Data Zone
Country/territory: Italy
IBA criteria met: A4i, B1i, B2, B3, C2, C6 (2000)
For more information about IBA criteria, please click here
Area: 30,000 ha
Site description (baseline)
A stretch of the River Po, including large islands of shingle and sand, riparian woodlands, poplar Populus plantations and flat, cultivated areas. The area includes a lowland freshwater wetland (169 ha) located a few kilometres north of the River Po, called Palude di Ostiglia. This marshland of reed Phragmites and sedge Carex is separated from the surrounding intensively cultivated countryside by a 2 m high dyke. Main land-uses are intensive agriculture (especially maize), forestry (poplar), and recreational activities. In Palude di Ostiglia the main land-use is the sustainable exploitation of sedge for producing traditional handcrafts.
Key biodiversity
This site is important for three large heronries (Pomponesco, Gramignazzo and Bellaguarda), and especially for Nycticorax nycticorax. The area also supports notable numbers of a wide variety of other wetland species. Species of global conservation concern that do not meet IBA criteria: Aythya nyroca (max. 1, passage), Acrocephalus paludicola (max. 1, passage).
Recommended citation
BirdLife International (2023) Important Bird Area factsheet: River Po: from the mouth of Adda river to Ostiglia. Downloaded from
http://datazone.birdlife.org/site/factsheet/2730 on 30/05/2023.
