Ånderdalen National Park ( no, Ånderdalen nasjonalpark) is located on the large island of Senja in

Troms og Finnmark Troms og Finnmark (; sme, Romsa ja Finnmárku ; fkv, Tromssa ja Finmarkku; fi, Tromssa ja Finnmark, lit. Troms and Finnmark in English), is a county in northern Norway that was established on 1 January 2020 as the result of a regional reform. ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...

. The park lies within

Senja Municipality Senja is a municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. It was established on 1 January 2020 when the municipalities of Berg, Lenvik, Torsken, and Tranøy were merged into one municipality. It is located in the traditional district of Hå ...

. The park was established by royal decree on 6 February 1970 and it was enlarged in 2004. The national park preserves this Northern Norwegian coastal landscape. The bedrock consists of hard granite rocks and the landscape image gives exciting impressions of the glacial forces that have worked on Senja. The coastal pine forest in Ånderdalen has in some areas primeval forest with over 600 years old trees and countless marble pines and lower. Along the river there are many lush hawked birch forests and floodplain forests. The national park had no

moose The moose (in North America) or elk (in Eurasia) (''Alces alces'') is a member of the New World deer subfamily and is the only species in the genus ''Alces''. It is the largest and heaviest extant species in the deer family. Most adult ma ...

before 1940, but it now has a permanent population. It is also an important calving and grazing area for semi-domesticated

reindeer Reindeer (in North American English, known as caribou if wild and ''reindeer'' if domesticated) are deer in the genus ''Rangifer''. For the last few decades, reindeer were assigned to one species, ''Rangifer tarandus'', with about 10 sub ...

. The most common smaller animals are red foxes,

stoat The stoat (''Mustela erminea''), also known as the Eurasian ermine, Beringian ermine and ermine, is a mustelid native to Eurasia and the northern portions of North America. Because of its wide circumpolar distribution, it is listed as Least Conc ...

s, hares, small rodents, and two species of

shrew Shrews (family Soricidae) are small mole-like mammals classified in the order Eulipotyphla. True shrews are not to be confused with treeshrews, otter shrews, elephant shrews, West Indies shrews, or marsupial shrews, which belong to differ ...

Seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to imp ...

s occur at the heads of the fjords and otters are often seen along rivers. Trout and char are common, and salmon run right up the river to the lake Åndervatn.

Name

The last element is the finite form of ''dal'' which means "dale" or "

valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains, which will typically contain a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams ove ...

". The meaning of the first element is unknown. In the valley and the park are similar names such as the river ''Ånderelva'' and the lake ''Åndervatnet''.

References

External links

* Map of Ånderdalen National Park {{DEFAULTSORT:Aanderdalen National Park National parks of Norway Protected areas established in 1970 Tourist attractions in Troms og Finnmark Protected areas of Troms og Finnmark 1970 establishments in Norway Senja