A comparative study of livestock husbandry on mountains Oiti and Kallidromo

Oiti and Kallidromo are two neighboring mountains of Central Greece, which are covered by fir forests. Although Oiti was declared as a national park in 1966 and both mountains were included in the protection network of NATURA 2000, livestock husbandry remains an important economic activity for the residents of the two regions. The objective of the study was to compare livestock husbandry in two mountains placing emphasis on the current grazing activities and the diachronic evolution of the livestock capital. Current activities were studied by collecting information from the farmers themselves through questionnaires and temporal evolution by collecting data from statistical records. It was found that sheep are the main animals in Oiti followed by goats and finally by beef cattle while in Kallidromo there are no sheep but only goats and beef cattle in numbers higher than in Oiti. During 1960’s livestock numbers decreased drastically while a tendency to increase beef cattle more than any other kind of animal was observed in both mountains. It is concluded that the disappearance of sheep from Kallidromo in the recent years should be attributed to socioeconomic reasons rather than to the protection status of the mountain since there was not a similar development in Oiti where a stricter protection status for livestock grazing is applied.