The paper presents the results of field studies carried out in I O chosen forest islands in a suburban area of the town of Jaworzno in the years 1995-2002. Different objects have been studied, among others: natural remnants of oak-hornbeam forest and planted pine-larch woodlots cultivated on the habitat of xerothermic grasslands. In comparison with the total nora of the town, the participation of non-synantropie species and synecological groups associated with natural habitats is much bigger. There are 24 protected species to be found, 40% of protected nora of the town. Despite their diversity, they are precious refugees of many woodland and grassland as well as meadow species occurring within the areas and in their vicinity.

Though current conservation policy in Poland refl ects world trends and approaches to action, compliance with all of its assumptions would entail the Polish authorities remodelling both the system and the methods by which natural resources are managed. On the one hand this requires a change of approach to the management of natural resources from the traditional, purely nature-related one, to a more modern inter-disciplinary one that takes in social and economic conditioning. On the other hand, a system need to be put in place to allow these ideas to be introduced in practice. The work described here deals with the participation of different stakeholder groups in nature management, with this regarded as a method of increasing the latter’s effi ciency. The many examples (of good practice) presented by the author well illustrate the wisdom of the approach, which often seems to achieve success where it is attempted.