With its two parks, Vezza d’Oglio is a true nature reserve, to be experienced and admired in its many aspects.
The change in altitude and therefore its considerable variations in climate, determines an enormous variety of flora and vegetation. Every clod of land is rich and multi-coloured – enough to amaze even the most experienced excursionists. A feast of colours and tones!
Above 1,000m, the broad-leaf woods mingle with conifers where silver and spruce firs, larches and cembran pines reign supreme, whilst, higher up, the dwarf and bending shrub belt extends including green alders, willows and dwarf mountain pines with many rhododendrons and junipers. Further up, we reach alpine pastures with a wealth of gentians, gentianellas, pulsatilla vulgaris, lilies, saxifrages, calystegia soldanella and edelweiss.
Numerous species of alpine fauna find their ideal habitat in this splendid natural paradise; deer and roe deer that scurry in the woods and the clearings, chamois and rock goats that climb high up. You can hear the whistling of alpine marmots and peek at squirrels and stoats’ pleasant little faces. There’s no lack of foxes, hares, hedgehogs, dormice, and beech martens although badgers and weasels are rarer. If you then listen out for the sweet sounds of nature, you’ll hear the melodious chirping of the many families of small birds of varied sizes and showy colours. Lift your eyes and amongst the branches you can see the chough, raven, crow, woodpecker, wood grouse and mountain grouse. There’s no lack of mountain partridges, buzzards, sparrow hawks, owls and rock ptarmigans. High up in the sky, the flight of the majestic golden eagle rules and sometimes lammergeyers and lamb vultures can be seen. Don’t forget the inhabitants of our ponds, streams and torrents amongst which typical mountain varieties, and naturally, our insects which form a less visible but equally immense and mysterious world.