The Collina Torinese Nature Park (Castagneto Po)

Nature parks

The Collina Torinese Nature Park (Castagneto Po)

Category: Parks

The Collina Torinese Nature Park consists of the Bosco di Vaj Special Nature Reserve and the Collina di Superga Nature Park. The Bosco di Vaj (Vaj Woods) is considered a “relic of the ice age” due to its mountain plant life, its oak and chestnut woods, and its many beech trees which, finding refuge in the Collina Torinese during the final ice ages, were able to assimilate with the Mediterranean plant species that took root in the periods between the various ice ages. Among the botanical rarities, there are the common Turk’s cap lily, the paradise plant, and various orchid species. The animal life is typical to Piedmont hill regions: foxes, badgers, stone martens, weasels, porcupines, and squirrels. The bird life includes: the sparrow-hawk, the tawny owl, owlets, the green woodpecker, the great spotted woodpecker, the hoopoe, and the cirl bunting.
The Collina di Superga Park has preserved a rather interesting environmental heritage, even though it is close to the city of Turin. The hill (collina) is dominated by the monumental complex of the Baroque basilica designed by Filippo Juvarra and has fauna similar to the fauna found at the Bosco di Vaj, with the addition of boars. Regarding the flora, species suitable for cool and wet climates are found, such as: beech trees, Scots pines, whitebeams, bilberries; others, such as the flowering ash, the service tree, butcher’s broom, and burning bush, are instead originally Mediterranean.
Both of these environments are made up of sedimentary rock, such as marlstone and sandstone, which is the reason that the surface in this area cracks so easily; this has allowed many fossils and other animal and plant findings from earlier eras to be discovered.

Information

Area: 74,585 hectares (Collina di Superga) and 7,150 hectares (Bosco di Vaj)
Founded: 1991 (Collina di Superga) and 1978 (Bosco di Vaj)
Environment: hill
E-mail: parco.collinatorinese@reteunitaria.piemonte.it
www.parks.it/parco.collina.torinese
Head Office
Via Alessandria, 2 - 10090 Castagneto Po (To)
Tel. +39.011.912462 - Fax: +39.011.012462