Nature Reserves of Py and Mantet

In the heart of the Conflent, between the Canigó massif and the Spanish border, the national nature reserves of Py and Mantet were created on the same day, 17 September 1984. Together, they cover nearly 7,000 hectares of high mountain, from wooded valley floors at around 950 metres up to ridges of almost 2,700 metres, around the Pic de la Dona.

At Mantet, three parallel valleys run down towards the north: their shaded slopes are covered in forest, their sunlit slopes in broom heath and summer pastures where flocks graze. The mountain pine climbs to 2,400 metres on the ridges. At Py, the larger reserve rises through four vegetation zones, from the hills to the alpine grasslands, over a variety of rocks: granite, gneiss, mica schists and marbles.

The village of Mantet, at the end of a dead-end road, was long one of the most isolated in France: the road only arrived in the 1960s and electricity not until 1983. It was nicknamed the “last village in France”. Today it has only a few dozen inhabitants.

The two reserves are refuges for mountain wildlife: the izard, the golden eagle, the bearded vulture and the griffon vulture are easily seen, while the Pyrenean desman, the capercaillie and the ptarmigan remain elusive. They are managed by the Fédération des réserves naturelles catalanes together with the communes, and more than 5,000 species have been recorded in each.