Parco Naturale delle Saline di Sicciole

General information

Sečovlje Salina Nature Park covers 7.5 km2 and consists of two parts. Its northern part, where salt is still being harvested, is known as Lera. From the Park's southern part, called Fontanigge, it is separated by the Grande - Drnica channel.

The Sečovlje salt-pans are, together with the nearby Strunjan pans, the northernmost and still active salt-pans in the Mediterranean and amongst the very few, where salt is still produced in compliance with several centuries old procedures. The Sečovlje Salina is exceptional in the great diversity of its fauna, flora and habitats.

From 2001, the Sečovlje salt-pans have been protected as a Nature Park with a special decree issued by the Government of the Republic of Slovenia. The visitors find the part called Fontanigge most attractive, for truly some unique scenes, unmatched in the entire Slovenia, can be seen there: numerous birds, extensive meadows of salt-loving plants, and over 100 abandoned and demolished salt-pan houses, which have jointly given the Sečovlje salt-pans a very special character. In 1993, the Sečovlje salt-pans were inscribed on the list of wetlands of international concern under the auspices of the Ramsar Convention, which binds the countries that have signed it - including Slovenia - to protect and conserve the wetlands and strive for their sustainable use. The great diversity of salt-pan habitats in Sečovlje Salina Nature Park to a great extent depends on the water regime practised in separate salt basins.
Thus we can find here numerous halophyte meadows, reeds, halophyte islets in the basins, overgrown and bare levees and mudflats. The great diversity of animal and plant species, which made the salt-pans famous far across the national boundaries, is the result of the great habitats' diversity. In order to conserve this exceptional biodiversity, it is therefore necessary to regularly renew and maintain the levees and the water regime in salt basins, which create the conditions necessary for the existence of numerous animals and plants in the Sečovlje salt-pans.
Apart from the exceptional diversity of their habitats, plants and animals, the Sečovlje salt-pans are also an example of exceptional and continually endangered Mediterranean landscape, as well as the most valuable and protected cultural heritage based on centuries-old culture of salt-pan life.