On July 28th, Khortytsia Island was granted the status of a natural monument of local importance.

On July 28th, Khortytsia Island was granted the status of a natural monument of local importance.

The design level for filling the Kakhovka reservoir was reached back in 1958, marking the final destruction of the Zaporozhzhia Great Meadow (Velykyi Luh).

Following the flooding of the Dnipro rapids and the Great Meadow floodplains by reservoirs, only Khortytsia Island and some surrounding areas of the Lower Dnipro remained relatively intact in terms of their original coastal landscapes.

The island’s value as a potential object of the nature reserve fund increased significantly, probably motivating its inclusion in the nature protection register. On 28 July 1958, the Zaporizhzhia Regional Executive Committee approved decision No. 507, granting Khortytsia Island the status of a natural monument of local importance. This established the beginning of the island’s official history as part of Ukraine’s nature reserve fund.

The monument encompasses the southern part of Khortytsia Island, Mala Khortytsia Island, the rocks: Stoh I and Stoh II, and a coastal strip up to 1 km wide along the right bank of the Old Dnipro, from the mouth of the Nyzhnia Khortytsia river.

This territory contains outcrops of Precambrian crystalline rocks and rocky vegetation, as well as remnants of ravine forests of virgin steppe and Dnipro floodplains.

This material was prepared by Mykhailo Mulenko, the head of the nature sector of the Khortytsia National Reserve.