Geomorphological heritage assessment in natural protected areas. Application in the Picos de Europa National Park

Geomorphosites are often important elements of Natural Protected Areas (NPAs) and may be valued both as structural and functional elements of the natural system and for their social values in relation to their location. Natural protected areas are designated as a result of a wide range of natural and cultural values that define a landscape, a natural environment, an ecosystem or a habitat. The conservation and study of the geomorphic values of NPAs may be approached from three viewpoints: as the infrastructure of habitats and ecosystems, as the landscape in general, and as an intrinsic value of the natural environment. Up to now the first view has been dominant and has resulted in a failure to consider geomorphic features as elements of value for conservation, investigation and management. In light of the second approach, geomorphosites have now been redefined in the framework of the cultural landscapes with which they are interrelated and which they affect. In this sense, the geomorphosites represent cultural, economic, tourist, educational and environmental resources involving a multiple assessment especially useful to NPAs. Moreover, with respect to regional or national inventories, NPAs have their own characteristics when it comes to defining geomorphosites because the interest is centred locally on their detailed territorial and cultural relationships. The protected areas in this way acquire heritage value. The Picos de Europa was declared a National Park in 1918, the first in Spain, due to its historical, landscape and geomorphic values: limestone mountains and glacial landforms around the glacial lakes of Enol and La Ercina. In many respects it marked the starting point of the Spanish conservationist movement and has been a symbol for mountaineers since the first ascent of Naranjo de Bulnes in 1904, effectively heralded as the beginning of rock-climbing in Spain. The assessment of the ecosystems and species present in the Picos de Europa area formed the basis for its extension in 1995 to include the high mountain region of the three massifs of Picos de Europa. Landscape highlights are dominated by geomorphic elements over human or biotic ones, and although they are pre-eminent in the Picos de Europa National Park, they have not been introduced into either the management of the area or edu