristics. The mountains are covered with coniferous forests (mainly spruce), mixed forests (beech, fir trees and spruce) and beech forests. At higher altitudes there are alpine meadows and juniper, blueberry and cranberry bushes and many others. In the hilly and plateau areas there are mainly deciduous forests, the dominant types of trees being the beech, the durmast and the oak tree. The steppe and forest steppe vegetation that grew on the areas with low humidity was, to a large extent, replaced by agricultural crops.
Fauna: at the alpine level you can encounter such species as the chamois and the golden eagle. In the Carpathian forests there live various mammals: bears, deer, lynxes, wolves, boars, roebucks, squirrels and a great number of bird species. In several mountainous regions you can still find black cocks. In the hills and plains the fauna consists of rabbits, moles, hedgehogs, various bird species, lizards and batrachians; the fauna characteristic of the steppe areas consists of rodents (ground squirrels and hamsters). The water fauna includes trout in the mountain rivers, European chub and barbell in the hilly waters and carp, perch, pike, cat fish and gold fish in the plain waters and the Danube Delta. Various species of sturgeon can be found in the Black Sea and the lower Danube.
The country’s main mineral resources are: oil (Romania has an old oil exploitation tradition), natural gas, coal, mainly coking pit coal, brown coal or lignite, ferrous and non-ferrous ores, gold, silver and bauxite deposits, large salt deposits as well as many non-metal-bearing resources. A special category of underground riches are the more than 2000 mineral water springs, used for consumption and medical treatments.
The total surface of protected natural areas in Romania amounts to almost 20% of Romania’s surface, comprising, in 2011, 3 biosphere reserves included on the UNESCO world heritage list (The Danube Delta, the Retezat National Park and the Rodnei Mountains National Park), 8 wet lands of international importance, 13 national parks, 15 natural parks, 206 natural monuments, 64 scientific reserves, 699 natural reserves and 148 areas where bird and fauna species are especially protected.
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