The Pannonian Biogeographic Region is a

biogeographic Biogeography is the study of the distribution of species and ecosystems in geographic space and through geological time. Organisms and biological communities often vary in a regular fashion along geographic gradients of latitude, elevation, ...

region, as defined by the

European Environment Agency The European Environment Agency (EEA) is the agency of the European Union (EU) which provides independent information on the environment. Definition The European Environment Agency (EEA) is the agency of the European Union (EU) which provides ...

. It covers the lowlands of the

Pannonian Basin The Pannonian Basin, or Carpathian Basin, is a large basin situated in south-east Central Europe. The geomorphological term Pannonian Plain is more widely used for roughly the same region though with a somewhat different sense, with only the ...

centered on Hungary.

Extent

The Pannonian Region is a large alluvial basin surrounded by the Carpathian Mountains to the north and east, the

Alps The Alps () ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps ; sl, Alpe . are the highest and most extensive mountain range system that lies entirely in Europe, stretching approximately across seven Alpine countries (from west to east): France, ...

to the west and the

Dinaric Alps The Dinaric Alps (), also Dinarides, are a mountain range in Southern and Southcentral Europe, separating the continental Balkan Peninsula from the Adriatic Sea. They stretch from Italy in the northwest through Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and He ...

to the south. The basin was once the bed of an inland sea. It is flat, and is crossed from north to south by the

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , ...

and

Tisza The Tisza, Tysa or Tisa, is one of the major rivers of Central and Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and ...

rivers. The region contains all of Hungary, and around the periphery contains parts of Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Romania, Serbia, Croatia and Ukraine.

Environment

The region is sheltered by the mountains, but has complex weather caused by the interaction of wet winds from the west, drier winds from the south and cooler winds from the Carpathians and Alps, which sometimes results in severe storms. The basin was once largely forested, with many marshes and shallow lakes, but has long been cleared and drained to make way for grasslands and cultivation. It contains inland sand dunes, sand steppes, loess grasslands and maple-oak loess forests.

Notes

Sources

* * {{authority control Environment of Europe Biogeography