General features of Estonian nature

Abstract: In Estonia altogether 1.626 peatlands with an area over 10 ha are recorded, 143 mires extend over more than 1.000 ha. Mires occur all across the country but the species-rich fen areas are situated mainly on Saaremaa Island and in the western part of the Estonian mainland, mixotrophic bogs are found first of all in western and central Estonia, larger raised bogs are located in the southwestern, northeastern and central parts. The flora of vascular plants of Estonian natural mires includes 280 species; from these 230 occur in fens, 103 in transitional mires and 45 species in raised bogs, respec-tively. Among the Estonian mires five habitat site types and 11 subtypes have been established. Due to their species richness the most conspicuous mires on the North European scale are calcareous fens and spring fens. By 1980 about 1,006.300 ha of lands were ameliorated. Peat is one of the most important natural re-sources for Estonia; the yearly production in 1970-1990 reached about 2.5X106 tons (with 40 % water content). In the recent years the amount of annual peat excavation has been 1.2-1.5 x 106 tons that ex-ceeds the natural peat accumulation rate two-three times. Moreover, comparing the annual emission range (0.8-1.6 x 106 tons of CO2-C) with the possible total annual carbon storing by peat accumulation (0.25-0.32 x 106 t CO2-C), it follows that the emission from drained fen sites alone is on the averag