Stepin Lug

Stepin Lug or Gaj (Serbian Cyrillic: Степин Луг or Гај) is a park-wood and, for the most part, non-residential suburban settlement of Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. It is located in Belgrade's municipalities of Voždovac (southern part) and Zvezdara (northern part).

Location

Stepin Lug is located on the south-eastern outskirts of Belgrade. It is a large, wooded area, roughly bordered by the neighborhoods of Veliki Mokri Lug on the north, Kumodraž on the north-west, Zanzibar and Selo Rakovica on the west, Beli Potok on the south and Bubanj Potok on the east. The southern border is marked by the road of Kružni put and eastern by the Belgrade-Niš highway.

Characteristics

Stepin Lug or formerly known as Titov Gaj or just Gaj, is a memorial complex, a park-wood with an area of 8,5 km². The area has a 13 distinct tree communities, but the number of the separate species is three times larger as many species were planted later even though they are not autohtonous, including both conifers and deciduous trees. They include:

Evergreen trees:

• Cedar (Atlas cedar, white cedar, California Incense Cedar);
• Cypress (Lawson's cypress);
• Douglas fir;
• Fir (white fir, Greek fir, Nordmann fir, Spanish Fir);
• Juniper (Greek juniper);
• Larch (European Larch);
• Pine (European black pine, blue pine, Eastern white pine);

Deciduous trees:

• Ash tree (European ash)
• Birch;
• Black locust;
• Chestnut (common horse-chestnut, sweet chestnut);
• Common Hackberry;
• Honey locust;
• London plane;
• Maple (Norway maple, Sycamore maple);
• Mulberry trees;
• Oak trees (English oak, northern red oak);
• Pagoda tree;
• Poplar (white poplar, black poplar)
• Rowan;
• Silver linden tree;
• Southern catalpa;
• Turkish Hazel;
• Walnut (black walnut, Persian walnut);
• Willow (White Willow, golden willow);

The wildlife comprises hares, roes and pheasants. Other important historical features are the vicinity of the Torlak hill and its importance in the battles for Belgrade in the World War I and the memorial-house of vojvoda Stepa Stepanović, one of the main army-leaders of the Serbian army. For a while, wood has been named after the Yugoslav Communist president Josip Broz Tito (Titov Gaj).

Stepin Lug can be divided into several areas:

• Stepin Lug ("Stepa's Grove"), in the northern section of the wood. Bounded by the small street of the Zavojnička reka, it is located in the municipality of Zvezdara. It occupies the small hill of Stražarska kosa and two smaller sub-areas of Baba Velka and Dugo bilo.
• Gaj or formerly Titov Gaj (Tito's Grove), in the central section. It occupies the area of the hill of Golo brdo, between the creeks of Bubanj Potok and Kamena voda.
• Lipovica (Lime tree wood), in the northern section, the least forested area of Stepin Lug, along the Kružni put. It should not bee confused with the much more popular recreational area of Lipovica (Lipovička šuma) in the municipality of Barajevo.

References

• B.Jovanović, E.Vukićević: Titov Gaj, 1977;