About the Mohos Peat Bog – Lake Saint Anne Natura 2000 site (ROSCI0248)

Lake Saint Anne is the only volcanic lake preserved integer in southeastern Europe. Formed in one of the twin craters of Big Ciomad, which is part of Ciomad Mountains, the lake is at an altitude of 950 m above sea level. A circle-shaped lake covers an area of 22 hectares, with a circumference of 1737 meters and an average depth of 4 m. The lake has no spring and the addition of water of the lake is obtained from the snow of the mountains surrounding it, which melts in spring and from rainwater. The lake is separated from the peat bog only by a narrow ridge. Near the lake is St. Anne Chapel where a pilgrimage is organized annually for day of Saint Ana, which is attended by numerous faithful Catholics.

There is a double crater in the middle of Ciomad Mountains. At an altitude of 100 meters above the crater of Saint Ana Lake, bordered by the Lake’s Edge, at 1050 meters there is located a filled, peat crater in nearly 80 hectares. The receding erosion of the Red Water and the drainage works carried out at the beginning of the last century in 1908, accelerated the cessation of a forty-meter-high waterfall on the northern edge of the peat bog.