Opinion: A further detailed look into the "Gariwangsan" ecosystem

Hyungyoon Cho - Week Two Card News

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During the Pyeongchang winter games in 2018, Gariwangsan was cut down in order to become a ski course.

During this process, innumerous endangered plants were lost. Mount Gariwang was untouched for nearly 500 years, making it a favorable environment for various plants and animals. Despite this fact, for the 8 day festival, the mountain was brutally cut down.

The mountain was a protected area for forest genetic resource conservation, there are even more vulnerable plants and animals that inhabit in Gariwangsan. In terms of trees that are living in Gariwangsan, there are mainly 4 different types of trees: tree layer, low-tree layer, shrub layer, and herbaceous layer. In total, there are 192 different types of trees(24 tree layer, 23 low-tree layer, 34 shrub layer, and 111 herbaceous layer).

In the process of developing Gariwangsan to a ski course, 58,000 trees were cut down. Some mammals that live in Gariwangsan include Racoons, Yellow-throated martens, Asian badgers, Leopard cats, Hydropotes inermis, Eurasian otter, Siberian roe deer, Wild boar, Korean hare, Red squirrel, Siberian flying squirrel.