Last year wood thieves cost the State Forest Department damages amounting to €25,500, with the offenders often being the inhabitants of Roma settlements, according to the spokesperson for State Forest Department in the Tatra National Park, Lenka Burdová.
Pieces of brushwood and saplings were chopped up and removed, even in the protected areas of Smokovec and Tatranské Matliare. Forest workers recorded 63 thefts of wood last year, focussing mostly on brushwood, with three thieves being caught in the act. Typically such thefts involved smaller sections of bush and trees, however the largest such theft was recorded by forestry workers in Tatranské Matliare where 120 cubic metres of timber disappeared, worth more than €23,000.
Gavin Shoebridge
