The Trebon Fishponds

The country around Trebon is flat, wet and almost entirely artificial. From the fifteenth century onwards estate engineers dug a system of fishponds, feeder canals and drainage channels across the basin, and the system still works: several hundred ponds linked by canals such as the Zlata stoka, stocked mainly with carp. Rozmberk, the largest of them, covers close to five square kilometres and has a dam broad enough to be a road, planted with old oaks. Svet lies right against the edge of Trebon with a path around it. The whole landscape is a biosphere reserve and a serious birdwatching area, and it is flat enough that a bicycle is the obvious way to cover it.

What you actually see

• Rozmberk pond - the largest fishpond in the country, with an oak-planted dam you can walk or cycle along.
• Svet - the pond on the town edge, circled by a level path in about an hour.
• The Zlata stoka - the medieval feeder canal that still moves water across the basin between ponds.
• The autumn harvests - ponds drained in turn from October, with nets, boots and crowds of onlookers.

When to go

May to September for cycling and birds, with spring migration the richest period. October and November bring the pond harvests, the local event worth timing a visit around, when individual ponds are drained and the carp netted. Summer afternoons are hot and shadeless on the dams. Mosquitoes are serious near the water at dusk.

Honest expectations

The landscape is flat and repetitive, and people who want scenery rather than atmosphere get bored quickly. Most ponds are working farms, so shores are reedy, muddy and often fenced, with limited access to the water. Swimming is only sensible at designated spots, and blue-green algae can close those in a hot August. Distances between ponds are longer than they look.

Nearby

Trebon itself has an arcaded square and a chateau; Ceske Budejovice is half an hour west.