Rila Monastery Nature Park
| Rila Monastery Nature Park | |
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IUCN category V (protected landscape/seascape)
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| Location | Rila Municipality, Kyustendil Province, Bulgaria |
| Nearest city | Rila |
| Coordinates | 42°08′52″N 23°37′38″E / 42.147911°N 23.627185°ECoordinates: 42°08′52″N 23°37′38″E / 42.147911°N 23.627185°E |
| Area | 252.532 km2 |
| Established | 1992 |
| Visitors | 1 002 204 (in 2008) |
| Governing body | Ministry of Environment and Water |
Rila Monastery Nature Park (Bulgarian: Природен парк „Рилски манастир“) is among the largest nature parks in Bulgaria spanning a territory of 252.535 km2 in the western part of the Rila mountain range at an altitude between 750 and 2713 meters. It is situated in Rila Municipality, Kyustendil Province and includes forests, mountain meadows, alpine areas and 28 glacial lakes. With a little more than 1 million visitors, it is the second most visited nature park in the country, after Vitosha Nature Park.
It was established in 1992 as part of the newly founded Rila National Park. In 2000 some territory of the national park was reassigned to the Rila Monastery and was recategorized as a nature park because by law all lands in national parks are exclusively state owned. Nowadays most of the park is owned by the monastery. The park includes one nature reserve, Rila Monastery Forest, with an area of 36.65 km2 or 14% the total territory.
The park falls entirely within the Rodope montane mixed forests terrestrial ecoregion of the Palearctic Temperate broadleaf and mixed forest. There are approximately 1400 species of vascular plants, 282 species of mosses and 130 species of freshwater algae. The fauna is represented by 52 species of mammals, 122 species of birds, 12 species of reptiles, 11 species of amphibians and 5 species of fish, as well as 2600 species of invertebrates.
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