The Oasis of Persano was established in 1981 around an artificial lake formed after the damming of the river Sele. This basin is the heart of the natural oasis that stretches for about 110 hectares along the banks of the river Sele between the town of Serre and Campagna, province of Salerno.
The Oasis is located within the Nature Reserve Foce Sele-Tanagro and is a wetland of international importance by the Ramsar Convention.
The reservoir of the Oasis is surrounded by very different environments, such as the hygrophilous (willow, black poplar, white poplar and black alder), flooded the lawn (daffodils, daisies, buttercups, wild gladioli, wild orchids), the riparian forest (ferns, horsetails, and water lily), the reeds and marsh areas (straw, cattail, sparganio and rattan). In hilly tract extend large areas of Mediterranean, coppice and natural meadows.
Otter, an animal on the verge of extinction, is the symbol of the Oasis. Among other mammals are polecats, donnales, badgers, foxes and wild boars.
The oasis is a shelter and a resting spot for birds as it is on the main route of migratory birds going back and forth between Africa and Northern Europe. The basin and the surrounding areas offer abundant opportunities and easy food for migratory birds due to the huge amount of insects, reptiles and amphibians and the fish fauna as chubs, eels, tenches, barbels, carps, roaches and the rare lampreys. Among the birds, in spring, there are the little egrets, the great crested grebes, purple herons and the gray herons, night herons, Squaccos, diving ducks, moorhens, coots and the water rails. Among the birds of prey there are kestrels, sparrow hawks, black kites and buzzards, while in winter there are peregrine falcons.
Observatory
Laura Maria Padovani, Paola Carrabba, Barbara Di Giovanni, Francesco Mauro, Biodiversità - Risorse per lo sviluppo, Hoepli editore
Photo gallery
