By Adele Brard
Chernobyl, Ukraine - All that's missing are all-terrain vehicles and souvenir stands. With lynx, wolves, eagles and wild horses, the radioactive no-go zone around Chernobyl has become a rich natural reserve in the 20 years since the accident at the nuclear power plant.
Dangerously soaked with radiation following the April 26, 1986 accident at the then Soviet plant, some 4 000 square kilometres of land surrounding the Chernobyl plant were evacuated and closed to humans.
In the two decades since, Mother Nature has had nearly free reign over this patch of land straddling the border between Ukraine and Belarus. The results have been impressive.
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Access is still forbidden to areas considered the most contaminated Take for example the famed Przhevalski horse, believed to be the only true modern descendant of the wild horse. In 1998, 17 of them were introduced to the area.
Today officials who accompany visitors to the zone say the steeds number between 80 and 90, and the area around Chernobyl is one of the few places in the world where they still roam free.
Nearly completely undisturbed by man - some 350 "self-settlers" still live inside the zone, but this mainly elderly group generally keeps to its eight villages - the flora and fauna here have developed with virtually no human interference.
In one day, a lucky first-time visitor may see elk, fox, otter, beaver, wild boar, gray crane and endangered great spotted eagle. Regular visitors say bears have also been spotted in the area.
With so few people, the zone is the perfect habitat for endangered species. The Chernobyl International Radioecology Laboratory has so far recorded the presence there of more than 400 animal species, including 280 kinds of birds and 50 endangered species.
And despite apocalyptic predictions at the time of the Chernobyl disaster, the animal species living inside the forbidden zone are not strange, disproportioned mutants.
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