Bosque de Fray Jorge National Park

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Bosque de Fray Jorge national park (Spanish Parque Nacional Bosque de Fray Jorge) lies in the Coquimbo Region in Chile. It is a UNESCO Biosphere reserve.

[edit] Geography

The national park is approximately 100 km directly south of La Serena on the Pacific Ocean, as well as approximately 30 km to the west of Ovalle. It lies close to the Atacama desert.

The park covers an area of 100 km ². The national park is known for its Valdivian temperate rain forests. The coastal fog (Spanish: Camanchaca) hangs on the mountain-slopes and moistens subtropical vegetation; the forest is a vestigial survival of the former glacial period.

Typical plants of the national park inclue:

Peruvian pepper tree Schinus latifolius
Epiphyte
Azara celastrina
Lithraea caustica
Porlieria chilensis
Olive trees (Aextoxicon punctatum )
Sarmienta scandens
Griselinia scandens

The park also includes a large number of smaller animals, as Degu, Chinchilla and foxes. Many different kinds of bird live in the forests, such as the Tinamou (Nothoprocta perdicaria ).

[edit] History

Outlookover the national park

The Bosque de Fray Jorge national park was created in 1943 and is administered by the Chilean forest authority CONAF. UNESCO incorporated the national park as a biosphere reservation in 1977. Beside this national park, two further parks belong to park to this biosphere reservation, Talinay- und Punta del Viento.