Osservatorio della Biodiversità della Regione Autonoma Valle d'Aosta

Vertebrates

Animals presenting, as a distinctive and peculiar feature, a spine that gives support to the body and allows it to move. The vertebrates represent approximately just 2% of all animal life on Earth. They are present in Italy with about 1300 species, accounting for 1 to 2% of the entire Italian fauna. In Aosta Valley about 350 species are present.

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Invertebrates

Large and heterogeneous set of animal species without an internal skeleton. They represent about 97% of all animal life forms on Earth. First to colonize our planet, about 4 billion years ago, they populate any terrestrial environment. In Italy there are about 55100 species, accounting for 98-99% of the Italian fauna

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Protection

The conservation of wildlife must consider multiple biological characteristics of vertebrates and invertebrates species, including high mobility and interactions among even distant populations. More and more often the legislative protection interventions must be transnational and thus they are shared by several Countries and Regions.

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Vascular flora

It represents the set of all those plants equipped with a specialized vascular system for the transport of water, minerals and sugars. Are part of the vascular flora the pteridophytes and phanerogams, all plants equipped with seeds and flowers more or less specialized, which represent, by themselves, about half of all species of the vegetable kingdom.

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Protection

With the Regional Law No 45/2009 - Regulations for the protection and preservation of alpine flora, the Autonomous Region of Aosta Valley regulates the protection and conservation of spontaneous and native alpine flora, as well as some species of ferns, mosses and lichens. Through habitat protection, promotion of conservation and management programs, research and promotion activities, this law is intended to ensure, on the basis of international, community and national laws, the proper conservation of the flora heritage.

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Lichens

Symbiotic organisms resulting from the close association between a fungus and an algae. The fungus absorbs the nourishment from the algae, and in return it provides water, minerals and support. Thanks to this symbiosis the lichen can live in extreme environments, generally inaccessible to other forms of plant life.

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Protection

With the Regional Law No 45/2009 - Regulations for the protection and preservation of alpine flora, the Autonomous Region of Aosta Valley regulates the protection and conservation of the species of lichens, which reproduction and diffusion occur in natural way. Through habitat protection, promotion of conservation and management programs, research and promotion activities, this law is intended to ensure, on the basis of international, community and national laws, the proper conservation of the natural heritage.

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Bryophytes

Very primitive plants that have structures similar to leaves and stems, but they are not provided of real roots and vascular tissues, and for this reason they are small. They are generally pioneer plants, able to colonize inhospitable places, where they retain water and limit soil erosion, thus favoring the settlement of species with more ecological requirements.

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Protection

With the Regional Law No 45/2009 - Regulations for the protection and preservation of alpine flora, the Autonomous Region of Aosta Valley regulates the protection and conservation of the species of mosses whose reproduction and distribution occur in a natural way. Through habitat protection, promotion of conservation and management programs, research and promotion activities, this law is intended to ensure, on the basis of international, community and national laws, the proper conservation of the natural heritage.

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Mushrooms

Systematic heterogeneous group, which includes organisms with very different shapes and sizes. In general, being unable to perform the photosynthetic process, unlike the plant they must draw nourishment from other organisms. They can be parasites of animals or plants or they can live on dead organic matter, accelerating its processes of decomposition.

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Signalisations

In this section you can enter the signalisations for:
-Fauna
-Flora
-Lichens
-Bryophyte
-Mushrooms

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Regional Observatory of Biodiversity
Autonomous Region of Aosta Valley

The Aosta Valley has a natural heritage of great value; about 30% of its territory is covered by natural protected sites, by sites belonging to the Nature 2000 European ecological network and by four alpine botanical gardens.

The VDA Nature Métro project, as part of the 2007/2013 Regional Competitiveness FESR Operational Program, was created to systematically respond to the necessity of creating a strong unified picture of all the protected natural areas of the Aosta Valley, by increasing their visibility and overcoming the current fragmentation of the context, in order to transmit a concept of protection and accessible and conscious natural fruition.

At national level, the National Biodiversity Strategy was presented in May 2010, whose main objective is to preserve the biodiversity by ensuring the use of its components in a sustainable and durable manner, through a multidisciplinary approach, as well as sharing and collaboration between the various stakeholders, including political figures, local governments and representatives of the academic and scientific world.

By using databases concerning the nature, the Observatory contributes significantly to the European Action Plan for the conservation of biodiversity, through monitoring actions of habitats and species, in order to improve the scientific knowledge.

In particular, the activities performed by the Aosta Valley Museum of Natural Science refer the scientific support on the construction of the VIVA (Aosta Valley unique by nature) system, the creation of a database based on naturalistic and human pressure topics, the activity of updating, evaluating and defining of the modalities for implementation of the state of scientific knowledge for each natural site, the development of survey methods and data monitoring and protocols for processing them, the identification of flora, fauna and habitats bio-indicators as well as social-economic indicators for performance monitoring of the sites and especially for the Nature 2000 network, the identification of regional ecological network.

In order to face these commitments, in support of the project VDA Nature Métro, the creation of the Regional Observatory of Biodiversity has been conceived, on which the Aosta Valley Regional Museum of Natural Sciences is the actuator subject, as an expression of the high naturalistic value of the region.
The Observatory is intended as a database system oriented to support the management of these high valued naturalistic areas, but it is also available to users who desire to obtain information on this natural heritage.
The Observatory is an essential part of the project “VDA Nature Métro” because the information and the istructions that will be provided should be focused to the preservation and responsible exploitment of the sites.
The user has the possibility to obtain information on natural features and can also contribute to the implementation of the contents of databases nature with their signalisations.

Regional Observatory of BiodiversityAutonomous Region of Aosta Valley

Regional Observatory of Biodiversity
Autonomous Region of Aosta Valley