Current view: Text account
Site description (2002 baseline):
Site location and context
The rough massif of Serra da Estrela is a high plateau NE-sloped and deeply crossed by the valleys of the rivers that born there. Mainly granitic with extensive areas of schist, the plateau presents rocky out-crops that define the landscape. Due to its great altitude, this is one of places with higher precipitations in Portugal. This also conditions a very marked vegetal zonation: a basal floor, up to 900 meters, with mediterranean influence, intensively cultivated; an intermediate floor, from 900 to 1600 meters, climatic domain of black oak (residual), with patches of coppices, genistas, heathers, brooms and rockroses, and artificial plantations of pines, pseudotsugas, cedars and firs; some rye-fields are also found; finally, the top floor, domain of heather and juniper groves, with some endemic rupicolous communities and orophytos nationaly only represented in Serra da Estrela. We can also find lacustrine communities of puddles and lagoons in higher zones.
This site has a important populations of some altitude species like
Anthus campestris,Emberiza hortulana.The avifauna above 1000 m has a diversity of 100 species during the annual cycle.
Pressure/threats to key biodiversity
There is not a management plan for nature conservation in natural park or site Natura 2000. The main threats for the site are burning of vegetation and tourism/recreation pression in Biogenetic Reserve.
National:Nature Park Serra da Estrela,101060 ha, contains IBA.SIC proposal Serra da Estrela,88291 ha included in the IBAInternational:SIC candidature,Biogenetic Reserve (Council of Europe)
Recommended citation
BirdLife International (2024) Important Bird Area factsheet: Estrela Mountains (Portugal). Downloaded from
https://datazone.birdlife.org/site/factsheet/estrela-mountains-iba-portugal on 23/11/2024.
