The landscape structure of the nature reserve “Medobory”
Authors: Brusak Vitaliy , Moskalyuk Kateryna 
Published: November 2019

Tovtry is a complex of fossil reef Miocene buildings that creates one of the most picturesque scenery of the surrounding plains of Podillya region. Tovtry zone consists of main ridge (the late Baden barrier reef), isolated Tovtry hills (the late Baden bioherms, located east of the ridge), isolated tovtry (the early Sarmat bioherms, located west of the main ridge), the territories of the former channels, lagoons and passes between certain reef masses, the part of which is occupied with the modern rivers. These geological and geomorphological elements are the basis of the definition of Podillian Tovtry landscapes areas, and their combination is the basis of the individual landscapes.
The great contribution to the study of Tovtry landscapes was made by K. Herenchuk (1949, 1979, 1980), who identified the main types of localities and individual landscapes. In addition to his distinguished achievements, the researches done by M. Chyzhov (1963), T. Kovalyshyn and I. Kaplun (1998), P. Shtoyko (2000), K. Moskalyuk (2011) and others could be mentioned. In Tovtry there are four landscapes: Mylno, Zbarazh, Medobory (Krasna) and Tovtry (Kamianets-Podilskyi). Natural Reserve “Medobory” (9 516.7 hectares) is located in the central part of Tovtry, mainly in Medobory landscape.
The landscape map of nature reserve, covering the surrounding area, at a scale of 1: 25,000 has been done. Six landscaped areas and more than 70 kinds of tracts have been identified. The largest area is the area of elongated summit plains of main Tovtry ridge rocky hills, covered by beech hornbeam-oak forests on humus-carbonate soils. The territory with the buried reef formations, overlained by loess-like loams, with hornbeam-oak forests on humus-carbonate soils in combination with grey forest soils occupies large area. The area of grouped and isolated side tovtry, covered by rock and meadow-steppe vegetation, shrubs on humus-carbonate soils are fragmentary represented in the natural reserve. Outside the territory of natural reserve, there are areas of the extensive plains with chernozems. They were covered by meadow vegetation in the past and now they are the agricultural lands.
Some areas of the reserve are covered by wavy interfluves of Husiatyn and Lanivtsi landscape, which are typical for stratal-tiered landscapes of Podillya. Wavy watersheds, composed of thick strata of loess loam, are mainly covered by hornbeam forests in place of oak on grey forest soils and podzolic chernozem. Along Zbruch and Gnyla the area of narrow river valleys with wide floodplains and low terraces fragments are very common. Floodplain is covered by grass-forb meadows, with alder and osier bed centres on meadow and meadow soils.
The regional and local features of the landscape structure of the reserve have been defined. Enough representation of the main types of Tovtry areas, their altitude differentiation (landscape layering) and monolithic areas of Tovtry main ridge are the most important.
Key words: Podillian Tovtry, main ridge, side tovtry hills, nature reserve “Medobory”, area of landscape.