Charakterystyka popytu na rekreację konną w polskich lasach

The aim of the research was to determine the frequency of horse recreation in the forests and the awareness of threats resulting from this kind of activity for the forest ecosystem. Horse recreational activities were analyzed in terms of gender, age, education, place of residence, and occupational status. The research used an original questionnaire and was conducted in 2016 among 1203 inhabitants of Poland, who were able to ride a horse. During the initial stage, a random selection was used using a layered sample. The population was divided taking into account their place of residence into rural, small towns up to 20 thousand, and cities over 20 thousand inhabitants. At the subsequent selection stage, the number of women and men was proportionally determined. These actions allowed to determine the sample size with the maximum error probability at 0.05. In the next stage, the non−random selection was used, consisting of responding to the respondent’s availability, up to a certain number of respondents in individual groups. Statistical comparisons were carried out using chi−square test. Forest areas are an important place for practicing recreation and horse tourism due to the large space, specific microclimate and a small number of acoustic stimuli, thus creating a friendly environment for the rider and horse. The frequency of horse riding in the forests depends on age and occupational status. The most frequent users of forest horse trails are students and pupils (9.94% of responses ‘very often’ and 12.50% ‘often’), young people up to 30 years old (8.20% of responses ‘very often’ and 12.48% ‘often’). It should be noted that these are people with high ecological awareness, who know the dangers to the forest resulting from the practice of horse riding (8.34%). On the other hand, the least ecological awareness is held by the unemployed (30.77%) and people practicing free profession (48.94%). In order to increase the ecological awareness among tourists and horse riders, it would be necessary to set along the trails signs with information about the risks that horses bring to the forest and how to behave on the designated paths and horse trails.