The Adamello Brenta Natural Park

The Adamello Brenta Natural Park extends for 625 km2 and is the largest protected area in Trentino.

Val Rendena cuts through the park and it is delimitated by the Non, Sole, and Giudicarie valleys. The Adamello Brenta Natural Park is home to a great abundance of wildlife, thanks to the environmental variability within the area. In addition to hosting the characteristic Alpine vertebrates, this area is distinguished from the rest of the Alpine chain for a population of brown bears who survived here right through the 1900s, the period of almost total extinction of the species across the Alps. They suffered extreme persecution by every possible means, confining them by the second half of the last century to a small area in western Trentino. In time was even further reduced to the eastern Brenta Dolomites in the zone between Cles and Andolo. After about 1985 no further reproduction of the species was recorded and the sad destiny of the 3 to 5 remaining animals appeared inevitable. In order to avoid the imminent extinction of the species, in 1996 the Park initiated a reintroduction project called Life Ursus. Between 1999 and 2002 ten brown bears originating from Slovenia were released and these adapted well to their new environment and life after a few initial problems, soon starting to breed and countering the fall in population. Over subsequent years the extension of their range increased to other mountain groups, almost exclusively in western Trentino. Currently (2022) the 10 introduced animals have all been deceased for some time, leaving about 100 brown bears in circulation, all born in Trentino. Some of these, females with cubs or solitary males, regularly frequent areas inside the territory of Cles.  The local area offers everything that a bear needs to survive: abundant beechmast (beech tree seeds) in the beech woods, a typical autumn food, and apples. The apple orchards bordering on the forests of the Cles mountains, from San Vito to  Caltron, are regularly visited by bears from the end of August to November.  Sometimes a number of bears fail to go into hibernation and continue to frequent the apple orchards through the winter. The recent spontaneous appearance of  wolves  and   golden jackals  demonstrates how the first two decades of this century have seen profound transformations in local fauna populations, not only in the Park but across the entire Alpine chain.