Description Whole Sumava mountains area is located on the territory of three countries (the Czech Republic, The Federal Republic of Germany and Austria). A total of 125 km of its overall length is located within the Czech Republic. The reference area includes districts of National Park Šumava at Czech side (Klatovy, Prachatice and Èeský Krumlov) and corresponding territory on German side (districts Cham, Regen, Grafenau). As old artificial lowland, Sumava was folded and raised as vaulted ceiling with a wide ridge, sharp inclines on the Bavarian side and freely slanting incline into Bohemia. In the middle of the Sumava Mountains there is an extensive core with the highest raised plateaus around 1000 - 1100 m n.m. known as "Plains". There are 6 mountainous zones reaching from these plains, five on Czech territory and one on the territory of the Federal Republic of Germany. From a hydrogeological viewpoint, the circulation of groundwater in one way depends on a thick network of cracks and as well on watering out coatings of gneiss, mica, granite etc. When effected by freezing efflovescence, during the ice age freeze over of Sumava, the decay coating can become tens of meters thick. Forest communities, established during the long-term development since the glaciation period, represent the dominant biotope. The mountain part of Sumava is nowadays featured by florid beech wood, mountain acidophile beech wood, and climex spruce stands. Their zonal distribution corresponds with terrain altitude. however, the natural character of those zonations has been greatly altered by long-term forest farming and the terrain altitude has recently been masked in many locations by nonidigenous spruce monocultures and deforested landscpe. At present, forest vegetation is formed by a mixture ranging from strongly changed, adapted communities up to almost natural remnants of forest communities which have been preserved in several Sumava localities (Boubin, Smrcina, Stozec, etc.). The Sumava fauna had been formed during the period of glaciation and originally it was of almost exclusive woodland character. Most of the woodland spedies have survived except for large predators (including bear, lynx, wolf, wold cat). Sumava water streams in their upper parts are minimally polluted and consequently Sumava belongs to the most important habitats of the river otter in the Czech Republic. The designation of a biospherical reservation (BR) and presence on the list of UNESCO. In the Šumava area the boundaries practically coincide with those of the PLA and National Park together (the biosphere reserve embraces the National Park). BR is a part of the UNESCO World Network of biosphere reserves on the basis of an approval procedure and thereby enjoy the advantages of global cooperation and easy access to diverse sources of information. It also facilitates the exchange of publications and work visits to other BRs. Very ocassionally material advantage and grants may result from such acquired information and thus established contacts. One such example was the inclusion of the Czech BRs in the grant programme of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) which, through the agency of the World Bank, promoted logistic and applied research pertaining to the conservation of biodiversity in three Czech BRs. The Czech National Committee´s endeavour, however, is that the knowledge and experience acquired in the BRs be quickly passed on to other large protected areas in the Czech Republic. To this end it arranges joint conferences, puts out publications, and organizes work sessions, for example such as the one held on the ocassion of the conference "Geo-bio-diversity of Šumava" in September 1996.